Respecting a Break Between Clouds: Blocking and Opening in Jun'ichirō Tanizaki's A Portrait of Shunkin

Abstract

Jun'ichirō Tanizaki's A Portrait of Shunkin (1933) has been seen as a critique of modern clarity because of the occluded images found in Tanizaki's writings. This novel is better described as a conflict between images of closure and openness, and it does have much in common with In Praise of Shadows (1933-1934). On the other hand, after Shunkin's “Distress”, which coincides with the beginning of modernization, the work depicts only negative images close to the period of industrialization and smoke pollution in Osaka. Again, Mozuya Shunkin Den is built on the conflict between concealment and communication, and the text figuratively invokes the return of closure and openness, while the first-person narrative demands constant recognition of the gap between the two forms. Such a mode of recognition was also antithetic to the ideals of the Japan Romantic School.