Mr Shintaro Ishihara was the Goethe of Japan. I was his pupil, a person in the same profession and his escort runner. Here I have woven together my private recollections which span as long as twenty-plus years of his life and death, and "my unfulfilled promise" to him. ー Shin Ushijima
(Trigger Warning: This chapter contains references to suicide.)
Chapter 1.1: Of 死 Death
Follow the book, My Mentor, Shintaro Ishihara, by Shin Ushijima, as it's published.
Much to my regret, I betrayed the expectations of Shintaro Ishihara.
"I want you to win the Akutagawa Prize. I'm sure you can do it. Just writing 150 pages of manuscript will do. I've already put in a good word with the magazine on your behalf."
It was in 2002, the 14th year of Heisei, that Mr Ishihara said this to me.
On that occasion, he also told me, "You write with great finesse."
He had already read the short stories that I had contributed to The Sankei Shimbun in a series. The serialization commenced in February 2002 and lasted for about two years, with a complete short story published once a month. Later, all seventeen installments were made into a collection of short stories, which were later compiled into a book. It is still available through Gentosha Inc. In each installment, a lawyer named Tadashi Ooki appears and sets the stage for the drama.
"Your writing is masterful. Each installment is very well-written, and its story deserves to be made into a novel."
It was flattering to receive such words from Mr Ishihara.
In those days, Mr Ishihara was also serializing a monthly column called "Nihon Yo" (日本よ, "Oh Japan") in The Sankei Shimbun. There was a story behind this serialization: Jun Eto, Mr Ishihara's close friend, had serialized a column called "Tsuki ni Ichido" (月に一度, "Once a Month") in The Sankei Shimbun, but he had taken his own life in the middle of the serialization. So after his death, Mr Ishihara stepped in to contribute his column as a successor to Mr Eto.
Catching Ishihara's Eye
My own series began when Mr Shigeki Takarada, a Sankei reporter, encouraged me to serialize my short stories in the newspaper. He had featured my book, The Shareholders Meeting, in a 1997 book review in the newspaper. Akira Shibata, who was in charge of the book for the publisher, Gentosha, had introduced us.
Since then, we have been on good terms, and he eventually extended an opportunity to serialize my stories in the newspaper. Fortunately, the stories caught Mr Ishihara's eye.
Encouraged by his words, I excitedly wrote in my 2003 New Year's cards, "I have set myself a great goal for this year." But I was told to "wait for one year." The person who said that to me was, of course, Mr Ishihara. My "great goal" was to write a novel that would satisfy Mr Ishihara's expectations. Little did I guess that writing a novel to Mr Ishihara's satisfaction was beyond difficult.
Mr Ishihara referred to me in an interview in the spring of 2003 in the first edition of a magazine called en-taxi (Fusosha Publishing Inc). He said, "Funnily enough, I know a strange mystery writer named Shin Ushijima. He's the most sought-after lawyer in Tokyo. So, he's got a lot of materials for stories. But Toru Kenjo of Gentosha told him brutally and honestly that the characters in his novels somehow don't jump out of the pages and act as if they were real. He's absolutely right."
Certainly, Mr Ishihara and Mr Kenjo enlightened me. I remember it well.
Ishihara's Autographs
In the interview for the magazine, Mr Ishihara also said that he and I had talked about Sei Ito and that I might overcome my problem if I successfully change my consciousness, bound in the folds of my current lifestyle, to a different life pattern.
Ishihara was 70 years old, while I was 53 at that time.
Kenjo had introduced me to Mr Ishihara. That was on November 19, 1998. This all happened during the brief four years' time after he had vacated his Lower House seat, until he became the Governor of Tokyo.
When I met Mr Ishihara, I happened to have a calligraphy sheet, inscribed with a passage from Fruits of the Earth by André Gide: "Nathaniel, I will teach you passion… After expressing on this earth all that was in me waiting to be expressed ー I want to be satisfied, or die in utter despair." It was a work Mr Ishihara had cited in his own book, and I asked him to sign it for me.
As he was signing his name, he said playfully, "You're behaving like a literary youth," and kindly corrected my spelling of "Nathaniel" carefully by hand.
The flyleaf of my copy of Ishihara Shintaro Tanpen Zenshu (石原慎太郎短編全集Ⅰ ("The Complete Short Stories of Shintaro Ishihara, Volume 1"). First published by Shinchosha Publishing Co, Ltd, in 1973, my copy also has Mr Ishihara's signature. I must have brought it with me at that time. The book, which comes in two volumes, cost me ￥4,000 JPY (today, $26) each, which was a fortune at the time. I wonder how I could have afforded such expensive books in my student days.
Failing Ishihara
Perhaps it gives away that I have been a big fan of Ishihara's for a long time. Of the stories in the book, I was most attracted to the one titled "Shokei no Heya." (処刑の部屋, "The Execution Room").
Nevertheless, after making Mr Ishihara wait not just one but many years, ultimately, I failed to write what he had hoped for.
"I'm stepping down as a member of the Akutagawa Prize selection committee," Mr Ishihara told me. He went out of his way to pay a visit to me at my present law firm. Records show that he quit as a member of the Akutagawa Prize selection committee in 2012, so it must have been a little before that.
Mr Ishihara was such a thoughtful and conscientious person. I had kept him waiting for 10 years, from 2002 until 2012, only to fail to fulfill my promise. It was a terrible thing to do and is my great regret.
Obsessed with Mishima
"Show me your office," he told me when he visited my office for the very first time. We had just finished dining at the nearby City Club of Tokyo, a few minutes' walk away. On the way back from the restaurant, passersby looked at us over their shoulders as we walked side-by-side. Especially, when we stopped at a crosswalk waiting for the light to change, all eyes seemed to be looking up at Mr Ishihara.
In my office, Mr Ishihara suddenly whispered to me, "Mishima was really a brilliant man," in a deeply reflective tone. Responding, I thoughtlessly blurted out, "No matter what, you cannot get the better of him, can you?"
"Why?" Mr Ishihara asked with a trifle of vexation.
"You know, Yukio Mishima committed seppuku (ritual disembowelment) at the age of 45. You've outlived him by many years ー you've managed to live until 66. How can you change this fact?" I answered. And Mr Ishihara replied, "Shut up. If I'm ever driven to die, I'll douse myself with kerosene and burn myself to death."
I tried to understand Ishihara's mixed feelings toward Yukio Mishima.
On the one hand, there was Mishima, the man who graduated from the Tokyo University Faculty of Law, served as a bureaucrat in the Ministry of Finance, and then became a novelist. On the other hand, there was Mr Ishihara, who entered Hitotsubashi University, shot to fame as a popular writer during his student days, became a politician, and then walked away from it all.
My Mentor, Shintaro Ishihara TABLE of CONTENTS
Follow the book as it's published
(To read the book in Japanese, please visit the publisher's website.)
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Author: Shin Ushijima
Ushijima & Partners, Attorneys at Law
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