Ryūhiko Shibusawa studied German and French, and since the 1950s he has been actively translating and introducing French heretical literature and philosophy; his introductions to the works and ideas of Sade, Breton, Batayeh, and Aalto have had an important influence in Japan. In addition to his interest in pornography and chivalrous literature, he devoted a great deal of energy to occult, naturalistic, artistic, religious, and customary studies, supplemented by avant-garde philosophical theories such as psychoanalysis, semiotics, and structuralism, and created many interesting texts that were not easily categorized.
These texts were very avant-garde in the context of the time, not only because of the "other-cultural" content and cutting-edge theories they contained, but also because of the challenging way of writing and stylistic forms. To this day, it is difficult for us to accurately describe the type of writing, which has both interdisciplinary vision and methods, systematic examination, and strong subjective narrative and lyrical color, and the writing method is unpredictable: novels are like cultural essays, essays are like historical papers, and historical monographs are like fictional literature. In short, he is a magician of style and narrative. His unique talent attracted a lot of attention, and his work was highly valued by important Japanese post-war writers and artists such as Yukio Mishima, Shuji Terayama, Mori Oshii, and Katsuhiko Takahashi. Recently, Gowasa Publishing Company published his Demon Phantom Chronicles, and Shibusawa had one more translation. This is his relatively early work, which is more "regular" and "simple" than that of later periods, and is an important text of "demonology" that has attracted attention in Japanese cultural circles.
"Demon Phantom Chronicles", by Shibusawa Ryuhiko, translated by Prince Hao, Houlang 丨 China Friendship Publishing Company October 2021 edition
The author | Wang Pengjie
(Ph.D. in Art, Tsinghua University, Teacher, School of Plastic Arts, Sichuan Academy of Fine Arts, engaged in artistic creation, criticism, theoretical research and curation)
The beginning of Shibusawa's style
The Demon Phantom Chronicle is a collection of eight essays written by Ryūhiko Shibusawa in 1961, which was completed in 1978 with an additional forty pages added to the original text and expanded to nine articles. The main threads of the book are very clear, revolving around the origin, development, and variation of the "demon" image, which is basically narrated in linear chronological order; from the time of primitive humans to the end of the Renaissance, basically covering the Western classical period as we usually understand it. In the course of the discussion, Shibusawa is not confined to the Western historical framework, and other non-Western regions are also used for detailed comparisons with Western cultural phenomena, with ancient civilizations such as Egypt, the Middle East, India, China, and Japan being particularly valued. Of course, in Shibusawa's vision, the "devil" thing is most fully embodied in Western civilization, so most of the book focuses on the discussion of western pre-modern history and culture. The reason why "demons" arouse his great enthusiasm is mainly due to the fact that the changes of "demons" can always break people's stereotypes of history and reality. Every drastic change in history and culture will greatly change the image and meaning of "demons" in an unexpected way. In Shibusawa's view, the driving force behind the growth and mutation of "demons" comes from the struggle between orthodoxy and heresy inside and outside Christianity. Western cultures such as ancient Greece and ancient Rome in the pre-Christian era, as well as Western foreign cultures such as ancient India, ancient Arabia and ancient Asia, also participated in the construction process of "demons", which greatly expanded the change potential of "demons".
Shibusawa was in his early thirties when he wrote this book, and not only loved the "demonic" culture, but also showed a strong interest in heretical aesthetics. In addition, his penchant for mysticism, surrealism, the human subconscious, and monsters is also exposed. It can be said that the basic characteristics of Shibusawa literature have taken shape at this time. Some of the topics covered in this book, such as Mephistopheles, Bosch, the Underworld, Death, and the Dream World, have been further expanded and deepened in his subsequent works. At this time, although the style of writing is not as enchanting and psychedelic as his later works, it is also quite fantastic because of a large number of demonic images. This is not a historical work in the true sense of the word, and the essay-style brilliance and sharp pitch are all there, which will make the reader forget that this is a treatise in the process of reading. Just when we think that when we read interesting essays, a large number of historical materials and rigorous interpretations make us feel the academic aspect of this book. This reading experience has been further developed in his subsequent works, which can be regarded as the first work of Long Yan's literary style, reaching a mature state in terms of language, narrative, texture and concept.
