Countryside teacher - Inakakyoshi

A full-length novel by Tayama Katai. Published by Sakuraya Shobo in 1909 (Meiji 42). When he graduated from the old Kumagaya Junior High School in Saitama Prefecture, Hayashi Seizo was full of strong ambition and, in a romantic atmosphere, had staked his future on literature. However, when he was rejected as a substitute teacher at Miroku Elementary School in Hanyu, Saitama Prefecture, he was soon plagued by a sense of failure and poverty, and realized that all his efforts, including publishing a coterie magazine, studying plants, taking the entrance exam for a music school, and studying clouds, were ultimately in vain. Born into a weak constitution, Seizo eventually contracted tuberculosis and ended his short life while listening to the lantern procession announcing the fall of Liaoyang. Incorporating the "impressionistic descriptions" of Turgenev and Goncourt, this work attempts to objectively capture Katai's own military experience and the image of a young man at the bottom of society in Japan during the Russo-Japanese War.

[Ichiro Kobayashi]

"Countryside Teacher (Iwanami Bunko, Obunsha Bunko, Kadokawa Bunko, Shincho Bunko)"

Source: Shogakukan Encyclopedia Nipponica About Encyclopedia Nipponica Information | Legend

田山花袋(かたい)の長編小説。1909年（明治42）左久良書房刊。埼玉県の旧制熊谷中学校を卒業するときは、激しい野望に燃え、ローマン的空気のなかで、文学に将来をかけようとした林清三も、埼玉県羽生(はにゅう)在の弥勒(みろく)尋常高等小学校の代用教員として落とされて行くときには早くも挫折(ざせつ)感と貧困にさいなまれ、同人雑誌の発行、植物研究、音楽学校受験、雲の研究などすべての努力もしょせん無駄な努力と知った。生来病弱であった清三は、ついに結核に冒され、遼陽(りょうよう)陥落の提灯(ちょうちん)行列の声を聞きながら、短い生涯を閉じたのである。ツルゲーネフやゴンクールの「印象描写」を取り入れ、花袋自身の従軍の体験と、日露戦争下の日本の底辺にいる青年の姿を客観的にとらえようとした作である。

［小林一郎］

『『田舎教師』（岩波文庫・旺文社文庫・角川文庫・新潮文庫）』

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