The Asia-Pacific Journal | Japan Focus Volume 16 | Issue 1 | Number 3 | Article ID 5101 | Jan 01, 2018

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The Torrent

Ō Chōyū (Wang Changxiong)

Translated and with an introduction by Erin L. Brightwell

The Asian Studies Department of CornellUniversity is proud to announce therecipients of the 2017 Kyoko SeldenMemorial Translation Prize competition,concluded on November 1. The prize for anunpublished translator has been awardedto Erin L. Brightwell, Assistant Professorof Premodern Japanese Literature at theUniversity of Michigan, for her translationof “The Torrent” (奔流, Hon’ryu, 1943) bythe Taiwanese writer Wang Changxiong (王昶雄, also known by his Japanese name, ŌShōyū/Ō Chōyū), who lived from 1916 to2000. Brightwell’s translation is a welcomecontribution to recent scholarship onJapanese-language literature produced inthe era of Japan’s multi-ethnic empire. Thetranslation vividly renders into English thenumerous subtly charged dialogues in thisstory, with their attendant psychicrepercussions.

On “The Torrent”: Introduction

Erin L. Brightwell

Despite growing and complex work on theliterature of Japan’s imperial period, relativelyfew Japanese-language stories by colonialsubjects have been translated into English:most typical are fairly unambiguous narrativesthat recount the toll Japan’s imperial dreamstook on its occupied territories.1 Such worksoffer normative readings wherein Japan’simperialist expansion is condemned, and

resistance to it is praised.2 If this is the desiredimage of colonial writings, it is easy to supposethat one reason for the scarcity of translationsis that many stories produced under varyingdegrees of censorship simply may not fit themodel.

At the same time, even those that have beentranslated hint at exclusionary typologies. Thecase of Wu Zhuoliu’s 1945 novel Orphan of Asiaepitomizes this: it appears under the ModernChinese Literature from Taiwan series of titles,but the foreword explains it is a later additiondue to “the amount of time needed to translateit from Japanese into English.”3 Given thenovel’s slight 247 pages, it is tempting to inferan additional factor, perhaps the problem ofwhere Japanese-language writing belongswithin the category of Chinese literature. Thepolitics of writing in the language of theempire, after all, is a topic that can beendlessly probed without ever yielding a clearanswer.4 Not only that, through the act oftranslating, these problems are exacerbated.For instance, should the author of Honryū 奔流(The Torrent, 1943), 王昶雄, be referred to as ŌChōyū (alternatively romanized as Ō Shōyū)?Wang Changxiong? Committing to either choicehas a political valence and obscures the issueat the heart of “The Torrent”: the “double lives”of Taiwanese as imperial subjects. Thus, I callhim “Ō” when discussing his Japanese writings,and “Wang,” his Chinese.

Ō Chōyū (Wang Changxiong, 1916-2000), aTaiwanese writer under Japanese colonial ruleeducated largely in Japan, was the author of

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several Japanese-language works that appearedin the 1930s and 1940s, including Ri’en no aki梨園の秋 (Autumn in the Theater World, 1936),Tansuigawa no Sazanami 淡水河の漣 (Rippleson the Danshui River, 1939), and mostfamously the 1943 short story Honryū 奔流 (The Torrent). “The Torrent” first appearedin the journal Taiwan Bungaku after Ō’s 1942return to Taiwan,5 and unlike the piecestypically translated into English, “The Torrent”is ideologically muddy.6 Although it can be readas criticizing the imperial project, it is deeplyunsettling. Ō’s tale lacks clear-cut heroes, andhis characters speak in ways at t imesuncomfortably close to nationalistic: thenarrator in particular presents an almostdissociative persona that swings back and forthbetween admiration for Japanese ‘spirit’ andhatred for what the system that supports itdemands of its colonial subjects.

Taiwan Bungaku, Vol 3, No. 3

The work centers around the relationshipbetween the narrator, Dr. Kō (Ch. Hong), andthe local Japanese teacher, Itoh Haruo (né ZhuChunsheng). It opens with Kō’s reluctant returnto Taiwan after a ten-year stay in the Tokyometropole; isolated and bored, Kō is overjoyedwhen he meets Itoh, a Taiwanese who haslikewise lived in Japan and now passes asJapanese. Kō initially idolizes Itoh as aTaiwanese who has successfully “remade”himself as Japanese: here is someone with likeinterests and experiences. Yet, when he learnsof the lengths to which Itoh has gone to denythe fact that he is Taiwanese, Kō experiencesan abrupt, nearly pathological about-face. Asbecomes clear, however, the real target of Kō’shatred is himself. Trying to analyze Itoh’smotivations, Kō finally admits that had he beengiven similar opportunities, he likely wouldhave made the same decisions. In the finalscene, Kō sets out to share news of a formerstudent/patient with Itoh; yet when he catchessight of him in the distance, Kō remains caught,trapped by the realization that both becauseand in spite of all that they share, he cannotforgive Itoh. The closing image is of theimpossibly positioned Kō, who, having justmade a silent vow to embrace his Taiwaneseidentity and plea for future generations ofTaiwanese to be able to do the same, suddenlyflees the scene, crying, cursing, and running.There is no pat solution.

Wang produced a revised Chinese-languageversion of “The Torrent” in 1991,7 claiming“strict censorship by the colonial government”of the original work as justification for manychanges to the text.8 Indeed, Okubo Akio’scomparison of the Japanese and Chineseversions reveals the latter to be much morepalatable ideologically in post-colonial Taiwan:the narrator is purged of his “sympathies” forJapan and Itoh, and a new emphasis is given toan independent “Taiwanese identity.”9 Yet I

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would like to suggest that the original Japaneseversion merits translation precisely because asa text it embodies the mechanics of colonialoppression. With its flawed characters anddissatisfying resolutions, the Japanese versionof “The Torrent” reveals an ugly reality, to besure, but one that nevertheless deserves to beacknowledged.

The Torrent

By Ō Shōyū/Ō Chōyū (Wang Changxiong)

Section One

It was in the spring of three years ago that Ileft behind Tokyo, my then familiar home of tenyears. Even now, when I close my eyes, I canclearly recall that night. When the snake-like 9PM night train bound for Shimonoseki haddeparted Tokyo Station, the l ights ofYūrakuchō, Shinbashi, Shinagawa, Ōmorivanishing one by one, something hot welled upin my chest, but, of course, there was nothing Icould do. It wasn’t so much the pain of partingthat left me with an unbearable sense of loss;rather, it was the thought that once I hadreturned to my hometown, when would I againset foot in the imperial capital? This wasn’t justyouthful sentimentality. After completing thecourse at the S-- College of Medicine, I still hadto finish my research residency in the anatomylab at the university hospital’s clinic. But nosooner had that begun—not even a year hadpassed—than I was met with the sudden deathof my father, who had run a medical practice inmy home village, and I had to go back asquickly as possible. Despite my desire to seemy research through, and despite myattachment to my life in the naichi,10 in the end,faced with reality, I surrendered without theslightest fight. Still, there was no denying thatsucceeding my father to a life buried away as acountry doctor was quite unbearable to me.

An 1898 Shinto shrine in Taiwan(Photograph by E. L. Brightwell

Seeing the village again after so many years, Ireally did find it beautiful, and I breathed asigh of relief. But that didn’t last forever. Thesimple work of a country doctor was notbothersome, but somehow, I couldn’t get intoit; the days vaguely continued one after theother. With nothing to dispel the boredom, Iwished, body and soul, to chuck the wholething. Where would I be able to turn forstimulation with such a simple lifestyle givenmy ambitions from my time in the naichi? Thiswas the kind of dead-end thought that wasconstantly and ever more hotly percolating inmy breast, bearing off my dejected heartinfinite distances. Even though it was myhometown, there was no one who couldgenuinely comfort or talk with me, and theboredom of being completely adrift constantly

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depressed me. “When am I going to just throwin the towel and go back to the capital?” Ithought, but at the idea of my elderly mother,my resolve would fail me.

It was around this time. My meeting one ItohHaruo. In so many words, just when I wascompletely drowning in that fierce sorrow likethe gloom of homesickness, the very one whogave my parched throat a sip of soothingtonic—that was Itoh Haruo. That was, as itwere, the motivation for my becoming closewith Itoh, as well as a factor that intensified thedegree to which we hit it off at once. So muchfor background.

Although nothing remained of October, the latesummer heat was still fierce. But once nightfell, the temperature dropped and grew cold, asthough in betrayal . Because of th is ,stomachaches were going around, leaving meso busy that I lost track of whether it was nightor day. It was one evening. In the midst ofexamining patients one after the other,someone proudly strode in, saying, “Greetings.”It was a man who looked to be 34 or 35, ofgood build. His eyes were bloodshot, and hisface was flushed and red. He had casuallythrown on a yukata, but somehow there wassomething imposingly vigorous about him. Thatwas Itoh Haruo. I immediately pressed thestethoscope to his chest, and after venturing toexamine his throat, I saw it was clearly aterrible cold. He also had a fever of 38.5º.

