Kokoro

[Anonymous No.18126283]

I'm not gonna lie, this book dragged a bit in the 1st 2 parts, but when it switched to Sensei's POV for the last half I could not stop reading. I went in blind and was expecting more of a focused story, but reading about Sensei and K's relationship was excellent and pretty relatable, especially when he talks about knowingly feeling two opposite ways at the same time. I was reading about people's interpretations of the ending, and to me it seemed like the reason he did it was less about making it up to K and following his emperor then it was about preserving his wife's image of him and taking the easy way out. Anyone have some interesting takes on why he did it?

[Anonymous No.18126294]

He couldn't bear the guilt any longer after meeting K, probably because he reminded him so much of himself.

[Anonymous No.18126311]

>>18126294
Did you mean after he met the narrator of the 1st half? I didn't get the purpose of his character until I realized that he was basically just Sensei but before he lost his trust in people.

[Anonymous No.18126426]

the last line fo the suicide letter says it all
>Why did I wait so long to die?

all else is cope

[Anonymous No.18126505]

It was simple detachment. Sōseki gives away what the whole book is about when when offers a monologue from Sensei (I don’t remember when or where) that ends with something to the effect of “...loneliness is the price we must pay for living in the modern world.” Sensei felt a deep and profound sense of alienation and detachment from society around him for most of his life, having spent his formative years becoming distrustful and resentful. It reached its most rapid development with the death of K but the peak of his alienation occurred with the passing of one epoch to another, signaled by the death of the general and the emperor. It was a world that Sensei fundamentally didn’t feel a part of, a lack of feeling that seemed to only grow and then ossify throughout his life. I think Soseki tells plainly in the title of the story also what exactly this story is about. Kokoro is translated roughly as heart, but it’s not heart in merely a physical, biological sense. It’s heart as a feeling. Thus, the story is about feeling, the feeling of sensei’s relationship with the narrator, with K, with his family, and with society at large, his feelings of self loathing, guilt and disgust, which ultimately cause him to end his life.

[Anonymous No.18126633]

>>18126426
this.

I also like the idea of him following his emperor. The culture and society he grew up in, that he loved, was dead. Japan had irreversibly changed, kind of like his relationship with K. He didn't feel like he belonged in the world anymore.
Not by any means an original take, but it works.

[Anonymous No.18128004]

>>18126283
Better than any western book.