Five Faces of Japanese Feminism: Crimson and Other Works

281 Pages·2016·1.606 MB·English

by  Ineko Sata

Five F aces of
Japan ese Feminism

Five F aces of
Japan ese Feminism
CRIMSON
AND OTHER WORKS
SATA INEKO
Translated with an Introduction
by Samuel Perry
University of Hawai‘i Press
Honolulu
© 2016 University of Hawai‘i Press
All rights reserved
Printed in the United States of Amer i ca
21 20 19 18 17 16 6 5 4 3 2 1
Library of Congress Cataloging- in- Publication Data
Names: Sata, Ineko, 1904–1998, author. | Perry, Samuel, translator,
writer of introduction. | Sata, Ineko, 1904–1998. Kurenai. En glish. Con-
tainer of (expression):
Title: Five faces of Japa nese feminism : Crimson and other works / Sata Ineko ;
translated with an introduction by Samuel Perry.
Description: Honolulu : University of Hawai‘i Press, [2016] | Translation of
a novel and four short stories by the Japa nese writer.
Identifiers: LCCN 2016002778 | ISBN 9780824866136 (cloth ; alk. paper)
Subjects: LCSH: Sata, Ineko, 1904–1998— Translations into En glish. |
Japan— Fiction.
Classification: LCC PL838.A8 A2 2016 | DDC 895.63/44— dc23 LC rec ord
available at http:// lccn .l oc. gov/ 2016002778
The cover art, “ Woman in White Lace” (1954) by Domoto Insho, has been
used with the permission of the Kyoto Prefectural Insho- Domoto Museum of
Fine Arts.
University of Hawai‘i Press books are printed on acid- free
paper and meet the guidelines for permanence and
durability of the Council on Library Resources.
Designed by Mardee Melton
Contents
vii
Acknowl edgments
ix
A Note on Names
1
Introduction
27
“Café Kyoto” (1929)
64
“Tears of a Factory Girl in the Union Leadership” (1931)
82
“The Scent of Incense” (1942)
98
“White and Purple” (1950)
126
Crimson (1936–1938)

Acknowl edgments
I want to begin by acknowledging Norma Field for introducing
me to Sata Ineko’s work in a gradu ate seminar at the University of
Chicago almost two de cades ago. Thank you, Norma, for sup-
porting my interest in literary translation ever since.
I am deeply grateful to the University of Hawai‘i Press,
and to my editors t here, Pamela Kelley and Debra Tang, as well as
to production editor Deborah Grahame- Smith and copyeditor
Virginia Perrin, for their help in the production pro cess. I thank
Yuki Sakurai and my colleague, Kikuko Yamashita, for their phil-
ological expertise.
My sincere thanks go to Sata Ineko’s heirs for allowing me
to translate and publish her works for an En glish-speaking audi-
ence, and to the Kyoto Prefectural Insho- Domoto Museum of Fine
Arts for their permission to use the painting on the cover.
A generous grant from Brown University helped to cover
the costs of securing t hese rights, while a Translation Fellowship of-
fered by the National Endowment for the Arts helped to jumpstart
the production of this book by funding my translation of Crimson.
I want to thank Alexis Dudden for being the world’s best
cook and travel companion and magnificent friend— and for
helping me make it far enough in the acad emy so that I might see
this translation proj ect through to the end.
vii
viii Acknowledgments
The word feminism appeared in the title of this book
rather late in the publication pro cess, but I dedicate this transla-
tion to my mother, Rhoda Perry, the first feminist in my life, as
well as to my b rother Alexander Perry and his d aughter Paige
Perry, whose feisty eight- year- old self suggests the coming of an-
other one in the family.
A Note on Names
As is now common practice among scholars of Japa nese lit er a ture,
all East Asian names in this book—of both historical figures and
fictional characters— appear in traditional East Asian order with
surname first. In the case of Sata Ineko, for example, Sata is the
author’s surname and Ineko her given name. B ecause Sata’s fiction
describes a wide spectrum of gendered, class positions, it should
be noted that the characters in her works are sometimes referred
to by their last name, sometimes by their first, and at other times
with the polite suffix “- san,” the diminutive suffix “- chan,” and/
or the feminine, honorific prefix “O-” attached, as in the case of
O- Yō- san in “Café Kyoto.” Macrons are used to indicate extended
vowels except in cases such as Tokyo, where common spelling con-
ventions prevail, and in cases of onomatopoeia.
The names of Koreans and Korean places in “White and
Purple” are sometimes rendered with the Japa nese pronunciation
and sometimes with the Korean. This selective use of dif er ent
reading practices is meant to preserve some of the historical spec-
ificity of Japanese- occupied Korea that a more consistent practice
of Romanization might not easily accommodate, while at the
same time keeping familiar those places that English- speaking
audiences can still recognize t oday.
ix