“As you can see, I’ve been pushing myself toohard. Even if I grin and bear it, I suppose that’sno match for an illness,” Itoh said with a laugh.There was a shadow or trace of somethingcomplicated lurking behind the laugh thatdidn’t go with the carefree expression on hisface. It seemed to speak to a desire to win, adesire that asserted the dignity of theindividual. When I asked about his job, he saidthat he was a Japanese National Language &Literature teacher at the Taidong SecondarySchool11 at the edge of town. Somehow, my

gaze drifted to Itoh’s face. When he said whathis job was, I stared intently at him, just asthough he were under observation. It wasbecause Itoh, this apparent naichi-person—Icouldn’t tell based on his accent, but based onthe contours of his face, his bone structure, hiseyes and nose—there was something about himthat looked to me like an Islander.12 Maybe Ican call it a hyper-aware, sharpened sixthsense from being born in a colonial territory?When I was in the naichi, with just a glance, Icould predict, without exception, whethersomeone was from the naichi (of course)?13 Orthe peninsula?14 Or Chinese? And, assumingthat this sharpened sixth sense of mine hadn’tbeen compromised, there shouldn’t be anymistaking what had caught my eye this time.This was enough to arouse my extremecuriosity. It spurred my impulse—the desire topin down Itoh’s true identity as soon aspossible and even to try to have a heart-to-heart with him. And i f I toh were, as Isuspected, a Taiwanese, I felt that this wouldbe a big part of the quality that invited myinterest and kindled my hope. But I thought itwould be rude and overly familiar to ask anymore questions at the time, and patients wereclogging the way behind him, so I gave him twodays’ medication and told him to comeback—with that, we parted.

I saw someone come in as he was headedout—well, if it wasn’t one of the fifth-yearstudents from the local secondary school, LinBonian?15 I guess Lin Bonian saw Itoh’s face; heraised his hand in greeting. I was happy thatLin Bonian had come at a good time. At 18, hisphysique, honed by kendo, was all muscle, andthere wasn’t anything childlike about it. Bynature fond of sports, he dabbled in otherthings in addition to doing kendo, and in hisimpetuousness, he had pushed his body toohard. Because of this, the membrane aroundhis lungs had suffered damage, so he’d beencoming to my hospital for two and a halfmonths. I tapped lightly on his chest, and aftersome simple inquiries about how things had

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been of late, I asked, “This seems like a strangequestion, but where is Teacher Itoh from?”

“That teacher?” Bonian was indeed put on thespot. “That teacher is Taiwanese. Although, ofcourse, his wife is from the naichi.”

“I was right, wasn’t I?” I thought with asatisfied grin. It wasn’t so much pleasure at thefact that my sixth sense hadn’t weakened, itwas more an indefinable happiness followingthe strange-yet-cheery thought that thisperson’s existence was somehow connected tome. Be it because he was in charge of NationalLanguage & Literature, or be it because of hissophistication that was no different from that ofnaichi Japanese, I felt that the presence of thisTaiwanese in my hometown was unbearablyhopeful, and it seemed that happiness bubbledup from the very bottom of my heart.

“A good teacher, isn’t he?” I unthinkingly askedthis stupid thing in the next instant.

“Well…I can’t say that.”

Why had Bonian immediately responded soobstinately? This person was of rather slightb u i l d , a n d t h e r e w a s s o m e t h i n gunapproachable about him. Maybe I wasimagining it, but his eyes seemed to narrow asthough he were sizing up the situation. I didn’tlike this apparent evasiveness, but I found theredoubled strength of his youthful sense ofjustice touching. I didn’t ask him anything elseabout Itoh, but from that moment on, the waitfor I toh’s return to the hospita l wasunbearable.

However, three days, then five days passedwithout a trace of Itoh. His cold had probablygotten better. I told myself that was why, andsince it would be a bother for me to initiate aconversation, I decided to wait for some sort ofopportunity to come along. From around thattime, the number of colds dropped offsomewhat, but in their place, the rainsparticular to this town rolled in. It was basically

a mist that never coalesced. One night, after allof the patients had left, I was hoping to distractmyself from my feelings of depression byreading; the clock had struck 9, but, luckily,just as I was about to lock up, someone came inwith a “Good evening.” It was Itoh. It goeswithout saying that I truly welcomed thisunexpected visit of his. Although he had beengoing to thank me for the other day and thenhead home, I did everything in my power todetain him, showing him to my study.

“This is quite a library, isn’t it? You’re ascholar, yes?” Itoh said as he cast his gaze overthe two large bookshelves. “What’s this?Haven’t you got more literary works thanmedical?”

Laughing, I offered him a floor cushion. “Someof these books belonged to my late father.Present appearances notwithstanding, at onetime in my youth, I was quite the literature fan.I wanted to become an author, but as it turnsout, that was just a long-ago dream.”

“Really? But I think that people need to havedreams. Human growth and advancement areinspired and driven by people’s dreams. Myschool only takes in Taiwanese children, butthey don’t have big dreams. In a nutshell,character is never what one might wish in thecolonies, which is a problem.”

“Indeed. They don’t have ambition, do they?”

“Their vision is, in a word, narrow. Anyway,when people can’t conceive of anything otherthan their own world and are afraid ofeverything, they shrink, don’t they? They’ve gotno backbone, no mettle. For instance…”

Just then, my mother came in with some teaand a tray bearing simple sweets. “Welcome,”she greeted him in Japanese. “The awful rainyseason has started, hasn’t it? It makes thingsdifficult.” This she said in Chinese.16

“This is my mother. She only understands a

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l ittle bit of Japanese,” I said by way ofintroduction.

“Ah, your mother? How nice to meet you. I amItoh Haruo. I apologize for the intrusion.” Thisgreeting was in Japanese. I was struck by anunexpected feeling. Even in this kind ofsituation, Itoh would not speak Chinese. At thatmoment, I thought, “Itoh’s life philosophy isawfully hard-core.” I had no choice but totranslate the greeting for my mother.

“Are your parents in good health?” I venturedto ask him after my mother had left.

“Uh, the old folks manage somehow,” Itoh said,as though to completely avoid the topic. “Sinceyou’ve spent a long time in the naichi, andsince you especially seem to have an interest inaspects of spiritual culture, this has probablyoccurred to you, but though people commonlytalk of a ‘Japanese spirit,’ this is reallysomething that has no meaning at all if onedoesn’t view it via the classics. For example,The Record of Ancient Matters, right? Whatdraws us to it, you know, is the way that thepurity of its sense and words emerges notwarped in the slightest. As a certain greatscholar put it, ‘Young children draw near tothrow themselves on their grandparents’ knees,with curious eyes a-sparkle, and delight inlending their ears to that ancient tale.’ There isno Japanese spirit without the Japaneseclassics.”

While Itoh was chattering, his eyes wereablaze, and even the skin on his face wasalight. “This is a greater man than I hadrealized,” I thought, gazing at him in secretadmiration. Thinking that his way of life wastruly splendid, I swallowed with a shudder. Youshould try to imagine it. This Taiwanese hadtaken a wife from the naichi, and in language,in behavior—no, in his very essence—he hadbecome completely Japanese. This man stoodon the sacred pulpit of the secondary schooland majestically taught National Literature.The people of the past could not have dreamed

of this, but the scent of esoteric knowledgeassociated with some truth had turned intopassionate words that seemed to gouge mycompanion’s heart; when I saw him describeplaying a major role in cultivating a sublimemind, awakening a heart with a longing for truescholarship, or rousing a feeling of unstoppablelove for ‘spirit’ in the breasts of the Taiwanesesecondary school students at that time whenthey were at their most receptive, my eyessomehow filled with tears. These weren’tbecause I was happy or anything, just a feelingthat my soul was strangely shaken. I guess Ishould say I was moved.

Although this was the first time we two hadgotten wrapped up in talking, we were able toconverse just as though we had known eachother for years. When Itoh went home, it wasafter twelve, but I had the sensation that theformally-ordered-yet-soulless, empty lonelinessof my return from the naichi itself haddispersed.

Section Two

It was a small town, but the foothold left by myfather was unexpectedly firm, and patientswere always gathered outside my door. Amonth and a half had flown by, but faced dayin, day out with crowds of the sick and painedwho were the very image of human suffering, Iwas up against a lifestyle so hectic I couldhardly breathe. In the wake of one of Itoh’svisits, we kindred spirits had begun socializing,but I could not step one foot beyond the miseryof my practice, so usually it was Itoh who cameto see me.

In the meantime, the year drew to an end, andeventually it was time to ring in the New Year.I, usually lethargic by nature, had the suddenidea to visit a shrine, and I got up while it wasyet early. In the chill air of the still semi-darkpre-dawn, not a thing was stirring, and not asound could be heard. The shrine was on top of

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a hill that couldn’t have been more than twoblocks outside of town, but the blue-blackmountains visible on the opposite shore lookedas though they were more than a day’s journeydistant. The sparkling light of the stars in thesky that faintly illumined the tops of themountains was a clear light blue-green. Therain had finally lifted, and in the lovelydarkness, the sky looked distant. When Ifinished my visit, like one liberated fromquotidian worries, I strolled carefree throughthe area. The piercing cold made me nostalgicfor the naichi winter. The beauty of the winterclarity on the Kantō Plain at just that time ofyear was beyond compare. And it was in thatdistant time that I had felt the winter sunlightand dry grass strangely warm, that the winterair washed over my entire body and even to myvery soul. In Taiwan, this was unthinkable.When I thought of Taiwan with its long burnt-to-a-crisp seasons, my mood began to flag. “AmI not getting more and more stupid, bit by bit?”I thought. How far had I walked? The easternsky had gradually brightened. For the moment,I returned home.

Since I had visitors, I didn’t get to Itoh’s homeuntil around 4 in the afternoon.

“Weeeeellcome.” Itoh, in a figured hakama,greeted me in a voice that was almost over-the-top.

At my overly grand “Felicitations for the NewYear,” Itoh brusquely replied, “No—that’s old-fashioned. Let’s do it in the new way.”

“All right, all right,” I said, scratching my head.We looked at each other and started to laugh.I’d been escorted into an eight-mat sittingroom. And if it wasn’t Lin Bonian sitting therecross-legged, looking thoroughly bored.Catching sight of me, I guess, he sat upstraight; placing his palms on the ground tobow, he said, “Felicitations for the New Year.”

