Dark Painting - Kurai-e

A short story by Noma Hiroshi. It was first published in the April, August, and October 1946 issues of Kibachi. It was published the following year as the first in Shinzenbi-sha's Apres-guerre Creatrice series. The story is set in the 1930s, when the left-wing revolutionary movement was almost completely destroyed by government oppression. Shinsuke Fukami, a student aspiring to become an artist, sees his fellow activists' determination to risk their lives in a hopeless resistance to militarism as "an inevitable righteousness," but in order to make that righteousness the true righteousness of his own life, he chooses a path that reeks of self-preservation and egoism, and breaks away from his fellow activists. After that, his fellow activists die one after the other in prison. This is a representative work of the first postwar generation, depicting the miserable youth of wartime through the medium of Bruegel's paintings, and marking the starting point of the postwar period.

[Kensuke Benino]

"Dark Paintings" (Shincho Bunko/Obunsha Bunko)

Source: Shogakukan Encyclopedia Nipponica About Encyclopedia Nipponica Information | Legend

野間宏(ひろし)の短編小説。1946年（昭和21）4、8、10月号の『黄蜂(きばち)』に発表。翌年、真善美社の「アプレゲール・クレアトリス叢書(そうしょ)」第1回として刊行された。官憲の弾圧によって左翼革命運動がほとんど壊滅的状況にあった昭和10年代を背景とする。芸術に志す学生深見進介(しんすけ)は、軍国主義に対する絶望的な抵抗に命を賭(か)けていこうとする活動仲間の決意を「仕方のない正しさ」としながらも、自らはその正しさを真の正しさとするために自己保存と我執の臭(にお)いのする道を選択し、仲間たちと訣別(けつべつ)する。その後、仲間たちは次々と獄死する。戦時下の悲惨な青春をブリューゲルの絵を軸に描き、戦後の出発点を示した第一次戦後派の代表作。

［紅野謙介］

『『暗い絵』（新潮文庫・旺文社文庫）』

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