"Through the long tunnel of the county border, there is the snow country. The night sky is white. At the beginning of "Snow Country", Yasunari Kawabata created a beautiful snow country through the beauty of snow, which is a romantic and beautiful dream for Shimamura, and it is also the place where his spirit is pinned.
Shimamura is the protagonist of "Snow Country", rich but idle, extremely empty mentally, and his emotional entanglement with the geisha komako and the maiden Leaf is the main content of "Snow Country", the story takes place in snow country, and also ends in snow country.
"Snow Country" is Yasunari Kawabata's first novella, and it is also a representative work of his aestheticism, embodying his idea of material sorrow. In Shimamura's mind, death is not the end but the freedom of the soul, and in the mind of the author Yasunari Kawabata, the ultimate in art is death, and Yasunari Kawabata has such a thought, which is inseparable from his personal experience.
Since the age of two, Yasunari Kawabata has been attending the funerals of his loved ones. First the death of his father and mother, followed by the death of his grandmother and sister, and finally his grandfather left him, leaving only the 15-year-old him. The death of his loved ones made him feel the impermanence of the world and the sense of loneliness, which made him think that everything was nothing and meaningless, that death was something that no one could escape, and that living was a futile effort.
Shimamura in Snow Country, like the author himself, thinks that life is a futile effort. Shimamura is rich and loves to study Western dance, but never goes to see other people perform, he does not pursue no goals, and is spiritually empty, so he goes to the snow country to find the meaning of life.
The person who is diametrically opposed to Shimamura is Komako, who is full of enthusiasm and hope for life, will not be defeated by difficulties, and can always find a way out of difficulties.
In the face of difficulties, some people think that efforts are useless and go against them, some people think that efforts are useful and fight back, whether efforts are useful, and what kind of life can be lived, depends on our attitude.
Perhaps, there are many things in life that are in vain, but we still have to do it without hesitation, not for others, but for ourselves.
Man's spiritual world is empty, there is no pursuit and no goal, and he is free from everything in the world, and he will naturally think that everything in the world is meaningless.
Shimamura in Snow Country is the empty man of the spiritual world. Shimamura has no formal job, lives off the property left by his ancestors, has no purpose in life, but is obsessed with all things that are illusory and unreal.
Shimamura's love of Western dance is also his pursuit of illusory things. He was attracted by Japanese dancers to study Western dance, but he never watched Japanese people dance Western dance, and the dance he liked was the dance he fantasized, and it can be said that he was obsessed with the dance of his fantasy.
Shimamura, who is constantly searching for things in his fantasies, is lonely, and this loneliness is that he is the only one left in the world, no one communicates with him, and what makes him happy is to connect with the people in the fantasy.
When Shimamura and Komako first met, he commented on Komako that the woman was too clean. He doesn't know everything about Komako, but komako is like a Western dance to Shimamura at this time, which is the beauty of his fantasy.
Shimamura is obsessed with the beauty of Komako and enjoys this feeling of not knowing and leaving room for fantasy, but Shimamura's fascination is short-lived.
Later, Shimamura fell in love with the leaves that he met on the train. In Shimamura's mind, Leaf is a woman who has strayed from the illusory world into reality, he is full of curiosity about Leaf, but he will not have too much intersection with the other party, when Leaf dies, he only has a trace of sympathy, not too much touch, but instead koma cries for Leaf's death.
Shimamura has always been outside the real world, he pursues the beauty of fantasy, and his infatuation is not the colt and leaf itself, but the fantasy of them.
The reason why people are addicted to the illusory world is because the real world is not beautiful enough, there are too many difficulties and frustrations, and the free and beautiful in the unreal world is harmless and easy to be satisfied.
Just like many people are addicted to games and novels, because in the game they are omnipotent kings, in the novel they are the favored protagonists, but in reality they are just a humble passerby.
Shimamura seems to be a person with a thin heart and a cruel heart, but in fact he is a lonely person who cannot integrate into reality, and everything in life is meaningless and worthless to him.
He travels to Snow Country to find meaning in life, but Komako and Leaf's experiences make Shimamura decide that everything is in vain. Komako became a geisha to earn money to cure the disease of the walking man, but failed to save the man, and the beautiful leaves like a dream could not resist the impermanence of life and were buried in the sea of fire.
