Chapter 5.4: Sensuality is All that Matters

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 5.4: Sensuality is All that Matters

Read other chapters in My Mentor, Shintaro Ishihara

Journalist Tsutomu Suyama interviewed Shintaro Ishihara for the December 23, 2008 edition of the Mainichi Shimbun.

In the interview, Mr Ishihara said: "I have a good friend called Shin Ushijima. He writes novels, too, but he's also an outstanding lawyer specializing in economic problems. I often pick his brains, asking, for example (in the novel), 'What if I create a scene like this?' Thanks to him, the story's internal power struggles have a sense of realism and legal accuracy."

That's what he said.

Suyama asked, "Were there examples that inspired you to write about the internal dynamics of a construction company the way you did?"

He also asked, "Regarding the ending, it left the impression that there wasn't much room for hope" (laughter).

Mr Ishihara boldly replied, "As we go through life, we become attached to all sorts of things, but if one has the courage to let go of everything, then they can do anything." He concluded, "If you ask, where does that courage come from, the answer is sensuality. Eventually, it all boils down to that."

'Talk About Books'

Earlier, in a November 1, 2008 column, "Talk About Books," Ishihara said: "For the legal aspects in the book, I got advice from my close friend, the lawyer Shin Ushijima. Recently, there's been a surge in financial crimes, which is one reason I wrote a novel focusing on the inner workings of a corporation."

An editor's comment added that, "In the novel, alongside a love story between the two main characters, the dark side of big corporations and the inner workings of corporate takeovers by yakuza are meticulously described."

Although there was a promise not to disclose that I had advised him about the legal aspects of the storyline for Island of Fire (Gentosha, 2008), it seemed such trivialities mattered little to Mr Ishihara.

"Right now, I have seven different ideas for novels that I would like to write," he said in the same column. "But unfortunately, there is not much left in the stock of time for my life."

That was what the 76-year-old Shintaro Ishihara said. The phrase "not much left" was particularly telling. He thought he still had some left.

I myself am already 73 and beginning to feel that time is running out. Probably, I can still hold up. But thinking so means it is no longer a given. Once you begin measuring it, life's "stock of time" passes by at an accelerating pace.

Mr Ishihara also stated in that column, "Modern human beings are afraid of loss, which is not true passion. True passion and sensuality disregard any regrets, instead melting everything away."

Then he added, "I would like to write a modern version of 'Tristan und Isolde.'"

As I recall, "Tristan und Isolde" was performed for the opening of the Nissay Theatre in 1963, when Shintaro Ishihara was 31-years-old.

The Influence of Beauty

The reason he chose Miyakejima for the theme, he explained, was that "Before I became a politician, when I first visited Miyakejima on my sailboat, I was so impressed by the beauty of the island that I fell in love with it instantly."

It was in the summer of 1966 when Mr Ishihara was 33. That first visit to Miyakejima was later described in Sea of Men (男の海, Shuesha, 1973).

Returning to the column about his book's storyline, he explained, "It should be called more a crystallization of unbridled, festering lust, than pure love."

I know that such a "crystallization of unbridled, festering lust" is described in detail in The Life of a Man Called ”I” (Gentosha, 2022). At any rate, it is surprising that "unbridled, festering lust" becomes a "crystallized." It speaks exactly to "the awesome depth of power and lingering impact of polished and sophisticated words" that Mr Ishihara wrote about in his personal letter to me. Lust not only festers, but also crystallizes. Here is Stendhal.

Come to think of it, Mr Ishihara used the expression "unbridled lust" as a crystallization of passion in "Talk About Books." He also mentioned "the candor of forsaking everything" for passion.

In the same interview article, a staff editor asked, "What makes your pen move?"

Ishihara replied, "It is the energy inherent in the novel itself."

"I think that a genuine novel is sensual in a way that sends shivers down the reader's spine. These days, there are almost no such works. There are probably no writers of my generation who are still writing decent novels."

