If there is a modern writer who can write about the purity and femininity of women to the extreme, it must be Yasunari Kawabata.
If there is a novel that can arouse human longing for beautiful women, it must be "Snow Country".
"Snow Country" is Yasunari Kawabata's highest masterpiece, and is one of the three novels mentioned by the jury when the author won the Nobel Prize in Literature.
The beauty of nothingness, the beauty of cleanliness and the beauty of sorrow depicted in the meantime reach the extreme, which makes people feel thrilled and sad.
This novel full of deep metaphors integrates the aesthetic image description into the expression of the characters' emotions, which not only shows the author's desire for eternal vitality, but also reflects the author's yearning for infinite transcendence.
The story takes place in Japan, where snow falls in a small mountain village seven or eight feet deep after December.
It is written at the beginning of the novel
"Through the long tunnel of the county border, there is the snow country. The night sky is white. ”
The snow country is covered with snow, and the view is pure white, as if there is nothing between heaven and earth.
This is the paradise of the protagonist Shimamura in the depths of his soul.
Here, there is not only the white snow of the day, but also the Kyaukgyao Milky Way at night.
The vast Milky Way hung before its eyes, as if to embrace the night earth with its naked body. Shimamura felt that his little figure had instead reflected the Milky Way from the ground. The stars of the Milky Way are shining brightly, clearly visible, and even the bright clouds look like grains of silver sand, very clear. The Milky Way poured through his heart, marking the fusion of Shimamura and the Milky Way, and his soul was finally cleansed and saved.
The isolated paradise is the place where the protagonist's soul is redeemed in many of the author's texts.
In ancient times, Tao Yuanming described the Taoyuan outside Wuling. In the representative work of modern writer Liu Cixin, "Three-Body Two - Dark Forest", the protagonist Luo Ji is also in the manor under the snowy mountain, under the vast starry sky, and finally succeeds in enlightenment and understands the truth of cosmic sociology.
What people can't forget is the light woman like ink and danqing, Zhuang Yan.
The novel "Snow Country" is no exception.
There are two heroines in the novel, one named Leaf and one named Komako, representing two kinds of women.
The leaves are beautiful and pure, as if everything is not in the air. And The colt is enthusiastic and unrestrained, a woman with a distinct personality, who dares to love and hate, and who is self-reliant.
They are very different, but they are all equally beautiful.
Cao Xueqin once borrowed Jia Baoyu's mouth in "Dream of the Red Chamber" to express her views on women.
Daughters are all flesh and bones made of water, and men are all turbid.
Obviously, Yasunari Kawabata thinks the same thing.
The Japanese scholar Hasegawa Izumi pointed out in the "Treatise of Yasunari Kawabata":
Each of us, no matter who we are, is rich in bad karma and original sin. The remedy is all around us, by art, by women. Works of art, with their beauty and women with their love, can wipe away the guilt that lies deep in human existence.
Shimamura, the protagonist of Snow Country, travels to Snow Country to visit the geisha komako who has fascinated him.
When it comes to geisha, people often have a prejudice with colored glasses in their minds, after all, geisha is simply a Japanese sake girl.
However, Komako's first impression of Shimamura was pure.
The woman's impression is surprisingly clean, even giving the impression that her toes are probably clean in the crooks, and Shimamura can't help but wonder if his eyes are due to the mountains he has just seen in early summer.
The word cleansing is used by the author without hesitation in the colt.
In daily life, koma always cleans the room diligently, and even the legs of the table and the edge of the brazier are wiped. She carefully pasted raw paper on the walls of the house, so the walls and bunks, though old, were very clean.
When talking to Shimamura, don't forget to pick up the hair that has fallen off at any time; As soon as he saw the soot fall, he quietly wiped it off with a handkerchief and brought an ashtray for Shimamura.
Although she is a woman who sells laughter for a living, as long as her heart is clean, the whole person is pure.
As she herself said to Shimamura, "As long as the environment permits, I still want to live a cleaner life."
Komako's love for Shimamura is just like her pure heart, which is a pure and unrequited love.
Every year on February 14th, Komako will push off all socializing and return to snow country to wait for the arrival of Shimamura.
Knowing that she and Shimamura would not have any future, she still loved him desperately, and she clearly remembered that the reunion with Shimamura was on the 199th day after their separation.
Even if he wanted to go out to make a living, he still came to the shimamura room at three o'clock and noon every night to help him clean up the court and clean up the room.
This kind of love is not a physical exchange, but a selfless dedication of love, a woman's self-sacrifice without any distractions.
Shimamura is from bustling Tokyo, and in Komako he sees a completely different way of doing things than the extremely egoistic urbanites.
Not only for Shimamura, but also for the sick young master of the Sanxian master's family, Komako is also very caring, serving at the bedside for many years, and even willing to go to the geisha to earn medical expenses.
Only because when she was initially sold to Tokyo, only the young master was alone to send her off.
It is a selflessness of willingness to dedicate oneself to others, and it is also the inner purity of the colt as a geisha.
This dedication makes Shimamura, who is an urban man, ashamed of himself.