This led him to believe that people should live and die according to nature, not to make useless resistance, and that efforts could not change the outcome.
But the wonderful thing about life is that everyone has their own sufferings and setbacks, there are gains and losses, and it is rare to be complete.
The impermanence of life is the constant of life, and what we have to do is to work hard to fight against difficulties, to find the goal of life, the meaning of life, even if the result is not satisfactory.
Life is difficult and may face many tests, but our attitude in the face of setbacks is to try to change the status quo.
Komako's life is a tragedy, and Komako's efforts are meaningless in Shimamura's eyes. Komako reads novels and takes notes without meaning, hard practice of the three strings does not make sense, in order to treat the man as a geisha is meaningless, falling in love with Shimamura has no meaning, knowing that doing all this is useless, and doing it is a futile effort.
But the result is not satisfactory, and it has not changed the direction of things, is it meaningless?
Komako doesn't think so, no one will give up efforts for unknown results, we will only have the idea that efforts are useless because of bad results, but the next time we encounter problems, we will still try to change.
Komako's efforts did not get good results, but for Komako, trying her best to live with dignity is the meaning of her efforts to live. In love, Komako loves and hates clearly, and in order to repay the favor, she chooses to be a geisha to save the man, but if she does not love the man, she does not love. When she loved Shimamura, she loved Shimamura fiercely and truthfully, in order to be able to see Shimamura once a year, they agreed to see each other, she would silently count in her mind how many days they could see each other, and when she realized that her attachment could not get Shimamura's love, she decisively let go and said to Shimamura, "I will go through the days after you leave." ”
Some people think that the author is futile to express life through the role of Komako, conveying a sad emotion, but from another point of view, Komako is a representative of enthusiasm and beauty, although she has experienced hardships, life is always unsatisfactory, unable to have the love she wants, but she has a courage not to give up in a desperate situation.
There is such a detail in "Snow Country", Komako signed a sale time with the main family for four years, Komako told Shimamura that she had paid back half of the cost in less than a year, if she wanted, she could shorten the four-year period to two years, but she did not want to force herself to do it, or her health was important.
Komako's life is real and meaningful, but Shimamura's life is meaningless, he is always outside the real world, living in his fantasy world, incompatible with real life.
Komako has always faced life with a positive attitude, no matter what kind of test life gives her, she can always find a new way out, even if the result is not satisfactory, it is a futile effort in the eyes of others, she does not regret it, the process of hard work is the meaning of her life.
The ideal world is beautiful, and the imaginary people and things are perfect, but the reality is to break the good to show people.
We all know that in Snow Country, Shimamura has been stressing that everything is in vain, he has said to Komako, he has said it before seeing the moth die, and he has said it to himself after climbing to the top of the mountain in search of meaning in life. Shimamura believes that it is meaningless to make efforts without getting the desired result, and meaningful things become meaningless in the course of time.
If we feel futile just for the sake of unsatisfactory results, this idea is not enough to affect our lives, but if we look at the present in the long life, then it is easy to think that life is a meaningless journey, and the people we encounter now experience lose their meaning after a long time.
If you face life with this attitude, it is easy to have a negative attitude towards life, as if you live to wait for death to come, and when death comes, the people you meet while you are alive are meaningless.
Thinking like this, it is easy to feel sad. It is in this thought that Shimamura falls into a state of confusion and struggle, and he goes to the snow country to find the truth, but instead becomes obsessed with everything that is nothing.
It wasn't until Leaf died and the perfect woman in his fantasy disappeared that he was finally liberated and woke up from the illusion.
Yasunari Kawabata wrote at the end of "Snow Country": When Shimamura stood firm, he looked up, and the Milky Way seemed to make a noise and poured down on his heart.
The collapse of the Milky Way also means that Shimamura has found the meaning of life, no longer immersed in illusion, and let him be redeemed.
Snow country is a beautiful country in Shimamura's heart, the place where his spirit is sustenance, and "Snow Country" allows us to see a snow country covered with snow, this place is romantic but full of sadness, and it is easy to make people think that everything is doing useless work. But from another point of view, we only know if there is meaning if we do it, and the meaning of life is our own definition.
The impermanence of life is the norm, the reality is cruel and not beautiful but real, and the illusion is beautiful but will eventually be shattered by reality. What we have to do is to enjoy the hard journey of life, live life to the fullest, and cherish the present.