In imitation of Itoh, I said, “No—that’s old-fashioned. Let’s do it in the new way,” and

everyone laughed merrily again. Only LinBonian just smiled a bit for some reason, hisface returning at once to i ts ear l ierunmanageable expression devoid of theslightest good humor.

“He’s a strange one,” I thought to myself, butthen again, this youth was by nature not of acheerful disposition, always silent with a lonelyair.

“Mother will be here in a moment,” Itoh said,offering me a floor cushion. I wanted to see themother of such a great man. Probably shewould be none other than a woman raised inthe old style. While I turned over such imagesin my mind, I looked up at the sky: it had takenon a slightly cloudy appearance. But that hadbeen completely unthinkable in the chill air ofthat morning; on the contrary, it had looked asthough a thoroughly bright warm current hadbeen on the verge of wafting our way.

Before long, the shoji opened, and Itoh’s wifeand Mother entered. I sat up straight, and myeyes widened in spite of myself. The womanwho must have been Mother was in Japaneseclothing that suited her to a T. She must havebeen well past sixty. She was an old womanwith narrow eyes and broad shoulders whosehair wasn’t thinning—instead it was mostlywhite. “I am ever so pleased to make youracquaintance,” Mother politely greeted me,bowing with her palms on the floor in front ofher. Maybe it was because her teeth wereloose, but her pronunciation was muffled. Hiswife offered us tea. I thought that there wassomething strange about this, but then Iintuited in a flash that this was his wife’smother. Still, what was going on? It wasn’t thatItoh didn’t have birth parents—perhaps shewas planning to do a bit of sightseeing inTaiwan and had become her son-in-law’sresponsibility. After exchanging two or threewords, Mother quickly withdrew, but his tactfulwife chatted with us about various things. LinBonian remained sullenly silent from start to

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finish, his expression suggesting he wished hehadn’t come. I happened to be seated to theright of the tokonoma alcove, and I noticed anikebana arrangement. It was probably hiswife’s. There was an usubata vase fromSentoku with a brilliantly beautiful nandinabearing adorable scarlet berries. It was in solidgood taste—appropriate for a sitting room atNew Year’s. A book of noh libretti had beenplaced next to it, and a shakuhachi stood nextto that. Though his wife was not a beauty, herbrow was of an incomparable purity, and thestraight bridge of her nose called to mind aninimitable class. Poised, in her fresh kimonoand dusty violet haori coat—I felt as though Iwere at long last back in the naichi.

By no means were all of the memories of myten-year stay in the naichi happy ones, but itwas during that time that I discovered the truebeauty of Japan, that I came into contact with ahuman touch that warmed me as though I werebundled up in hay, and that I experienced aspirit verging on a high ideal much, muchloftier than I had longed for and a matter thatprofoundly moved me. Unable to be contentwith being a southern-colony-born Japanese, Iwasn’t going to be satisfied unless I couldbecome a pure Japanese. It wasn’t that Iactively labored at Japanizing myself; it wasmore a feeling that unconsciously naichi bloodwould take possession of my blood vessels andin no time silently circulate in me.

On that note, too, there was a girl from a goodfamily in Tokyo whose existence I cannotforget. The fact that I understand the appeal ofikebana or Tea Ceremony, that I have anaffection for kimono or the Takashimadahairstyle, that I can be enchanted by noh orkabuki—all of this is because of that person.Her round eyes were always sparkling withintelligence, and though something in herfeatures suggested a competitive coldness, sheherself made an exceptionally warm andpassionate impression. The way her exuberantblack hair was loosely bound, or the

easygoingness of the lines traced by herstrange movements: al l of this cast afascination as purely Japanese over me, asouthern-born. Afterwards, she ended upbecoming an ikebana instructor or something,but I had intense memories of how by means ofikebana, she thought to personally search everdeeper and how she had a way of life devotedto the single-minded pursuit of something. Inother words, hers was a ceaseless probingwithin the heart, an endless directing of her lifeforce in the service of a noble artistic practice.There is a desire for truth that probablyconstantly stirs her heart; though buffetedcountless times by rough seas, a day when thesun shines for her will surely come. She whoboundlessly enlightened me—she was myteacher, my friend, and my lover. I rememberhow when I met with her gaze coincidentallywashing over me, I would feel as thoughunspeakably hot blood were coursing throughmy body; but at the same instant, I would beashamed of my own un-ripeness and feel asincere drive to personally temper myselffurther.

Just a week before I was to return home, Ireceived a slip of paper with an inscription on itfrom her in farewell. It said “a first-class personof the realm.” This was probably in reference tothe great Confucianist Satō Issai’s line: “Hewho sets his goal firmly must surely be a first-class person of the realm.”17 I decided not tomeet her and sent a letter of thanks, afterwhich I soon received a letter in reply. Part of itread: “Please don’t say that a slip of paper is awonderful thing. It makes me think that if therewere a cave, I’d about feel like crawling into it.When I was writing those characters, Ireflected that perhaps my only worth was inpresenting those words to you. I am utterlyembarrassed. But no matter how many times Ihesitated, I had to write them. This feelingfinally drove me to write the slip. With all myheart… I believe that the gods will surelyforgive me for such insolent behavior. And ofcourse, you, too…”

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I resolutely withstood my rising passions. Evenif we had described what was in our hearts toeach other, this was goodbye. Personallyspeaking, had I become qualified to marry thisperson? No—more than this, as an only son, Iwould have to bring this person to thehinterlands of Taiwan, but when I asked myselfwhether the happiness we’d known up untilthen could endure and considered the situationfrom all possible angles, I felt as though I werewalking a tightrope. I cried at my lack ofcourage.

Compared to this, Itoh was a super-star. While Ididn’t know the ins and outs of his situation,hadn’t he made up his mind without hesitationand wonderfully persevered to the present?Itoh had brought that comfortable feeling andlifestyle of the naichi back to our villagecompletely intact. I was convinced he waswonderful.

When the clock struck five, Lin Bonian said thathe was heading home. I had hoped to stay a bitlonger, but thinking that it was high time wewrapped things up, I got ready to take myleave. But Itoh grew scarlet and held me back.“It’s New Year’s—what’s the rush? Neither you,Doctor, nor Lin Bonian seem to have muchenergy. Today you should take it easy andrelax.”

“Uh…” Lin Bonian hesitated and scratched hishead.

Then his wife moved to detain us. “Anyway, it’snothing special, but won’t you stay for dinner?”

The two had made up their minds to invite us todinner.

There were five of us in attendance. In spite ofmyself, I fixed my eyes on the tables Itoh’s wifebrought in: I was overwhelmed. As I set to myozōni rice cake soup with my chopsticks, Ilooked out over the numerous practicallywasteful treats that bedecked the tables. Alarge sea bream, herring roe, chicken soup,

shrimp tempura, and so on—it seemed asthough it had been absolutely months since Ihad been thus wined and dined! When I lookedat him, Lin Bonian had not made a movetowards the side dishes. He simply mutelyconsumed his ozōni.

There was the faint sound of the front dooropening. Itoh’s wife set down her chopsticksand went to the entryway. “Oh, my! If it isn’tTaipei Mother. Please do come in,” she said.

“It’s fine, it’s fine. I’m leaving in a minute. Iseveryone well?” The owner of the voicesounded like a fairly elderly woman, and basedon her halting Japanese, I at once understoodher to be a Taiwanese. For some reason, Itohseemed a bit rattled, and he went out to theentryway.

After a bit, I could hear the elderly woman’svoice again. “I didn’t have any special reason,but I wanted to see your face after so long, and,Chunsheng, your father has suddenlyweakened, and he’s always saying how lonelyhe is, so please come see him once in a while.”This was in Chinese. The last part was said intears and was not clearly audible.

“Oh, enough already. I’m going back inside.”Itoh flung out the words as though he werediscarding a pot and returned to the sittingroom. Agitated, he drew in air through pursedlips. I could see in his face that he wassuppressing a feeling of things having goneawry. I couldn’t definitely put my finger onwhat the matter was. But it flashed through mymind that that Taiwanese woman was noneother than Itoh’s birth mother. If that were thecase, why would Itoh need to so despise herand keep her at a distance? I naively wanted tobelieve that there was surely some deep secretreason for this. I hadn’t noticed until now, butLin Bonian had set down his chopsticks and sathunched over, chewing on his lower lip. Hiseyes were moist with tears.

Before long, Itoh’s wife returned. It seemed

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that the elderly Taiwanese woman had gonehome. “I am terribly sorry,” Itoh’s wife said.But the room had already sunk into an emptysilence, and the only sound was the overlappingin-and-out of our breathing. Actually, I felt asthough something hot were clogging my throat,and I couldn’t even speak.

Perhaps thinking that this was inappropriate,Itoh suddenly was in high spirits. “I’m ready togo, ready! I might even recite my pet Ina ditty,”he said and recited as follows

How depressing

The journey along the Kiso road.

The leaves from the trees

Scatter over my umbrella.

However, Lin Bonian seemed unable to bear it,and without regard for whether Itoh hadfinished reciting, he said, “My stomach is reallykilling me, so I ask to be excused. Thank youvery much for dinner.” And with that, hequickly stood up and sprang for the door. Hadanyone clumsily tried to stop him, hismomentum would have sent them flying; whenI saw Lin Bonian’s unyielding expression, I wasstunned more than anything. But now I felt thatI understood Lin Bonian’s feelings of thoroughrepulsion towards Itoh, feelings that wereprobably lodged in the nooks and crannies ofhis consciousness. Still, I couldn’t just sit therewithout stopping this. “Lin Bonian, aren’t youbeing rude to Teacher?”