Get a clue for the devil's world
In the East Asian art history research tradition, the devil theme has long been forgotten. This may be related to the fact that the concept of the devil originated mainly in Europe and the Arab region, or it may have to do with the disdain and repression of heretics in the mainstream cultural traditions of East Asia. In addition, it should be recognized that art historiography is an imported product from the West and is a very young discipline for Asia. Whether in China or Japan, modern scholarship and art are the product of modernity. In both China and Japan, the discipline of art history in the modern sense was born after the 20th century. At the beginning of its establishment, nature focused on consolidating the foundation of the discipline, eagerly absorbing the basic concepts and research methods of art history from Western origins. The basic concepts of style, form, imagery, and positivism were understood and mastered by local scholars, and they were used for more than half a century. Compared with China, the discipline of art history in Japan was established earlier and grew more rapidly. Around the 1930s, the basic norms and methodologies of the discipline had matured. Japanese art historians noted earlier than China the comparative study of the images of local "monsters" and Western "demons". In the first half of the 20th century, Japanese scholars have achieved some results in their research on Western "demons", but they are very fragmented and have not yet formed a clear framework understanding. Outside of art history, the image and genealogy of Western "demons" is still quite unfamiliar to ordinary Japanese people, and this knowledge was rarely sought after the war in post-war Japan in the 1950s and 1960s. In this context, it is easier to understand the cultural impact and historical significance of Shibusawa's "demon" art history.
The world of demons comes from subjective delusions, and Shibusawa is a mystic who scoffs at rigid mechanical reflection theory (spirit is entirely a reflection of the physical world of reality), and his description of the history of demons firmly grasps the inner context of spiritual history. Every change in the form and meaning of the devil is inseparable from the ideological movement and psychological mechanism of the time. Human curiosity, fear, trembling, longing, and hope create ever-changing "demons" in the human world in strange ways. Shibusawa's ability to sort out the genealogy of the devil so clearly is due to his precise grasp of the key events in the overlap of religious history and social intellectual history in the West (but not limited to the West), such as the emergence of dualistic ideological structures, the conflict and fusion of Nordic peoples and Roman cultures, the rise of the concept of hell and purgatory, the confrontation between the Trinity and the anti-Trinity structure, the emergence and popularity of the Book of Revelation, the repeated tug-of-war between churches and heretics, the divergence between the Holy See and the Eastern Church, the black death ravaging the European continent, and the maturation of the image of the dragon , the ascetic trend led by The Franciscan Catholic Dervish monks, etc. In addition to actively exploring the relationship between thought and events, Shibusawa makes full use of art history research methods such as iconography and style comparison, and convincingly explains the personality of the devil in different eras in a way that uses the method of mutual verification of graphic history. Shibusawa fully understands that all strange things are representations of the conscious and subconscious, born out of the various intrinsic production activities of the human spiritual process.
Iconography, art history, conceptual history and postmodernism
Shibusawa was probably the first Japanese writer to master both semiotics, psychoanalysis, and iconography, and his adventurous and experimental stylistic explorations inspired a sense of post-structuralism. For Shibusawa, these are not learned theoretical techniques, but more closely resemble some kind of talent. His talent does not stop there, he is extremely sensitive to the stylistic interests and formal themes of visual works of art, such as paintings and sculptures. The works of art he chooses to discuss not only satisfies the author's curiosity with its strange shape, but also can be called a model of similar works of the times in terms of artistic integrity and uniqueness of expression. It is worth noting that many works of art were not noticed at the time, and Shibusawa had never seen any original works (or even had not yet traveled abroad) when performing image analysis, but he could gain insight into many subtle treatments in the works, which showed the strong sense of artistic sensitivity.
