Mr Shintaro Ishihara was the Goethe of Japan. I was his pupil, someone in the same profession, and his escort runner. In this chapter, I have woven together more of my private recollections, spanning as long as twenty-plus years, and "my unfulfilled promise" to him. ー Shin Ushijima
Chapter 4.7: Building the Plot
Read other chapters in My Mentor, Shintaro Ishihara
Mr Shintaro Ishihara brainstormed ideas for the plot of his new novel in the meeting room at my law firm in early in the year. Having yet to put them on paper, he continued to stream his thoughts as I listened.
"The president's younger brother lets go of his shares, giving them to a woman. Then, somewhere along the line, those shares fall into the hands of a shrewd yakuza, who is a childhood friend of the president's wife. The yakuza blackmails the company with the acquired shares, demanding to be a member of the holding company."
"Does it mean that he wants to be a director?" I asked him for confirmation.
Mr Ishihara replied in high spirits, "Legally speaking, yes, it does," and continued. "The chairman flat-out refuses, saying, 'No.' So, the shrewd yakuza kills the chairman. Needless to say, the police embark on an investigation into his death. But they cannot obtain any conclusive evidence because the yakuza uses a rental truck to kill the chairman. The directors of the company suspect that the chairman's death is unnatural, but they decline to make it known to the public."
After explaining all of this, Mr Ishihara said to me, "The novel begins with the scene of the chairman's funeral." "It is assumed that the directors are aware of the existence of the promissory note, but I haven't developed the story yet as to what the directors do with that."
Certainly, as published, Island of Fire (火の島, Gentosha, 2018), begins with the scene of the chairman's funeral.
As was always the case with him, Mr Ishihara leapt to whatever thought popped into his mind mid-conversation.
Enter Irwin Shaw
That day, like a bolt of lightning, he said, "There's a book written by Irwin Shaw called Evening in Byzantium" (Delacorte Press, 1973).
In the story, a middle-aged, male playwright falls in love with an intelligent young woman, about the same age as his daughter, who comes to interview him. He becomes so obsessed with her that he seriously considers divorcing his wife just to be with her. Considering the content, around that time, Mr Ishihara must have been in love with a woman who was way too young, who had probably interviewed him. It must have been a deep, sensual relationship ー readers of The Life of a Man Called ”I” (Gentosha, 2022) may recognize her.
"Irwin Shaw's The Young Lions (Random House, 1948) is good, too, and it was made into a movie," he said with a facial expression as if going deeper into his inner self. Possibly, he was reminiscing over his life full of sensual delight with that woman.
"And Mathilde of Le Rouge et le Noir" (1830). Again, he leapt to a different topic.
Le Rouge et le Noir was a particular favorite of Ishihara's.
Contrary to the public perception of him as a spoiled rich kid from Shonan, Ishihara described himself as "a self-made man." Having recognized himself as such, perhaps he identified with Julien Sorel in Le Rouge et le Noir ー a young man who never regretted taking advantage of women for the purpose of rising in the world and yet who was enveloped in women's love.
The Music Foundation
Abruptly, Mr Ishihara said, "There's a foundation…for music."
Back to thinking about his new novel, he started to talk nonstop again.
"It's a prestigious foundation and has a relationship with Her Majesty the Empress. The president's younger brother gets deeply involved and, for the foundation, he embezzles the company's money. With the chairman gone, the elder brother becomes his father's successor, that is, the president. Worried that his younger brother might be arrested, he makes a certain decision."
Saying that he needed to work out more details, Mr Ishihara ended the talk there for the time being.
The next time he called was on April 19, 2005. It was only six days after our previous conversation.
We talked until 5:35 in the evening.
He had called the previous day at 5:04 PM. My secretary told him I was away, but asked whether she could have me call him back. Mr Ishihara replied, "No, thank you. I just wanted to express my thanks to Mr Ushijima. Please tell him that I'll call him again."
As it turned out, he called around the same time the following day.
Mr Ishihara obviously was anxious to talk with me on the phone, but he did not ask my secretary to tell me to call him back. Undoubtedly, he thought he should avoid bothering me.
That was very like Mr Ishihara, courteous and considerate.
Finishing the Plot
On April 19, Mr Ishihara's mood was highly elevated from the beginning.
"I've made considerable progress in the plot. I spent considerable time over the last week working on it in Zushi. The story is about the woman and the shrewd yakuza. It's premised on the yakuza holding shares in the holding company, and I was curious what would actually happen at an actual general shareholders meeting. So I asked a friend at a construction company how it would work in a real-life situation. The friend told me that many things are brought up at general shareholders' meetings, even dissolution, but that no yakuza are involved."
"That may well be so," I responded. "A listed company would never tell the Governor of Tokyo that, 'Truth is, we have created a demolition company to take care of the off-the-books funds.' Not even if it actually had."
"You're right," Mr Ishihara admitted. "How about if the company deceives an outside director, driving him into a difficult position? The company is framing him in a desperate attempt to oust him."
"If that happens, the outside director would most likely be able to push back against the company using his position."
"But anyway," Mr Ishihara suggested, "let's have the company make a demolition outfit to find a way to oust him or something like that." It seemed that Mr Ishihara was groping to work out finer points of the plot.
I offered a legal hypothetical. "For example, suppose that the managing director takes advantage of his position as an executive and cuts a big deal arbitrarily. Then, the company gets scared and demotes him to a part-time position. And that former managing director possibly lashes out and tries to get back at the company."
End of the Year
I don't know how useful it was to Mr Ishihara, but he sounded satisfied, and our telephone conversation ended.
At the end of the year, on December 31, 2005, I received another phone call from Mr Ishihara. That was the phone conversation in which we talked about Saburo Shiroyama.
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(To read the book in Japanese, please visit the publisher's website.)
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Author: Shin Ushijima