But Itoh just said, “Leave it, leave it,” as hestraightened things up. “One has to imaginethat such things as this will happen over thecourse of a long life of teaching. As someonesaid, ‘Bringing up students is not just stackingup bricks; a lot goes on at once in their dailymanagement.’ Especially given Taiwanesestudents’ tendency towards a contrary

character, one just has to beat them into shapefrom the ground up.”

Though he explained this business with LinBonian under the guise of education, Ipreferred to get to the real story behind theexchange in the entryway. But for some reason,I couldn’t get myself in the mood to ask aboutit. I felt that I couldn’t reveal the brittleness orcollapse of the trust and respect I’d had for Itohof late.

“A strange child, isn’t he,” mumbled kimono-clad Mother, who had been silent up until now.His wife had been staring out of the windowthe entire time, her expression suggesting shewas fretting about something—somethingungraspable that wasn’t exactly sadness orloneliness flowed about her.

About an hour and a half later, I took my leave.It was fairly dark outside. The January windwas, in the end, cold upon my skin, and itlooked like I’d be shivering—brrrr. Thecountless stars overhead continued to twinklepleasantly. I was trying to forget the earlierscene, but for some reason, it kept flickering inand out of my thoughts.

“Is that Lin Bonian? What are you doing outagain…?”

“Doctor,” he was at my side before I knew it. Inthe eventide darkness, his trembling voice waslow, but the words gushed out in an excitedtorrent. He was terribly agitated. “ItohHaruo—no, Zhu Chunsheng—he trampled onhis own birth parents…”

“Well, let’s take it down a notch,” I chided himfirmly. “Don’t be inappropriate towards yourteacher. You should show some restraint.”

“Doctor, you probably don’t realize it, but thatold woman in the entryway was Itoh’s realmother. He has cast aside his real mother andfather and is living like that. He thinks that aslong as he’s happy…”

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“Hadn’t you better stop?” I couldn’t stand anymore.

“No—please let me talk. Please hear me out.Itoh’s birth mother is m- m- my aunt. I know myaunt’s suffering better than anyone. Pleaseimagine the feelings of someone who has beenabandoned by her only son in the entireuniverse. Doctor, are you going to take Itoh’sside about this, too? About this, this…?” Hisshoulders shaking, Lin Bonian finally burst intotears. Those raging feelings that had alwaysbeen secreted away inside had finally smashedthrough, just at that moment when he facedme. It was strange to imagine that Lin Bonian,mute and with a cowardly streak that didn’tmatch his physique, had such passionatedepths. Lin Bonian was thus agitated, but thedistress that infected me, too, was just as great.Something—I didn’t know exactly what—wasbattling up in my chest, and I felt curiouslyhelpless as I stood there.

“It’s all right. Your indignation is fully correct,but can’t you try to think about it a bit morecool-headedly? As a teacher, Teacher Itoh has agreat life philosophy, so I think there areprobably things that can’t be measured by yoursimple sense of justice alone. It’s cold outtonight, and it’s already late, so for now, gohome and get some sleep.” I comforted himthus, and Bonian went home.

I couldn’t sleep at all that night. Bonian’sagitation must have transferred itself to me. Myeyes were increasingly clear, and my mind wasextraordinarily excited. I felt that there wassome kind of convergence between LinBonian’s normal attitude towards Itoh andItoh’s apparent evasiveness when I asked himabout his parents. Itoh’s agitation in thatinstant—didn’t it reveal something? As for itsinterpretation—with the appearance of hisunsightly Taiwanese mother, significantcircumstances that had been kept silent upuntil then suddenly ran into reality. This wasthe discomfort I sensed. Had Itoh, as Bonian

said, gone so far as to sacrifice his flesh-and-blood parents in pursuit of his own pleasure? Ihad to pray that the dream that he had onceexplained to me did not aim for this sort offrivolity.

Section Three

One day when this lingering grievance still hadgrown no lighter, something awful happenedthat cast a shadow over my thoughts from thatday forward.

Itoh’s birth father, Zhu Liang’an, died at last.Chronic diabetes had weakened his physicalcondition with each passing day, and to makematters worse, about a half a month earlier, hehad contracted a flu-like lung inflammation thatwas pronounced the cause of death. Accordingto what I later heard from Lin Bonian, Itoh hadbeen to see him only once. While this mighthave been a symptom of the flu-like pneumonia,he frequently experienced confusion anddelusion, and he was constantly blurting outghastly mixtures of expletives and curses. Hewas endlessly embittered about the extinctionof his bloodline, and even on his deathbed, hiseyes shone brilliantly with a bizarre light asthough expressing a deep anguish that wouldoutlive him, even in death.

For some reason, even on the day of the funeralitself, I still had not heard anything from Itoh.Although I had never met Itoh’s parents, Idecided that I wouldn’t wait for news from himand definitely would attend the funeral. Whileit’s true that this was in part because of ourstanding friendship of kindred spirits, it mightb e m o r e f i t t i n g t o s a y t h a t h a v i n gstraightforwardly accepted what Lin Bonianhad told me, I was spurred by a curiosity to seethe every move of him who should be the filialson (the chief mourner), Itoh. This extremefeeling of my dishonesty towards him did, to besure, rub me the wrong way, but I couldn’t helpwhat was, frankly, my maliciousness.

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Well, when the day arrived, I was all geared upand ready to go, but because of an emergency,I wasn’t able to make it on time in the end. Igave up the idea of reporting to the ceremonialhall in Taipei and decided to hurry to whatshould have the burial site, which was a bitoutside of the city. But when I got there, thecoffin was already in place before the grave,surrounded by wailing surviving familymembers. It was probably just after 5 PM. Thesun, on the verge of setting, was dipping in thewest, and though a lethargic light lingered, thesky was tinged with darkness. As a result, thescene was tainted with a blackness borderingon eerie. The grave was partway up a hillside.Graves were scattered here and there along theway, shrouded in weeds and unknown plantsthat had been allowed to run wild, and thereddish earth stretched drearily in alldirections. As I climbed, I felt something warmsurging up in my chest. There were quite a fewmourners. I hid behind them and quicklysurveyed the group. My attention was caughtby the sight of Itoh, drawn up to his full height,to the right of the coffin encircled by hemp-cladmourners. He was in a black suit with a blackarmband. It might have been my imagination,but his face looked dispirited and ashen. Nextto him, his wife stood modestly in a kimono thatbore the family crest. Her gaze was directedslightly downwards, but her eyes seemed a bitred. Just when I thought the wailing might goon forever, Itoh, who looked as though hecouldn’t bear it, thundered, “I’ve already saidthis is unseemly enough.” Pulling his owlishexpression still further into a grimace, he urgedone of the monks, “How about getting on withthe ceremony?” With a timid air, the monkhastened to direct the mourners away from thecoffin and made ready to proceed to the nextstep. But there was an elderly woman whoclung to the coffin and wouldn’t let go. She wasa short thin woman. Feelings that hadwithstood containment for so long suddenlyreached the point of explosion, and herdesperate sobbing that seemed to blame thedeceased, cursing him and everything, went on

and on without the least inhibition. “I’ve heardthat voice somewhere before,” I thought. Itstruck in nearly the same instant. The intuitionthat this was Itoh’s mother. I pictured thispitiful woman, without a soul in the world uponwhom she could rely anymore—the idea of herfirmly seized hold of my heart and squeezed ittight. In the next instant, someone protectivelyled this sorry old woman away from that place.But it wasn’t Itoh—it was a youth in a simplehempen robe. It was Bonian. Large teardropswere visible in his eyes, red and swollen fromcrying. For an instant, I was moved by a desireto call out, “Bonian!”

As the caretaker finally took his shovel andcovered the coffin with dirt, the survivingfamily members began to arrange themselvesalong the mat in front of the spirit tablet inorder to make prostrations and take their finalfarewells from the deceased. The Itohsremained standing and performed a simplerévérence. One of the monks struck a gong,and the sound was born off by the eveningbreeze, swelling and contracting, you couldhear it sometimes coming near, sometimeseven right up to your ears—a weird thing thatseemed to summon all the souls from thedepths of the earth. After a while, the bun-shaped grave was completed, whereupon atemporary grave marker was put in place.

What time must it have been that thisceremony was finally finished? Beneath thecompletely darkened sky, the sea, visible in thedistance, and the mountains on the oppositebank appeared only blue-black. People wentdown the hill, gazing back lingeringly at thefresh grave from the newly completed funeral. Icouldn’t help it—Itoh came to look increasinglyhard-hearted to me. In the meantime, Itoh’swife had approached the old woman fromearlier and said, “Mother, how about coming toour place before you go home?”

“No, I must straighten up the house in Taipei,so it’s probably better for me to get back early.

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I’ll come by some other time,” she said, andafter simply clasping Itoh’s wife’s hands, sheheaded down the hill. I didn’t want to believemy eyes or ears. But this wasn’t a dream oranything of the kind. When it sunk in that thishad actually just happened, I bit my lip in angerand frustration. I felt a never-before-tastedheavy pressure to vomit. At the mere sight ofthis pitiful elderly woman, I experienced ahorrible feeling. At that moment, a loud voicesuddenly cried out from off to the side, “Auntie,shall we go home together?” and the owner ofthe voice took the old woman’s hand. It wasBonian. It was as though he didn’t even noticeme. His voice could only be taken as in defianceof Itoh’s behavior. His lips quivered violently,perhaps with rising anger. This spread to hisentire body, and even in the dark, I could tellthat he shook with much too great anexcitement. Bonian was easily moved, and fromhis perspective, this was a fairly serious shock.With sluggish steps, I made my way down thehill. I wanted to call out to Bonian, but to behonest, I was filled with the desire to try tothink over and reflect on various things inquiet.