It is also worth emphasizing that Shibusawa's erudition is shocking, which may be related to his obsession with naturalism, and the scholars he admires are often polymaths of all ages. Naturalism now seems not to be a strict modern discipline, almost including astronomy, geography, biology, customs, history, religion, craftsmanship, science and technology and other aspects of knowledge, Shibusawa took the way of naturalism to be exposed to an exceptionally rich literature and image materials, coupled with a wide range of interests and amazing understanding in literature and philosophy, becoming a thinker who runs through the East and the West, ancient and modern learning. In iconographic analysis, he can clearly point out the complex allegories of "demon" images in different eras, and can also find the hidden connection between these dazzling symbols and historical trends. He is not a truly professional scholar, but his degree of erudition is probably only acceptable to most humanities scholars. This kind of knowledge allows him to skillfully combine image analysis with conceptual history combing in a natural way.
Different from professional art history writing, Shibusawa's "demon" art history breaks through the shackles of style history, and does not stick to the simple and blunt sociology of art, but enters from the mystical tradition, through the construction of multiple clues in the history of classical religion and social concepts, and enters the mechanism analysis of the devil's production mode. Considering both Christian theology and the contribution of heretical theology and the occult to "demonology," the author investigates multiple cultural systems not only in a superficial way, but in their ideological systems. For example, within the genealogy of pan-Christian theology, the Judaist classics Talmud and Kabbalism (Hebrew mystical philosophy), the Old Testament ideas of the Bible, the ideas of revelation, and Protestant ideas are frequently mentioned, and the author makes a vivid and linked interpretation of these ideas. In order to explain the symbolic meaning of the image of the devil in different eras and regions, he used all kinds of knowledge, but he did not stop at the pedantic book bag, and could retain aesthetic intuition. The mystic must have great respect for feelings, and in order for his feelings to be spoken in a convincing way, his evidence and exposition are usually clear and rigorous. Of course, after all, the literature on "demons" has long been outside the mainstream historical horizon, and related research has always been tied to witchcraft and alchemy, so it is always simply understood as a superstitious science. After reading this book, the reader will find that "demonology" is obviously not a superstitious science, but actually a surprising insight about human fantasies and dark consciousness.
Shibusawa Ryuhiko's manuscript
Shibusawa adopted an open-ended phenomenological conception, quoting Enrico Castelli as a "non-existence manifesting itself as purely aggressive." Shibusawa concludes through many cases that the devil is a flowing, migratory thing, constantly moving through different realms, and its way of existence is change and movement. For example, the inevitable struggle and conflict between the devil and the angels can also become blurred at certain moments, and the demons and angels are sometimes indistinguishable, and even role reversals occur. The form of the devil is deeply shaped by a dualistic structure, which always corresponds to some kind of object corresponding to or opposite it, but its face has never existed steadily. It is often considered a messenger of terror and death, but driven by the extreme fear of the people of the European Middle Ages, it can also evolve into an object of expectation and greeting. Although it arises from the depths of man's heart, it is neither a thing within human beings nor an objectively existing thing, and by "extracting objectivity to achieve a state of excess", excess has become the kinetic energy of the devil constantly traveling back and forth inside and outside human beings.
This kind of gaze and understanding is related to a postmodernist sense of the world held by Shibusawa. In post-war Japan, the first theorist to win the attention of postmodernism was Akira Asada, and some even believe that he was the main founder of Japanese postmodern philosophy. In fact, before him, some thinkers and scholars had already grasped the theoretical essence of postmodernism. Shibusawa, 29 years older than Akira Asada, grasped semiotics with mysticism and entered the realm of post-structuralist thought, forming a profound critique and questioning of rationalism and metaphysics. In this book, Shibusawa reveals his distrust of the rational world through suggestion and argument, loosens the inertia of modern thought that everything is rational, and expresses his praise for the irrational spirit. He exalts the values of uncertainty, movement, and disruption as a fundamental way of feeling the world. In The Phantom of the Devil, this postmodern view of history and epistemology has taken shape. Three years later, he wrote The Cosmology of Dreams, which marked the maturity of the Shibusawa-style postmodern worldview, and the spiritual texture was more unique and different.