Shimamura represents the loneliness, indifference and nothingness of the urban man, to whom nothing matters.
He came to snow country to escape from society, but in snow country he still has nothing to do, and even the skiing that Tokyoites enjoy tirelessly has not aroused his enthusiasm for life.
But since knowing Komako, this woman's friendship with the old lord, her love of life, and her strength in suffering have constantly impacted his soul.
Komako seems to be a mirror that reflects the weaknesses in his life, and Komako's enthusiasm is exactly what he lacks, or what he subconsciously longs for.
Shimamura was caught in the void when Komako walked in, as if bringing heat and light. The red tides flying from the eyelids and cheekbones of the colts pass through the thick white powder, which seems to bring a warm current in the cold of the snowy night. Shimamura could see the god in this intoxicating bright red.
This bright red color is a little red in the snow of the snow country, and it is a symbol of the warm nature of the colt.
Although Komako is a poor woman living in a remote mountain village, she always faces life positively, for example: even the clothes to be washed must be folded neatly, and she laughs at herself and says, "Probably by nature." ”
Even if you are a geisha, you must do your best, the text reads:
Komako put the three-stringed piano on his lap and opened the practice score in a serious manner, which was almost like two people. When Shimamura heard Komako playing, his cheeks got goosebumps, and a chill went straight to his lungs. His empty mind was filled with the sound of a three-stringed piano. He was not so much completely surprised as he was completely conquered. He was touched by a pious heart and washed away by thoughts of remorse. He felt that he had no strength, so he had to happily plunge into the torrent of the artistic charm of the colt, letting it float and rush.
What is particularly valuable is that although he has fallen into the wind and dust, the colt still insists on what he loves.
There is a rumor circulating among the residents of the Snow Country that Komako did not abandon the other party because she was engaged to the young master of the master's family.
Shimamura knew that this was not the truth, and when the young master was dying, Komako insisted on sending Shimamura on the train, unwilling to go back to see the young master.
This is not only because Komako does not want to see the young master's death, but also because she loves Shimamura in her heart.
Yes, it's the Shimamura who doesn't care about anything.
We modern people, enjoying a much superior quality of life than in the past, are difficult to be as hopeful as a colt in the face of difficulties.
Sometimes, a little frustration can knock down an adult, for love, we pay too much attention to the addition of feelings, and the concept of door-to-door pairs seems to have not changed for thousands of years.
Komako was different, and she knew clearly that the men from the city of Shimamura did not belong to the remote snow country, or even to themselves.
It was a love that was doomed to be fruitless, and perhaps she didn't know whether Shimamura loved her or not.
But she still sincerely loves, loves, and looks forward to Shimamura.
The snow country ends in tragedy, when the fire in the movie screening room takes the life of the young leaf.
Mr. Lu Xun once said: "Tragedy is to tear beautiful things apart for others to see." Tragic art can often evoke the deepest emotions in the human heart.
Shimamura first met Leaf on a train to snow country, and Leaf was also a young girl from the Sanxian Master's family, and she returned to her hometown with the critically ill young master.
On the train, she leaned her upper body slightly, looking down intently at the man lying in front of her.
Her careful movements, her serious gaze without blinking, all showed her sincere feelings.
With gentle movements, she constantly wrapped the scarf around the man, innocently repeating the same movement.
This innocence shattered Shimamura's cold shell at once.
In the village of Snow Country, Ye Zi used to run to the door of the shima village to take care of him, and he must take good care of the komako.
Finally, Leaf falls from the second floor of the burning screening room and dies in front of Shimamura and Leaf.
In the novel, the flame is used many times as a metaphor for the existence of komako, and the flame also symbolizes the relationship between komako and Shimamura.
They warm up to each other, but they also have the potential to destroy each other.
Yasunari Kawabata uses flames as a metaphor for the beauty of life, and also uses flames to symbolize the punishment and purification of extramarital affairs.
The leaves symbolize the original beauty of mankind, an ethereal spirit that transcends meaning, and the purity that the colt yearns for.
Dragging the hem of the geisha's long clothes, the colt staggered over the pile of rubble washed by the water, holding the leaves back as if holding his own sacrifices and sins.
And the light that illuminated the face of Shimamura also seemed to shine into the soul of Shimamura.
It was as if in this instant, the light of the fire also illuminated the years he spent with the colt. It is also full of unspeakable pain and sorrow.
In this instant, both Shimamura and Komako's souls are redeemed.
05 Conclusion
The novel ends here, leaving us with endless thoughts.
Snow Country is the redemption place of Shimamura's life, the purification of the soul, and the emotional sustenance of Kawabata Yasunari's heart, he has said more than once that "Snow Country" describes his inner emotions.
Two beautiful and pure women who saved Shimamura and made the author himself.
Human life needs to be enriched and energized, and human life needs to be purified and transcended.
It is mentioned in the Selected Works of Japanese Literature : Yasunari Kawabata that the author himself declares:
Throughout the book is a vision of human life!
I am not surprised by this, because I have always believed that the eternal woman symbolizes the original beauty of mankind.
I am a grid object, a little person who wants to convey warmth with words.