I thought about my time in the naichi. When Iwas asked, “Where’s your hometown?” whatkind of psychological process was there? Iwould usually answer that it was in Kyūshū orShikoku. Why was I embarrassed to promptlyreply, “It’s in Taiwan”? Because of that shame,I always had to brandish the pseudonym“Kimura Bunroku.” When I went to thebathhouse or out drinking at the odenrestaurant, I went under this name. And since Iplanned to become a full-fledged Japanese, Iwould self-satisfiedly square my shoulders andchatter away. Once in a while, I’d spit out someidiotic dialect bits and dazzle my companions.That’s why, when I was together with friendswho spoke in broad local dialects, I wasinvariably on tenterhooks about whethersomething might not give me away asTaiwanese. And when my cover was finallyblown, I would flee like a squirrel. I spent ten

years like this, with my nerves on edge.

(“What kind of a low-life are you? Isn’t thisclear proof that you despise Taiwan itself?Taiwanese aren’t Chinese, and they aren’tEskimos either! In fact, how should they be anydifferent from people born in the naichi? Beproud! Just like a Japanese citizen is!”)

When I finally grew tired of my masquerade, Itold myself this as though it were establishedfact.

(“Hey, wait! I’m not a low-life. Can’t we alsosay that the dedicated concealment of my truecharacter is a kind of acceptance of thebenevolent wing of the parent bird that alwaysprovides me with a warm bed? In other words,it’s not something I’m driven to by force, butrather, shall we say, an aspiration that hasseeped into me, be it in terms of lifestyle or interms of spirit, while I was unawares. And Iembrace it. And a great benevolence essentiallyfeeds me my fill.”)

Another me repeated this over and over. Itohhad been able to sustain this feeling even afterreturning to Taiwan. As someone who himselfhad experience in the naichi, I, more thananyone, ought to have been able to understandItoh’s feelings easily. But had he really had touse his parents as a steppingstone? Itoh hadtaken a woman from the naichi as his wife. Itwas natural that through her, he shouldpractice a dedicated filial piety towards hisJapanese parents; but couldn’t he surely do hisbest to be filial towards his Taiwanese parentsat the same time?

While I thought about various things, the road Iwas walking along gradually grew dark. Icouldn’t help crying. “I have no idea what Iought to do now,” I thought. “Does a world thatcould sustain such desolation as this exist?” Mythoughts were on the point of fragmenting intothousands and thousands of such questions.

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Section Four

After that, I didn’t see much of either Itoh orBonian. My mind was blank, just like someonewho had gathered together all of his hopes anddiscarded them, and the days passed emptilyby. When I realized that Itoh’s way of life,which had seemed a profound way of survivalfilled with gumption, regardless of whether theend was justified, was actually one of nervoushypersensitivity with such an unstable shallowbasis—for good or for ill—it provided me with acredo. This was that through my medicalpractice I would live an outstanding life. Don’tdoctors fail to cure by focusing only on thebody and forgetting that humans have psyches,too? To be able to simultaneously examine aperson’s body and his/her emotions orpsychological strength! I began to understandthat the cowardice of just gaining confidence inmaking an accurate physical diagnosis wouldbe dishonest. Given the extent of the blindadoration the Taiwanese felt towards doctors,this probably wouldn’t be a shallow way of life.

One afternoon, I had just returned home aftermy rounds when there was a phone call fromthe Taidong Secondary School. It was fromItoh. One of the students had fainted withcerebral anemia, so would I please come atonce? Without wasting any time, I picked up mybag and went. At Itoh’s instruction, the patientwas resting in the first-aid room, and I loweredhis upper body and head somewhat and raisedhis lower body; I loosened the clothing aroundhis chest, and once he seemed to be breathingfreely, I gave him an injection of cardiotonic.After a little while, he seemed to be recoveringbit by bit—this student was a member of thegroup under Itoh’s charge. While this wasgoing on, Itoh tried to anticipate the patient’severy need. During that time, his eyes shonewith sincerity. How can I describe it? It wasl ike a window into his soul . Wasn’t i tunthinkable that even the slightest shadow ofguilt at having rejected that old woman mighthave lingered in those pure eyes? I was

wondering whether I could go home soon whenItoh turned serious and said that there was adistrict-level kendo match in ten days; theathletes were undergoing strenuous trainingevery afternoon until late, and he invited me tocome take a peek. More than curious, I washopeful. This was a secondary school that onlyaccepted Taiwanese. Just the image of thoseTaiwanese students at that very momentproudly wielding bamboo swords gave me athrill.

The dojo was a rather broad planked space. Infact, several sets of athletes, their faces andchests covered, were clashing with a fiery vigoras though it were a decisive match. From timeto time, I could hear an impervious voice thatsounded as though it belonged to an instructor.“Don’t raise your weapon and stand there asthough you were going to face down theenemy. He’s not bad so much as he doesn’tknow the right way to do it…. If you face youropponent and switch to skewing the sword leftand right from the center of your own body, thehands end up reversed, creating an exposedarea! …You don’t have enough fight, notenough. Can’t you muster more courage andstrike?”

Itoh watched with an earnest gaze. After a briefinterval, he explained. “At last year’s match, wecame up short. We were lacking something,and we let the big one get away. That’s whythis year we’ve got to do something… But whenyou try to think about it, the problem is not somuch whether we win or lose the match—morethan anything, it’s how to get Japanese-likeblood coursing through their bodies.”

Without taking my eyes off of them, I nodded atwhat Itoh was saying.

“Especially in the case of Lin Bonian,” Itohcontinued. I turned then to Itoh for the firsttime. “Since his chest lining is supposed to bedone for, I suppose such strenuous practice asthis is not really possible. But Doctor, what isyour diagnosis?”

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For the first time, I remembered Lin Bonian.“Ah, yes, right. No wonder he hasn’t put inmuch of an appearance at the hospital of late. Ifpossible, it might be better for him to holdback.”

“Ah, there he is.” Itoh pointed to one of thepairs among them. He said that the one facingthe opposite direction was Bonian. He waspracticing. The awfulness of that moment of hiscomplete absorption—with his sword directedat the eyes of his opponent, his entire body wasoverflowing with energy. Was it fury? Was it anunfettered wildness? He seemed as though hewere moving four long-restrained limbs at will.The boy watching him, on the other hand, wasdamp with sweat. Although there was notrigger for all of this ceaseless movement, LinBonian must have had such energy concealedaway somewhere. At some point that evening, Ihappened to remember the frightful zeal of thattime when he had grilled me about Itoh. Butthen again, I thought that if he was thisvigorous, any pain was probably gone.

As we sat there watching, unable to tear oureyes away for even an instant, a loudpenetrating voice called out from behind us.

“Well if it isn’t the doctor from the Muyang-tang Clinic. This is a first.”

I turned around to look, and there was Vice-Principal Tajiri, who had been to see me two orthree times with a cold and was in charge ofthe History & Geography lesson. He wasalready middle-aged with salt-and-pepper hair,and his somewhat hunched shoulders seemedthe product of having long withstood acomplicated life, but his restlessly weirdlymoving gaze did not convey the slightestgentleness. I bowed politely back. “Mr. Vice-Principal? Excuse the intrusion. They’re allgetting fired up, aren’t they? What are the oddsof victory this year?” I asked and tactfullylooked at the water.

“Ha ha ha! Well, what indeed? They’re scared

and ready to turn tail at the mere sight of adog, right? They say that he who despiseshimself is in turn despised by others, but I can’timagine anyone being despised by that piece-of-shit team—a victory is most unlikely. Don’tyou think so, Itoh?” He looked at Itoh whilemaking this high-handed speech.

Itoh looked very humbled and said, “I feel thesame way. Almost daily, I think how regrettableit is.” I compared the faces of the two and thenkept my eyes on the practice.

Before long, Vice-Principal Tajiri said, “Well,please enjoy the match,” and busily left thedojo. Despite this exchange, the athletescontinued to smash away with their bambooswords to cries of “Break his arm!” and “Makehim scream till he can’t!”

A few tears formed in my eyes. “Youth ofTaiwan!” I called out in my heart.

(Now, we must study and provide for both theprogress of history and that of ourselves. Aren’twe steadily climbing the mountain a little at atime? And resisting the occasional backtrackingdown the mountain path. When it comes to ourendless road ahead, not one bit of indolence ordecadence is allowed. With unflagging tenacity,we forge a new path wherever it may lead.)

After a bit, the coach suddenly gave thecommand, “Stop—15 minutes’ rest.” Theathletes stopped practicing at once and afterformally exchanging bows, undid the ties ontheir masks and let in some air. Bonian musthave caught sight of me, for he suddenly madeas though he would rush over; but for somereason, he turned midway towards the exit andleft. I watched Bonian go.

“Bonian.” When called, Bonian stopped.Grinning, he approached. Maybe it wasbecause he was nervous, but his smiling facelooked strangely stiff. “How are you feeling? Ihope you’re taking it easy,” I said.

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“Nah, don’t worry about me, Doctor. Thanks toyou, here I am, and when my arm gets the itch,there’s no stopping it. I’ll show you victory,”Bonian said, stroking his wrist and smiling withgreat confidence. There was sweat steamingdown his lightly tanned skin, but that made mefeel as though he were suffused with a stronglife force.

“Definitely do! Bonian, whether or not you likethe course of history, every day you areconfronting a strong current, and the time hasfinally come when Taiwanese can ascend thestage as great Japanese. That’s why this time,you know, your victory will have especiallydeep meaning.” Despite myself, I said this sortof difficult thing by way of encouragement, butit immediately washed off of my companion.

