48
The day after the above incident took place Tokio had had time to reconsider and ponder over his recent outburst to Yoshiko; however, the ensuing description of Tokio's mental state confirms that, after all, he is a man who upholds traditional values and is no different from other men.
Tokio was still angry but he was in a better mood than yesterday. He felt on the one hand a sense of indescribable loneliness when he considered that he would not be able to see her beautiful expression as they would be separated by a distance of about 500 miles. On the other hand he felt at least relaxed when he thought that he had transferred Yoshiko from the hands of his rival to those of her father.[1]
As we progress by analyzing the development of Tokio's mental state towards the end of the story, it becomes clear that Katai is adopting a similar technique to that of Hauptmann in revealing his protagonist: the prime mover of the story is hidden within Tokio's character as was the case with Johannes. Because this technique is used, the story of Futon develops organically, wavering back and forth between traditional values and Nature, returning at the end to its original starting point where Tokio is a respected mentor, as was expected from a person of his calibre.
The foregoing analysis establishes that both stories develop organically without the intrigues, chance meetings and unnatural plot devices which had been adopted by the authors' predecessors. Because of these techniques, which portray the characters in a natural way, readers are lead to believe that these characters are part-and-parcel of their own lives. But there are differences in the literary forms that each author adopts. Hauptmann chooses a play as his form of expression, while Katai selects the novel as his form.
- ↑ Katai, Futon, chap. x, p. 82.
