Photo by Akif Hakan found on artclit.tumblr.com
Back - once more - in the House of the Sleeping Beauties and the case of old Eguchi ...
What is he hoping to find in bed with drugged and naked teenage girls and why do his fantasies invariably involve violence and a desire to physically abuse the young bodies that stimulate such sweet memories, rather than treat them with tenderness and affection?
What is he hoping to find in bed with drugged and naked teenage girls and why do his fantasies invariably involve violence and a desire to physically abuse the young bodies that stimulate such sweet memories, rather than treat them with tenderness and affection?
Is it because male sexuality is inherently aggressive? Do all men dream of rape and incline towards tyranny as soon as they have a hard-on? I don't think so. Nor do I believe that Eguchi's anger towards the sleeping beauties is born of impotent frustration, or the ugly resentments of age (though he is acutely aware of his declining powers and his lust is doubtless driven to some degree by the approach of death).
Rather, I think we must look elsewhere for why it is Eguchi repeatedly thinks of strangling the girls, or placing his hand over their mouths and noses and so preventing them from breathing. He is aware that such acts constitute evil, but he can't help contemplating them; of sacrificing virgins, rather than merely deflowering them.
His thoughts, in other words, are atrocious rather than sensual; Eguchi wants to leave his mark on the girls and - above all - he wants to waken them and imagines that he might have a better chance of doing so were he to tear off a limb or stab with a knife, rather than place kisses on a breast or his flaccid penis between soft lips.
Ultimately, it's not the astonishing beauty of the young women that drives Eguchi mad; it's their radical passivity. He cannot bear the fact that not only do the sleeping girls not speak, but they do not know his face or hear his voice either. In other words, the girls - who have volunteered to become perfect objects - negate his subjectivity so that not even the smallest part of his existence is acknowledged.
It's the desire to still be recognised as a man and a living being in the eyes of the world that is uppermost in his heart - and this is precisely what is denied him. And so, even when sandwiched between the naked bodies of two women, Eguchi knows himself to be fatally isolate and alone - just like the rest of us at last.
Note: 'House of the Sleeping Beauties', by Yasunari Kawabata, can be found in House of the Sleeping Beauties and Other Stories, trans. Edward Seidensticker, with an introduction by Yukio Mishima, (Kodansha International, 1980).
Rather, I think we must look elsewhere for why it is Eguchi repeatedly thinks of strangling the girls, or placing his hand over their mouths and noses and so preventing them from breathing. He is aware that such acts constitute evil, but he can't help contemplating them; of sacrificing virgins, rather than merely deflowering them.
His thoughts, in other words, are atrocious rather than sensual; Eguchi wants to leave his mark on the girls and - above all - he wants to waken them and imagines that he might have a better chance of doing so were he to tear off a limb or stab with a knife, rather than place kisses on a breast or his flaccid penis between soft lips.
Ultimately, it's not the astonishing beauty of the young women that drives Eguchi mad; it's their radical passivity. He cannot bear the fact that not only do the sleeping girls not speak, but they do not know his face or hear his voice either. In other words, the girls - who have volunteered to become perfect objects - negate his subjectivity so that not even the smallest part of his existence is acknowledged.
It's the desire to still be recognised as a man and a living being in the eyes of the world that is uppermost in his heart - and this is precisely what is denied him. And so, even when sandwiched between the naked bodies of two women, Eguchi knows himself to be fatally isolate and alone - just like the rest of us at last.
Note: 'House of the Sleeping Beauties', by Yasunari Kawabata, can be found in House of the Sleeping Beauties and Other Stories, trans. Edward Seidensticker, with an introduction by Yukio Mishima, (Kodansha International, 1980).