“Yep. No matter how hard it is. Taiwanese aregreat Japanese, too. It’s impossible being toldthat we’re cowards as though it’s a given. Yeah,and on top of that, we’re definitely going to doit, to take down those guys who despiseTaiwanese despite being Taiwanesethemselves.”

“Taiwanese” and so forth was probably inreference to Itoh. The way that lingering angerfrom another time could leave endless rippleswas a frightful thing. His highly impressionableheart was exactly like tangled thread—I didn’tknow how far it might go on if I made a misstepor something in teasing it out.

“Enough already,” I hurriedly raised my handsto rein him in. “I really get your determination,but it’d be better to just lay off the cynicism.Come on, don’t force things.”

“‘Not forcing things’ is lame, Doctor!” Instead,he turned defiant and suddenly dashed off. Butit didn’t escape my notice that there weretraces of two streaks of tears, belying him, onhis cheeks. You could say that this was the firsttime that I encountered this side of him—hishell-bent drive never to lose—and it pained meunexpectedly.

The next ten days went by. But I was on pinsand needles the entire time. Even if theTaiwanese boys did their best, they had neverwon a match in the past . This lack ofconfidence coupled with an anxiety about theiruntested abilities churned together, and I foundmyself caught up in it and unable to relax, asthough this directly concerned me, too. But thehorse had already left the starting gate. Theyhad won. I found this out on NationalFoundation Day, that is, the evening of the dayof the match.

I wasn’t dreaming. Taiwanese boys hadmastered the national sport of kendo. Was itbecause they had been able to become one withthe sport and respond to the challenge with so-called emptied minds and tranquil thoughts? Itwas probably because their fiercely aflamefighting spirit had been able to crush all oftheir opponents, but in any case, they had won.The district championship was the equivalent ofthe island-wide championship. Even thoughthey were despised as mere dogs, and eventhough they didn’t know what they were doing,it looked like this would be the stuff of legends.Was it not the case that the ancient flowers ofthe Way of the Warrior were consciouslysprouting in the hearts of Taiwanese youth?Was now not the time for Taiwanese boys towipe away feelings of abjectness and try tosoar? I was too happy to breathe. My chestswelled for no reason, and I couldn’t help myblood being so alive that it hurt. “I’d like to seeVice-Principal Tajiri’s face,” I thought.

But I forgot that there was someone evenhappier than I. It was Itoh. It was the day afterthey had won the match. Thanks to Itoh’s goodwill, I was able to attend the round-table talkinvolving the athletes, and something happenedon the way home. I was heading home, walkingshoulder to shoulder with the hero of that day,the “Center,”18 Lin Bonian, when Itoh called tous. “Lin Bonian, come to my place. Doctor, you,too, please.”

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Itoh’s happiness probably wouldn’t allowBonian to just go home. I, too, was feeling light-hearted. I thought Bonian would probably bendtoday, but…

“No, I’m going home.” He drew his mouthfirmly shut, showing his typical strangelydefiant attitude. I grew a bit irritated.

But Itoh smiled still larger and said, “I wantedto give you a bit of a celebration. Won’t youcome by?”

“That’s unnecessary. Anyway, I’m going home.”Bonian set off on his own. I was dumbstruck.

“Bonian, wait.” Itoh was finally angry. Heovertook Bonian and grabbed him by the chest,I think, and his sturdy hand flew at Bonian’scheek over and over. But Bonian made no signof resistance. He just let himself be hit. “You’vegot a lot of nerve. What are you hoping toaccomplish with such a rotten spirit?”

“You should ask!” Bonian hadn’t been broken.“Do you think you can educate? With a spiritthat could abandon your birth parents?”

“Idiot. You understand how I feel? Butsomeday, you will. Of course you say today is‘unnecessary.’ Well, you can feed your perversenature to the dogs.”

Itoh said these things as though regurgitatingthings heard countless times. I didn’t knowwhat I should do. But Itoh just smoothed hiswild hair several times and then hastenedaway.

“Bonian.” I spoke for the first time. “You’rebeing rudely obstinate, aren’t you? Youprobably have no idea how Teacher Itoh isconstantly thinking about you. As I said oncebefore, your feelings are, at first glance,justified, but Teacher Itoh’s perspective on lifelooks at the big picture, and there are elementsto it that can’t just be explained by casualcommon sense. No matter what, he is your

teacher. Why don’t we go together toapologize?”

“I don’t want to.”

It seemed my repeated efforts were goingnowhere. But in that moment he sniffled in aneffort not to show tears, and large teardropssuddenly fell. And several more continued tofall. He made no attempt to stop them.

I thought that maybe today of all days I mightgo to Itoh’s. I was afraid that if I didn’t get tothe bottom of how he was feeling—no holdsbarred—and clear away the hovering darkclouds, their mutual tragedy might conclude asprecisely that. But at the last moment, Ihesitated. Was I worried of always beingpushed by the strength of Itoh’s shove? Ormaybe I had an ulterior motive of not wantingto disturb the happiness I had finally attained?I fretted. When it came right down to it, what Iwas fretting about was the spiritual voidsuggested by thoughts that were I to have beenput in the same circumstances as Itoh, wouldnot I, too, have made the same mistake? Andwould not I, too, have become servile?

Section Five

The sad and the happy memories of those timesaccumulated in a uniform flow. The time finallycame for Lin Bonian and the rest to leave theschool nest. Leaving with us an unsurpassablegift—the memory of that sparkling victory. Oneday, I came back from having spent more thanhalf the day making my rounds in the country,and the pharmacist reported that Lin Bonianhad come by about two hours earlier with atrunk in order to say good-bye. I stamped theground in frustration and thought that it wastoo bad, but that the ship had already sailed. Isilently closed my eyes, and Bonian’s narrow,drooping, dispirited eyes, his small nose withan intellectual sharpness somewhat blunted,and his lips pulled into an inverted ‘v’ floated

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before me. It was probably the result of theenvironment, but even if I admitted that histemper was perverse, when push came toshove, the grit and strength of his nature hadmade a deep impression on me. The first timethat he came to the hospital, his face was pale,and looking down on the nape of his neck, ayouthful weakness still lingered, but duringthat last fierce practice, he had exuded adetermination of one a year or two older. WhenI thought about it, we were nothing more thandoctor and patient, and we unfortunatelyhadn’t ever talked at length, but somehow itseemed that he trusted me more than anyone. Iwanted, time permitting, to inquire about hisaspirations and future course as well as tosnoop further for information on his cousinItoh’s household.

From that point forward I was strangelyincreasingly consumed by the thought ofwanting to meet with this boy. I thought,“Maybe I’ll go to his home village of Nantou.”However, because of a ceaseless stream ofpatients at the hospital, I couldn’t find any freetime; at last, one Sunday morning three weekslater, I made up my mind and left my house.Bonian’s home was a little outside of NantouCity. I could more or less infer from the addressand its condition that the household was notvery well off. I was greeted by a thin elderlywoman who was perhaps pushing sixty. It wasBonian’s mother. Speaking of which, I thoughtshe vaguely resembled Itoh’s mother. I simplytold her that I had a medical practice in such-and-such a town, that I was extremely closewith both Itoh Haruo and her son, and mypurpose in coming. At this, the elderly womanbowed deeply over and over again, her aweevident. Tears streamed from her eyes, andfaintly, in a trembling voice, she said,“Unfortunately, a mere two days ago, Boniandeparted for the naichi. As you can see, thishousehold only gets its income from Bonian’sfather and a single older brother who areemployed at the same company, and we justdon’t have the resources to even send that boy

to the naichi. But Doctor, when it came to thatboy, he did love to study from when he wassmall, and even though he was poor andstruggling, in the end, he proved himselfwonderfully, so… even an outsider would havehad sympathy with his entreaty! His fatherwould roll his eyes and hit him—but he madenothing of it. It was impossible. But now we’rethinking that if Bonian were to become a doctorlike you, even if it meant debt…”

Touched by the utmost parental love thatflowed out from the old woman’s mouth byvirtue of her unadorned artless Chinese, I waschoked with hot tears in spite of myself. Ihadn’t foreseen in the slightest Bonian’sjourney to the naichi, and seeing that we wereleft behind thus, a loneliness that was, as onemight expect, unlike a parent’s, welled up.“Why didn’t he consult with me even once?” Ithought rather resentfully, but I told myselfthat no matter what the future held, he whohad left me here was no average lad. I wantedto ye l l “Banzai !” at how wel l he hadpersevered. I’d missed the chance to ask himabout his future plans, but when I heard hisparents’ fantasies that he might become adoctor, a chill ran down my spine. Wasn’t itprecisely this generation’s ardor for developingits full youthful potential without prejudice thatwas so desirable to the generation of theirparents? The phrase “medicine cures all” wasnot a well-loved one here. But when I metBonian’s mother’s eyes charged with sharphopes, my spirits completely sank. “Well, but,how were you able to let him go?” I was unableto refrain from asking.

“Well, Doctor, it was about two days beforethat boy’s graduation ceremony, and Mr. Itohcame all the way here. Maybe it was due to talkof Bonian definitely aiming to go to the naichi,but Itoh said no matter what the school was, toplease let him go. Instead of us, he’d somehowdo what he could in terms of the schoolexpenses. It’s really an embarrassing story, butwe got worried about that, and we reminded

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him he’d better become a doctor. Ha ha ha.” Inher expressiveness, the wrinkles at the cornersof her eyes were remarkably deep—probablytelling of the travails of this person. Since Itohhad come up in the conversation, I grewexcited in spite of myself, and I let her bend myear as though utterly fascinated. This onegesture of Itoh’s struck me like a thunderboltfrom out of the blue, and when I regained holdof myself, I felt that I understood Itoh to thecore. When the extent of his resolve hit home,it seemed as though I would suffocate at anymoment. And I was certain that were Bonian tobe aware of this gesture of Itoh’s, he would grithis teeth and refuse.