"The Cosmic Chronicle of Dreams", by Ryūhiko Shibusawa, translated by Lake, Shinmin Shu 丨 Guangxi Normal University Press, November 2019 edition
Epilogue: Alternative Ambitions
Shibusawa is an important pioneer of Japan's modern heretical culture and a pioneer in promoting heretical aesthetics, criticizing and questioning the unity of modern culture in a way that reverses social modernity. In addition to his remarkable literary sense and shocking unconventional intellectual volume, his writings are perhaps more fundamental reasons for his heretical worldview and values, especially in East Asian cultural circles where collectivist cultures are stronger. For the purposes of this book, the theme of "demons" is discussed so vividly and brilliantly that it presents an alternative whole new world for the "one-dimensional man" who is poisoned by instrumental rationality. In the East Asian world, the mainstream culture's discussion of things like ghosts and monsters is quite resistant and resistant, and after the war, Japan is in the midst of a social wave of national reconstruction and drastic transformation, and few people care about the art of the devil. Shibusawa was indifferent to the construction and resistance movement in society in this era, immersed in the mysterious world of demons and dreams. He was an out-and-out individualist, instinctively resentful of anything mainstream (including the radical actions of young people inspired by the revolutionary atmosphere in the era of the security movement), and often acted in conflict with the mainstream norms and cognitions of society. In the same year that shibusawa wrote the book, Shibusawa and Kyoji Ishii, president of the Modern Thought Society, were sued by the court for the publication of "悪徳の栄え" (the glory of evil virtue) on the grounds that Shibusawa's translation of the book was contrary to the mainstream ethical concepts of Japanese society. The lawsuit lasted for 9 years and became a famous event that caused a sensation in Japanese society. Shibusawa was detached about the lengthy lawsuit, saying it didn't matter if he won or lost, as long as it was noisy and funny. In 1969, he was convicted and fined 70,000 yen, and he said in a joking tone that being fined only 70,000 yuan was simply a court trick, which showed his contempt for the common attitude of life.
In his research and writing, he is very the themes of pornography, horror, mystery, and deformity, and this aesthetic taste and the value orientation behind it regard all the reasonable stereotypes in the world as illusory. In this book, he actively advocates for the heretical devil, constructing a transcendent alternative worldview beyond the values with which we are familiar. Although this book can be regarded as an art history monograph, Shibusawa ignored the clichés of academia and did not write it as an academic monograph, attaching great importance to his own intuition and imagination, and even creatively (and controversially) organizing argumentative material to show that these imaginations were credible enough. His writing is distinctly scholarly and ideological, but it is not written for the academic community, nor for the literary world, but purely for his own purposes that are very different from the times. By telling the story of the "devil", we explore new paths for readers to understand the more complex and deep real world. From his subsequent works, the reader can find that his greatest motivation for writing is to satisfy his own interests, and "interesting" for him is almost equivalent to the meaning of life. The reason why he has a special love for heteroculturalism may be because heteroculturalism means a wonderful beginning to infinity, it is always on the edge of some kind, always wandering outside the world of rational cognition and scientific argumentation, it will not be eliminated by knowledge because of the unreality of "knowing", and its renewal potential will not be exhausted. The path of exploration of other cultures is endless, so that the meaning of the lives of those close to them also becomes unpredictable and full of unknowns.
Author| Wang Pengjie (Ph.D. in Art, Tsinghua University, Teacher, School of Plastic Arts, Sichuan Academy of Fine Arts, engaged in artistic creation, criticism, theoretical research and curation)
Editors | walk away
Proofreader | Liu Baoqing