DEAR HENDRICK,--I am glad to hear that you are a strong and successful
swimmer in that awful sea of struggle, and that your home is happy.
Having two little ones, you can understand now what the Japanese call
_Mono no aware_,--weirdly translated by Aston as "the Ah-ness of
things."[3]
[3] More literally, "the pity of things."
Thanks for the Martinique clippings. The Swede's account seems to me
possibly apocryphal,--for his localizations are all wrong. The other man
did, apparently, visit Saint-Pierre, and explore the vicinity.--I opened
and re-read that black day a letter from Saint-Pierre, enclosing a spray
of arborescent fern, labelled "From the sunny garden."
The time is approaching in which I must go abroad, for my boy's sake.
To Queen Elizabeth I wrote, asking for a possible smoothing of the way;
and if you can put a spoke in my wheel any time about next spring, or
during the summer, I should be as grateful as I can--which is nothing to
brag of, I need scarcely say. I should like some easy post, for about
two years. "Easy posts" must be in sharp demand; and I am not sure that
I am asking for the possible. New York is, of course, the place where I
do not want to go--for my lad's sake; but I shall probably make a flying
trip there,--if the gods allow.
For the time being, I am with Macmillan. But I fancy really that all
publishers regard authors merely as units in a calculation,--excepting
the great guns who, like Kipling, can force strong respect. I need
scarcely tell you that my books do not make me rich. In fact, I have
given up thinking about the business side of literature, and am quite
content to obtain the privilege of having my book produced according
to my notion of things. Still, by reason of various translations into
Swedish, Danish, German and French, I have some literary encouragements.
I believe you know that I have three boys: they are sturdy lads
all--though the eldest is rather too gentle up to date. I live
altogether in Old Japan, outside of lecture-hours; and might think
myself lucky, but for that "Ah-ness of things." Of course, I have become
somewhat old--it is more than twelve years since I saw you! And then I
have had to learn a multitude unspeakable of unpleasant things. But, as
they say here, _Shikata ga nai_! There's no help for that!
Japan is changing rapidly, as you can imagine; and the changes are not
beautiful. I try to keep within fragments of the old atmosphere--that
linger here and there, like those bands of morning-coloured mist which
you have seen spanning Japanese pictures. Within these wreaths of the
lifting mirage, all is Fairy-land still; and my home will always have
its atmosphere of thousands of years ago. But in the raw light outside,
the changings are ugly and sad.
Ever faithfully,
Y. KOIZUMI.