“Oh, really? Teacher Itoh is quite fervent, isn’the? He is determinedly kind and also thinksabout Bonian’s future, so I think you ought toaccept,” I proposed, thinking I’d worm someinformation about Itoh out of this woman. “Ihaven’t known Teacher Itoh for very long, but itseems as though his family situation isextremely complicated.”

At this, the old woman’s face instantly grewdark, but she regained her composure at once.“That can’t be helped. You just have to leave itto fate,” she said, and from there, shecontinued talking at great length. I feared thattouching upon something best left unmentionedwould do unnecessary injury to her, a relative,b u t I r e l a x e d w h e n I s a w h o w v e r yphilosophical she was about it. The story beganwith Itoh’s birth. She was given to repeatingherself, and the content was extremely tangledup and difficult to pull together, but if I adapt itall and keep my personal opinion in check, it isas follows.

“Zhu Liang’an, that is, Itoh’s father, was amerchant. But this being said, he wasn’t amerchant born and bred. Liang’an’s father wassaid to have been a ‘senior licentiate’19 of theQing court, so they were definitely an esteemedold family. That was why from a young age,Liang’an had been exclusively educated in the

Four Books and Five Classics20—a man with aso-called intellectual temperament who thoughtthat society business had nothing to do withhim; however, when times changed, beingsatisfied with being an ‘intellectual’ was nolonger tolerated, and he was in a position thatthreatened his very ability to survive unless heconverted to something else. The quicktransformation to ‘merchant,’ as might beexpected, did not produce very desirableresults. This drove him to the point offrustration, and when he met with his wife’snagging stinginess, serious clashes arose fastand furious. It was truly stormy seas, day afterday. Itoh was their only child. For that reason,he ought to have been doted on, but theprovocations he experienced up through hiscompletion of ‘public school’21 at the age ofthirteen were truly convoluted. That is to say,the maelstroms born of his parents’ frequentclashes certainly did not leave this childuntouched. His mother’s hysteria only grewmore violent. These two emotional pillars werelike gales stirred up against each other. Ithappened frequently that they would changedirection and then usually descend, in anavalanche, upon the child. Although he feltparental love, Itoh’s heart must have had toendure ceaseless pressure as a child in thathousehold. He announced that regardless ofwhether he finished public primary school, hewanted to enter secondary school in the naichiimmediately. At first, his parents were ofcourse unwilling to seriously accept thisunforeseen proposal. But, given the unexpectedstrength of this seemingly timid child’sattitude, as well as the presence of distantrelatives in the imperial capital, and moreover,since it wasn’t the case that they couldn’t coverthe costs of having him obtain a secondaryeducation in the naichi, even though businesshad not produced marvelous results, theygrudgingly sent this child to Japan. However,only under the condition that he enter medicalschool.

Itoh studied hard. Like a bird released from its

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cage, he spread wide his giant wings—wingsthat up until then it had been doubtful that hepossessed—and soared towards the wide, widefirmament. In secondary school, he pushedthrough so that his marks were always in thetop five. In five years, he returned home onlyonce. He had become an unrecognizable youthwith a robust frame. What was still moresurprising was that neither his attitude nor theaccent of the National Language that he useddiffered a hair from those of the Japanese. Hewould not utter a word of Chinese, not towardshis parents, who only spoke bumblingJapanese, nor even to people who could notspeak Japanese at all. His parents rejoicedinwardly at their son’s splendid maturation,and sent him to the naichi again, but here, anunforeseen problem arose. They had hoped thathe would enter medical school, but didn’t heturn his back on his parents and enter theNational Literature department of B--University? His father was angry. To saynothing of the carryings-on of his hystericalmother, which reached the abject. Even withthe threat that unless he changed his mind thatinstant the money for his schooling would stopat once—Itoh’s resolve did not even waiver inthe face of poverty. From that time until hisgraduation from B-- University, without anymind for whether he’d have his parents’financial support or not, he surrendered to hisyouthful passion and somehow or othermanaged to tough it out and work his waythrough university. He was spurred on by thedesire to rebel against his parents and theirinability to think of a plan, as well as hisoverflowing youth; and having experiencedputting himself through school, he developedinto a tough-as-nails individual.

The sighs of my older sister, who had lost heronly son—those were difficult. I, too, was stuck,since there wasn’t anything I could do for her.But, well, the whole thing, it’s all fate, Isuppose. It’s good that Bonian, too, went to thenaichi, but it’s too bad that those two ended upenemies.”

The old woman’s account ended here, butsomething glistened in her eyes. Yet she hadsome expression other than one of tears orlaughter, a vacant look. I had been listeningfixedly, arms crossed, but I suddenly noticedthat my entire body somehow throbbed with afeverish pain. The truth of the matter was moreor less clear now, but I was at a loss as to how Iought to understand Itoh’s mental state.However, there was no room for doubt at thatmoment. I simply had to tell the old woman thefollowing: “While Teacher Itoh’s conductcertainly wasn’t praiseworthy, his motivations,however, seem most upright. It’s too bad. Ofcourse, I can’t say anything about Bonian’sfuture, but there’s nothing to worry about. AsI’ve seen myself, that boy has a good head onhis shoulders and a sense of purpose, so I don’tthink his intellect will develop in a skeweddirection. No doubt he’ll come back theembodiment of education.”

And I didn’t forget to say this at the end, either.“Moreover, Mother, the road to advancementfor Taiwanese is not just limited to medicine.The Taiwanese of tomorrow may becomefamous soldiers or bureaucrats, or evenpioneering artists. So to kill someone’s innateindividuality—such talk would be an awfulwaste indeed.”

At that, the old woman smiled vaguely: itwasn’t clear whether she had understood ornot. Thinking my business finished, I deflectedher efforts detain me with the promise that thehead of the household and his son would soonbe home, and I headed for a station where Iought to be able to catch a night train.

It was about half a year later that I receivedBonian’s letter.

Doctor Kō,

Greetings. I’ve finally entered amilitary academy. Against thewishes of those around me. I’m

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always just swinging around abamboo sword. Bursting withenergy. I am the first Taiwanese atthis school. The ego-less happinesswhen I resolutely stand my groundand raise the bamboo swordinstantly frees me from my earlierg loom. P lease imag ine myliberation! Really, the feeling Ihave, you know it’s like a strangeforce that stirs me. It’s that instantwhen there is a sensation of agentle power running throughsomething, like when the buds on atwig have not yet bloomed. In anycase, we don’t have long-honedmethods or convoluted theories.Isn’t our only weapon our simpleyouth? I realized that in order tobe connected with the great“Yamato” spirit, we have to silentlypersevere, until it is in our veryblood. No matter how you look atit, that’s the heart of it.

However, I think that the more Ibecome a great Japanese, the moreI must be a great Taiwanese. I’msouthern-born, but that doesn’tmean I’m the least bit abject. Isoak up the lifestyle here, but thatdoesn’t at all mean that I lookdown on my hometown as out inthe sticks. No matter how much ofan unsightly native my mother is, Ilove her with all my heart. Forinstance, even if my mother wereto come here just as she is ,unseemly, I would not be the leastabashed. Because when my motherhugs me, my feelings—happiness,sadness—are all those of her child.

The other day, the news came frommy father that they were somehowgetting together the money for myschooling. But I worry about

causing difficulties for my parents.I’m going to do the best that I can.There are still a lot of things that Iwant to write, but I’ll leave themfor my next letter. Doctor, pleasewrite to me, too. It’s taken me awhile to write, but I thank youfrom the bottom of my heart for allof the care you took of me when Iwas in our town.

From Bonian

Even after I had finished reading it, I didn’t setit down. I tried to picture Bonian, with hisstrangely flushed cheeks, his youthful skinglistening with sweat, his black eyes, thoughnarrow, a-flash with light. I also tried toimagine that passion that seemed about tooverflow his body and the bulging wristtendons, knotted together, too. However,frankly, what I felt still more promising wasBonian’s character. Though not so much timehad passed since he had crossed the sea toJapan, he wasn’t becoming the least bit servile.It seemed that he hadn’t heard that TeacherItoh was supplying the money for his schooling.In this letter, there wasn’t anything about Itoh.Yet maybe Itoh was gradually becomingcomprehensible to Bonian. But this youth hadtaken the position that he would alwayscondemn turning one’s back on one’s ownmother, yokel or not. Simply put, it wasbecause, compared to Itoh, Bonian was tooinnocent.

One Sunday afternoon, thinking that I definitelywanted Itoh to read this letter, I visited thesecondary school dormitory. Unfortunately,Itoh was out. Since there was nothing I coulddo, I put the letter back into my breast pocketand went for an aimless stroll. Walking along along cobblestone street, I came to an old flightof stone steps. When I ascended them, they ledout onto a pretty, rather high grass-covered hillfrom which I could look out over the entireharbor. White clouds threaded across a

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flawless sky. Although it was mid-April, the sunwas warm enough that a brief walk was enoughto make me break out in a sweat.

