#9 QUICKSAND (7/10)
by Jun'ichirō Tanizaki (谷崎 潤一郎)
I was standing in line to get my matcha when the man in front of me started talking. He surprised me because he had as much energy as a ball of rubber bands and when he spoke he practically shook the stylish basement we were standing in. His name was Ichiro Nakayama and he was a theatre director. When I mentioned my feelings for Yasunari Kawabata he laughed—this was a recurring theme during my time in Japan and I made sense of it by imagining a Japanese girl in Ireland saying oh you know James Joyce? I love him... Ichiro told me I HAD to read Tanizaki so when I found Infinity Books in Sumida City and saw Tanizaki’s QUICKSAND among their sparse selection of Japanese novels in English my mind was made up for me.
No one thinks they are driven by power. Most people are proud that they are the ones who aren’t driven by power—but how easily it sneaks up on us when we think we see signs of our power, in reality. I am at a Korean ceramics exhibition and as I approach a melon-shaped Meiping vase the woman who is already standing there moves, as if to make way for me. But the movement is unnecessary—there is more than enough room for the two of us to comfortably stare at the vase. I have presence. Or, this is a sign of power. Moses and the parting of the sea. Me: at the gallery, a soft woman moves prematurely, needlessly, out the way for me—until I catch myself. You too are seduced by the idea of being powerful.
This novel has to have one of the best beginnings I have EVER read:
Do forgive me for bothering you again, but I simply had to see you today—I want you to hear my side of the story, from beginning to end. Are you sure you don’t mind? I know how busy you are with your own writing, and if I go into every last detail it might take forever! Really, I only wish I could put it all down on paper, like one of your novels, and ask you to read it… the truth is, the other day I tried to start writing, but what happened is so complicated I didn’t know where to begin. So I thought I’d just have to talk it out, and that’s why I’m here. But then, I hate to let you waste your precious time for my sake. Are you quite sure it’s all right? You’ve always been so sweet to me I’m afraid I’m taking advantage of your kindness, and after everything you’ve put up with…
This madly conversational voice comes out of nowhere and it’s brilliant because not only is this the voice of the main character Sonoko but I think it is ALSO Jun'ichirō Tanizaki HIMSELF talking to his reader acknowledging the simping inherent in the writer’s act…
I only wish I could put it all down on paper and ask you to read it… are you quite sure it’s all right?
And I LOVE the simping inherent in the writer’s act—please read me oh please please read me I promise to do the perfect combination of spelling out and drawing in and slow reveal and sharp shock intuitive break dance with your head between my palms and all the other diaphanous intellectual massages in-between… it’s so pathetic, but somehow, still, cool.
QUICKSAND is an incredibly erotic novel.
So erotic I have to keep putting it down to make abstract plans for the future… it’s sticky, and circular,—the way gossip can be. And it’s both formally interesting AND easy to read.
Before it was called QUICKSAND it was called MANJI (Buddhist swastika) with each prong referring to one of the four lovers involved in the story—so that’s a Buddhist spin-off on the well-known love square, but how much more interesting/loaded/twisted/shocking than a love square? I’ve been in a love square myself before but it felt much more like a… love swastika (nazi inflection.)
Judging by the author’s notes which appear sporadically throughout this text, it seems to work as a critique of those intense or extreme kinds of love which happen sometimes. Tanizaki seems to be pointing to the hidden egotism at play there…
For example, Narrator, who is a self-conscious character in this novel, describes the hand-writing of one of the characters as,
Somewhat slippery and unctuous
And true to form, in the midst of her sisterly wetness for Mitsuko, Sonoko, infers the divine presence of Mitsuko’s name (her beloved) even in the dripping of a leaky tap,
Drip-drop, drip-drop… what can they be whispering softly to me:
Drip-drop, drip-drop…
Ah, yes! Mitsuko, Mitsuko, Mitsuko…
This is certainly slippery territory. As with one of my own love stories recently, I had expected a particular relationship to become a major thread in my life… until it ended. Very shortly, after it began. I mention it here because Watanuki, the beautiful liar of this novel, strongly reminds me of this man…
Except, perhaps, where Watanuki was impotent, G was heartless. Heartlessness has its own kind of impotency.
To put it in a nutshell, he wore the mask of a lover in order to take advantage of women.
Tanizaki misleads the reader in a crafty way because he starts by telling them a story about a particular man in a particular relationship and we, poor pathetic reader in the dark, we assume why this must be our story!
But then it isn’t. And it isn’t. Again and again. Making QUICKSAND an incredible lesson in the art of using smoke and mirrors whilst storytelling.
Because this isn’t the art of the story within the story within the story… no, this is all about waving multiple story lines in your reader’s dutiful face and misleading them as to which one is going to turn into the main event—all without pissing them off, which isn’t easy.
Tanizaki is so very clearly from this novel, a master of his craft.
Huge appreciative sigh,
Tilly.
Next.