Page:Tayama Katai and His Novel Entitled Futon (Reece).pdf/33

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and to adopt European authors' techniques in order to westernize Japanese literature and reflect the true feelings of the author. Katai executed this literary theory in Futon, or The Quilt, as mentioned in his essay "My Anna Mahr;" he conceived the idea after reading Gerhart Hauptmann's Einsame Menschen, or Lonely Lives.^[1]

Despite the evidence of Katai's essay suggesting that Futon was patterned after Hauptmann's Einsame Menschen, scholars and critics had given relatively little attention to the comparative aspects of this work. Up to now the attention received by Futon has dealt mainly with its biographical allusions and historical meanings relating to other authors. With the appearance of Fūzoku Shōsetsu, or the Criticism on Modern Realism, by the critic Nakamura Mitsuo, it became evident what Katai had adopted from Einsame Menschen in Futon. Dr. Nakamura states:

First of all what becomes clear after reading Futon and from Katai's above cited statement^[2] is that he was inspired by and imitated Johannes who was portrayed in the drama, but it was not Hauptmann who wrote this drama.^[3]

But Dr. Nakamura's criticism of Futon fails to show the relationship between Futon and Einsame Menschen, despite the fact that

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1. Gerhart Hauptmann's third drama, Einsame Menschen, spread his fame beyond the boundaries of his own country. In Japan the name of Einsame Menschen was mentioned in a December issue of a literary magazine Mesamashisō by Mori Ōgai in 1899. (See, Ōgai Zenshū: Chosaku Hen. Vol. XX. pp. 323–26.)
2. Nakamura is referring to Katai's statement that Futon was directly patterned after Sabishiki Hitobito [Einsame Menschen] by modeling Katai's principal character after Hauptmann's Johannes and his heroine after Anna Mahr.
3. Nakamura Mitsuo, Fūzoku Shōseteu Ron (Tokyo: Shinchōsha, 1967).