I sat down on the grass and gazed at the ocean.I just sensed that my present position was on apar with the height of the mountains in front ofand behind me. My surroundings were literally“the world below.” As though soaring aloft andriding the wind, not knowing whither it takesme—these were apt words of a poet ofyore.22 Mountains, ocean, and the forest on theopposite bank, the homes lining the streetsbelow—all of them looked as though they weresmoking in the glare of the sun, but thatunexpectedly heightened the scenic beauty ofthe abandoned harbor. In the distance, I couldsee the inhospitably widening Taiwan Straits.The blue of the ocean dissolved into the blue ofthe sky: it was a color to sigh for. The way thisabandoned harbor, formerly long the cradle ofTaiwan’s culture and a trading port whose famehad been celebrated in verse, now quietlyslumbered in the midst of nature suffused withthe color of late spring—it strangely struck achord in my heart, giving rise to a sensation ofconnection to something eternal, somethingbigger than human intelligence could grasp.Where the endlessly uniformly radiantmountains and rivers, plants and trees,encountered the blindingly brilliant sky, I couldfeel the vital strength of something alive. Irealized with a start that only the splendor ofthe Japanese winters had been seared into mybrain while I had completely forgotten thegoodness of my homeland’s endless summers.It became clear that my own affection for myhomeland was lacking. Wasn’t I learning twosimple, earthly things from Itoh and Bonian?From this point on, I had to firmly plant thesefeet on this soil. Whatever the birth pangs mycountry experienced, whatever the individualpain I had to swallow, by thinking of each asthe last, I would be able to endure howevermany things, each time praying it would be thefinal one.

I’m not sure how much time had passed when Ibecame aware of a person approaching alongthe road at the immediate base of the hill.When I realized that it was definitely Itoh, Iflinched, but at once decided to call him over.Yet in the next instant, for some reason Idecided to let him go. It was a strange feeling.Was it because his attitude at the grave theother day still rankled me? No, wasn’t itperhaps because in the face of such resolve, mycourage simply to display the contents of theletter had deserted me?

I hadn’t noticed it until then, but looking downfrom atop the hill, I could count the hairs onItoh’s head, so clearly visible were they. I feltthat I had seen something I ought not to’ve,something that I could in no way undo. Weren’ttwo-thirds of those thirty-three or -four hairswhite? Suddenly, I had to recognize Itoh’sworries and anxieties, unknown to others.Despite his extraordinary robustness, heseemed unexpectedly frail. From Itoh’sstandpoint, becoming a Japanese through andthrough had meant completely distancinghimself from the backwardness of his nativeland. In order to do that, he had even had towalk all over his own flesh and blood. In effect,it was the same as destroying his own parentsfor the greater cause. Young people who hadbeen educated to “be pure Japanese, be pureJapanese” at school or in society tended to beset apart in a completely different circle whenthey went home even briefly. This is the acuteanxiety that underlies the ‘double lives’ of theyouth of this island. That’s why, in order toovercome this suffering, one probably has toveer to one extreme and attack it head on,trampling it into a fine dust. Besides, shouldour present generation wage a desperate battleto seize our liberation from ossified toxich a b i t s , t h e n e x t g e n e r a t i o n — o u rchildren—could have it as their birthright. Anddepending on how you look at it, perhaps this isjust Itoh breaking his back to atone for the sinof casting aside his countrified parents, itselfthe result of the guidance and education of the

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youth of this island, which engenders a purelyemotional, violent feeling of horror at anuneducated way of life. The affection heshowed for Bonian can’t be glossed over asmere affection. In any case, if Itoh’s white hairisn’t a manifestation of this filthy war, what isit? Although I kept on repeating and repeating,“Let it go, let it go,” for some reason, thatscene at the grave continued to flicker

ceaselessly in my mind. I was filled with adesire to cry.

Eventually, I ran down from the hill, yelling,“Shit! Shit!” And I ran like a child, tripping andsliding. And buffeted by the wind, I kept onrunning.

Erin L. Brightwell is Assistant Professor of Pre-modern Japanese Literature at the Universityof Michigan. In her research, she is particularly interested in issues of language and identityas well as the circulation of texts, motifs, and intellectual traditions both within and beyondJapan. She holds an MA in Chinese from the University of Washington (2007) and a PhD inClassical Japanese Literature from Princeton University (2014).

Notes1 See, for instance, the translation of Kim Sa-ryang’s 1939 Hikari no naka ni 光の中に (Intothe Light) in Melissa L. Wender’s collection of translated writings Into the Light: AnAnthology of Literature by Koreans in Japan (Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press, 2011):15-38.2 Faye Kleeman observes, “With the nationalist discourse of ‘resistance’ dominating the post-colonial interpretation of colonial texts, the typical reception of this body of literature [byimperial-subject writers] has been unsympathetic and disapproving.” Faye Yuan Kleeman,Under an Imperial Sun (Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press, 2003): 198. I suggest a similartrend exists for translations.3 Wu Zhuoliu, Ajia no koji アジアの孤児, (New York: Columbia University Press, 2008): v.4 Cf. Wender, 2-5.5 Taiwan Bungaku 臺灣文學 3.3 (Fall 1943): 104-129.6 Faye Kleeman notes that Ō “is sometimes considered an imperial subject-writer,” beforepointing out that The Torrent can be assessed more positively than other similar writings inthat it at the very least “proposes a dual identity” for Taiwanese subjects. Faye Kleeman,215-216. See also Leo Ching’s summary of Lin Jui-ming’s similarly sympathetic evaluation of“The Torrent.” Leo Ching, Becoming Japanese: Colonial Taiwan and the Politics of IdentityFormation (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 2001): 120-121. Yu-linLee’s more recent study of the psychological toll the imperial project takes on the charactersin the story appears to be based on Wang’s 1991 Chinese-language version. See Yu-lin Lee,“The Dislocation of Empire: An Identity Paradigm of Colonial Displacement in Wang Chang-hsiung’s A Raging Torrent,” Taiwan Literature Studies 1.1 (2007): 7-31.7 Okubo Akio 大久保明男, “Ō Chōyū ‘Honryū’ no kaiteiban ni tsuite—Nihongo-ban to no hikakukara” 王昶雄「奔流」の改訂版について−日本語版との比較から, Komazawa daigaku

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gaikokugobu ronshū 52 (August 2000): 177.8 Leo Ching, 121. See also Okubo, who also calls attention to Lü Xingchang’s speculation thatthis may have been Wang’s attempt to “prove he was not writing as an ‘imperial subject,’”before himself pointing out that documented examples of censorship on “The Torrent” arevery few. Okubo Akio, 177-178.9 On the narrator and Itoh, see Okubo Akio, 181-186. For identity (and Lin Bonian), see ibid.,187-189. Both points are summarized on the same page, 189. * This translation is based onthe reprint of the 1943 original found in Kurokawa Sō, ed., “Gaichi” no Nihongo bungaku-sen(1): Nanpō, Nan’yō/Taiwan (Tokyo: Shinjuku Shobo, 1996): 220-250. All annotations, unlessmarked otherwise, are likwise from this edition. Notes merely offering lexical glosses forobsolete Japanese terms have been omitted.10 Japan proper [as opposed to its colonies].11 Translator’s note: “middle school” would be a more literal, albeit misleading, translation ofchūgakkō 中学校, since under the educational system of the time, the chūgakkō wascomprised of five years of high-school education.12 Hontōjin 本島人 (islander) refers to Han-Chinese Taiwanese (Fujianese or Hakka).[Translator’s note: hereafter, I will use “Taiwan” or “Taiwanese” for hontō and hontōjin; giventhe importance of geography in the rest of the paragraph, however, I opted for a more literalrendering here.]13 I.e., ethnic Japanese.14 I.e., Koreans.15 Translator’s note: I have chosen to transliterate the names of the openly Taiwanesecharacters based on Mandarin pronunciation in pinyin. Thus, Rin Hakunen 林柏年 becomes“Lin Bonian.” The narrator’s surname,洪, I render as “Kō” rather than “Hong,” because theone instance in which he is referred to by name is clearly in Japanese. This was done in orderto help the reader keep clear who is Taiwanese and who is (passing as) Japanese. I have donethe same with place names, with the exception of using the conventional English spelling ofTaipei, rather than Taibei.16 Translator’s note: the original term here, hontōgo 本島語 literally means “the language ofthis island.” While it refers to a language of the Han Chinese in Taiwan, it is unclear whetherthe characters in the story are speaking Mandarin, Southern Min, or Hakka. Given thepolitical implications of going with any one of these choices, I have opted for “Chinese” in thesense of a blanket term encompassing all three of the aforementioned relatedlanguages/dialects.17 Satō (1772-1859) was a late-Edo Confucianist. From 1841 onwards, he lived out his days asan official Confucian academic of the shogunate. Although on the surface a follower of Zhu Xi,he was strongly influenced by Wang Yangming and was referred to with “Zhu and Wang/Yinand Yang” [literally Yin-Zhu, Yang-Wang].18 In a kendo team competition, the athlete who competes in the middle, between the“spearhead” [the first competitor] and the Captain.19 During the Ming and Qing dynasties, individuals who attended an imperial college afterbeing recommended on the basis of outstanding study and conduct at a provincial academy.20 The four fundamental texts of Confucianism (The Great Learning, The Doctrine of the Mean,Analects, and Mencius) and the Five Classics (The Book of Changes, The Classic of

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Documents, The Odes, The Spring and Autumn Annals, and [The Book of Rites]).21 The primary school attended by most Taiwanese children.22 A line from the “First Poetic Exposition on Red Cliff” by the Northern Song poet Su Shi 蘇軾(1036-1101), one of the Eight Masters of the Tang and Song. The original reads, “We wereswept along in a powerful surge, as if riding the winds through empty air. And not knowingwhere we would come to rest […].” [Translator’s note: the translation of Su Shi is taken fromStephen Owen, An Anthology of Chinese Literature: Beginnings to 1911 (New York andLondon: W.W. Norton & Co., 1996), 292.]