However, within the story itself, Sensei's testament is another written dimension which itself reflects upon another earlier time. The frame of the entire story, one should not forget, is the narrator writing after the events of the story. However, Natsume also pays close attention to natural surroundings and often details them in simple, restrained descriptions reminiscent of traditional Japanese writing.ĭiscuss the different layers of narrative in the story. Sensei often tries to dig deep into his own consciousness to find the underlying reasons for his outward actions, just as the narrator does when he presses Sensei about his past. Which aspects of this novel are distinctly Western? Which are distinctly Eastern?Įspecially in Sensei's testament, Natsume pays close attention to the internal psychologies of his characters, showing his Western influences. K on the other hand holds both women and love in low regard, due to his Buddhist-influenced worldview. In doing so, Sensei seems to have imagined his wife as the living ideal of a Japan which is swiftly passing, looking upon her from the perspective of a fallen modern man.
Sensei too notices this outstanding quality in her, but even more than the narrator he is obsessed with her beauty and considers it her defining characteristic to such an extent that he seems to equate her person with it.
The two women in the novel, Ojosan (or Sensei's wife) and the narrator's mother, are both similar in that they are traditionally minded Japanese wives, but Sensei's wife receives much more respect from the narrator due to her intuition. Any many years of having done this, Sensei seemed to have become inured to the prospect of death, and so when the circumstances were right, he was able to kill himself.ĭiscuss the different attitudes towards women in the novel. Sensei writes in the beginning of his testament of his longtime suicidal thoughts and how out of cowardice and a reluctance to abandon his wife he never followed through with his plans, instead deciding to live a dead man's life by doing nothing. However, his decision to finally kill himself obviously involves at least two other elements: the indelible guilt for causing K's suicide and the possibility of sharing his story with the narrator. The proximate cause of Sensei's suicide is the news of General Nogi's suicide and Sensei's wife reminding him of the concept of junshi. What was the motivation of Sensei's suicide?
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