He thought of Saburo Shiroyama, who grew old and withered. Mr Ishihara described him that way to me, saying Shiroyama was pathetic. But he really meant that he himself was different.

Obsessed with Sensuality

Whenever I read Mr Ishihara's statements about sensuality from his later years, I cannot help but think of Junichiro Tanizaki. Mr Ishihara wrote Island of Fire at the age of 76, just as Junichiro Tanizaki wrote The Diary of a Mad Old Man (Chuokoron Shinsha Inc, 1962), also at the age of 76. But their sexual orientations were polar opposites: phallicism versus masochism.

They were, however, quite similar in that they placed sensuality at the center of life even at the ripe old age of 76. Both men possessed a mental vigor that allowed them to convey this in their novels. They also commonly used the word "damned" to describe their bodies that no longer worked the way they wanted them to.

*Obi belt from the cover of "The Last Writings" by Shintaro Ishihara*

Unlike Tanizaki, Mr Ishihara showed no trace of impotence or the inclination toward kinky masochism that it produced. On the contrary, Mr Ishihara revealed, ”Fortunately, I'm not sexually impotent even at this age," in The Road to Death, which he seemed to have written just before his death (The Last Writings, Bungeishunju Co Ltd, 2022). But both novelists, at 76, were obsessed with sensuality and sex, and in that sense, were invigorated by the same life force.

Drops of Life

Sei Ito appears.

Sei Ito described this force as "drops of life."(Metamorphosis, p 299). "It's so funny, isn't it? I often find myself bursting out laughing while reading it," Mr Ishihara told me about the novel one time when he called to tell me how he felt. Sei Ito wrote this novel at the age of 63. He was very young compared to Mr Ishihara or even to me now. The age of 63 is young.

Sei Ito stated in Metamorphosis: "The lust of old age is a manifestation of the desire to eliminate the oppressiveness of the short time remaining in life, and is a paean to life itself. This lust, which must look hideous to strangers of old age, flickered before me, spotlighting the radiance of sacred life and beckoning me." (P 369)

Mr Ishihara and Tanizaki shared another analogous trait ー they were both self-centered. They were very similar.

But I would be the one whom Mr Ishihara's self-indulgence was lost on.

Why so?

Probably, because of my own selfishness and self-centeredness.

"There is similarity in the methodology of novelists and of politicians engaged in politics. Both are oratorical, that is, they manipulate words. It may seem that they are at opposite sides of the spectrum, but actually, they are two sides of the same coin." Ishihara is quoted as saying this in his "Talk About Books" interview.

Well, well, was Mr Ishihara possibly trying to groom me, as a writer, to follow in his footsteps after I won the Akutagawa Prize? The idea flashed through my mind. But where was it that he said a politician who cannot write even a short story is pathetic?

A Historical Perspective

"If the novel is made into a movie, I would like to play the role of that lawyer," I thought.

It probably goes without saying, but I'll write it down anyway. Otherwise, I risk being subjected to unwarranted criticism for the next 100 years. If that happens, I would be too ashamed to face Mr Ishihara as his legal adviser, so I would like to set the record straight. At least, my following comment as a legal adviser to Mr Ishihara in writing Island of Fire would help literary historians in the future to save time and trouble:

What I mean is the passage in the novel: "Nishiwaki is a privately-held company, isn't it? Then, transfer restrictions should be imposed on its shares. So, it's impossible that its shares could be transferred to someone else so easily." This judgment comes from vague, half-baked knowledge.

Actually, Takayuki Nishiwaki transferred the shares he owned to a certain woman, and through her, they fell into the hands of Eizo Asanuma, the shrewd yakuza. This is the fundamental premise of the plot of Island of Fire. There may be some readers of my book, Minority Shareholders (Gentosha, 2018), who find such stock transfer incomprehensible.

However, it is easy to understand with a visual illustration.

Find the Table of Contents

(To read the book in Japanese, please visit the publisher's website.)