- KOKORO
- Kokoro (1914; tr. Kokoro: A Novel, 1957) is a semiepistolary novel by Natsume Soseki. First published in serial form in the Asahi newspaper, Kokoro deals with the tensions of modernity and its concomitant isolation. It is divided into three sections. The first, narrated by a character known only as “I,” discusses his friendship with an older man he calls “Sensei” (teacher or master). In the second section, the narrator travels home to the countryside due to his father’s failing health, where he receives a letter from Sensei. The entire third section, comprising nearly half the novel, is that singular letter, in which Sensei finally tells the narrator the story of the love triangle that led to the death of his childhood friend, K. Sensei then, out of loyalty and in the spirit of tradition, commits suicide in conjunction with the death of the Meiji emperor.
Historical dictionary of modern Japanese literature and theater. J. Scott Miller. 2009.
