“The Makioka Sisters” by Junichiro Tanizaki

Tanizaki’s “The Makioka Sisters” is a story about four sisters who are on the brink of losing certain traditions and cultures obtained through their historical family to the changing world of Japan during the mid-20th century. A critical analysis of the varying degrees of cultural change over Japan and the wider world, the reader sees tensions grow between the sisters as all four of them seem to want different things from the world. Whilst there is a sister who prefers the lavish and feminine lifestyle of old, without worry and without an occupation or hobbies. Whereas, another sister prefers the world of the working woman and thus, turns the Makioka tradition of non-working, uneducated females upside-down. Her want to have hobbies, make a professional of herself and other things creates great tensions. But the sister that creates the most tension is the one that has not been able to get married. She may have suitors but after a newspaper-bred scandal that left her reputation amongst Makioka and other Japanese people alike, she has been unable to find a husband for herself and her family are extremely worried that, like the working woman, this will tarnish the historical name of Makioka. As far as tradition and females go, there are many characters who want to protect the culture of rich history that has many, many years and generations of members. However, with the war at hand, there are things that required to be changed in order to survive - even if this concerns being modernised within the confines of a traditional family who do not think certain things should be done by women. The symbolic nature of the sisters seems to represent the way in which war changes a population. There are obviously those who want to keep the current regime that is the old one at any cost - even if it means losing people they love. There are then the ones who care not for the modern world at all and want to keep everyone within the older regime in hope of keeping the tradition alive and thriving. Then finally we have the modern ones who care not for traditions and regimes, but choose to grow up with the world, growing together and changing to modernise. These are considered the best adapted to survive after the war. They may be considered to be best adapted but this novel also takes into account the fact that old and new are required equally in order for the world to move on from history. History is where we learn from and the modern is what we strive towards. This is exactly how the book sees things as well.

The way in which women are seen is very important as to the way the reader understands them. First of all, we have the example of Yukiko and Taeko appearing slightly out of place for women of their age. This is the first indication of Yukiko and Taeko being different in behaviour to the other sisters as well as appearance:

“…Yukiko would have been taken for perhaps twenty-two or three, and Taeko was sometimes mistaken for a sixteen- or seventeen-year-old. Yukiko had reached an age when it was no longer appropriate to address her as a girl, and yet no one found it strange that she should be ‘young Miss Yukiko’…” (p.31)

It is clear from this that the foreshadowing suggests that there will definitely be tension between Sachiko, the more traditional sister and these two siblings, but also between Yukiko and Taeko themselves. This will turn into the build-up and main problem during the novel, which definitely concern the marriages of Yukiko and Taeko.

Sachiko is the traditional sister and thus, she wants to keep Yukiko and Taeko in her grasp. But her main concern is that she is attached to her past. This is something that the reader will recognise as a fault in her character as not only can she not emotionally progress, but because of her traditional ways, she feels strongly against voicing many of her concerns as well. The reader sees this in many instances throughout the novel, not only explicitly negative, but mostly emotionally harmful to Sachiko’s character:

“They had, as little girls, been especially delighted with the way in which the samisen refrain echoed in solfeggio the word chirimen, ‘crepe’. ‘The Lovely Maid of Miyako, Ton Chirimen’ had become a nursery song, and Sachiko remembered it alone of the jiuta, the old Osaka songs…” (p.71).

This represents one of the better memories of Sachiko, but is still, as she always is, tinged with a slight sadness in nostalgia. She is the more traditional one and thus, when she returns to these memories, she mostly returns to loneliness as the others grow up in a modernised world and forget their past. Sachiko cannot escape her own and though Yukiko cannot escape hers either, Sachiko feels more repenting towards her own though she has done not much evil. She seeks to repair everyone else as well, her mind constantly turning on where she went wrong in bringing her sisters back to the traditional Makioka way.

Another aspect of Sachiko’s character is that she wants to stay in Osaka whilst the other sisters want to travel. It is clear that Taeko wants to travel around the world, constantly going back and forth from Tokyo and cancelling a much-wanted trip to France after many French Lessons. But Sachiko is determined to make a nice life for herself in the small, traditional Osaka and wishes to stay there at all costs. Her life is in Osaka and so, she is constantly concerned about the family she has built and the life she wanted for herself:

“Sachiko wondered what her husband would think. In view of Tsuruko’s tone, they need expect little resistance from the main house. Would he say even so that it would be best to wait?…” (p.128)

But again, even though Sachiko chooses to focus on her life and her family, she cannot escape the concern of her memory and her past. Her emotional requirement to stay in her own place is visualised by her dislike of Tokyo:

“Sachiko, who knew little of Tokyo and to whom named like Shibuya meant nothing, could only imagine something like the distant views she had had of the Tokyo suburbs from the Loop Line, of well-wooded hills and valleys and intermittent clusters of houses, and overhead a sky whose very colour made one shiver - of a wholly different world, in short, from Osaka.” (p.131)

Sachiko’s dislike for Tokyo is based purely on her want to remain in Osaka where she feels safe and there are no tensions or, as they put it a few times in the text, ‘storms’. When the flood comes and Sachiko is scared about her husband and her sister still being missing, it is clear that she is overwhelmed and does not know how to react:

“In any case, it was much too soon to begin weeping. Sachiko was to compose herself and wait for him. She was not to worry if her was a little late. He would do nothing rash. He would turn back as soon as it appeared that he could go no farther.” (p.184)

It represents that Sachiko, though in her own home in Osaka, is still massively worried and concerned about her husband who is out in a flood. However, she is still concerned only about her own weeping. Her own weeping is her focus but the reason being her husband represents also that Sachiko is more concerned about her own safety and family than she is about her sister who is now modernising and she can do nothing about it.

When Sachiko examines Taeko in her modern ways, she is almost hyper-critical of her even though upon initial glance, it may not seem that way. The language of Sachiko watching Taeko makes the tension between the characters look more than what it actually is at that particular time. Therefore, it is a foreshadowing of how Sachiko will become even more overwhelmed and worried about Taeko’s changing position in life even though for now, she is still within Sachiko’s home and grasp:

“Watching Taeko practice to a hummed accompaniment, Sachiko had thought it the pose she liked best, and perhaps the clothes and the high Japanese coiffure on the day of the recital made it even more effective. Sachiko was not sure herself why she was so taken with it, unless she found there more than anywhere else a certain delicate winsomeness and grace quite lacking in the usual Taeko, so showy and up-to-date. Taeko went ahead quite without hesitation - sometimes even to the point of making herself a little unpleasant - when she had decided where she was going; and yet from this photograph that there was in her too something of the old Japanese maiden, something quietly engaging that pulled at Sachiko as the usual Taeko did not.” (p.200)

A representation of the way in which Taeko and Sachiko will grow further and further emotionally apart later on in the book, this quotation is also a direct representation of how Sachiko recognises this growth. She recognises it as out of place initially for a Taeko she no longer understands, she recognises it as unusual and unpleasant, but also unavoidable. It is clear that Sachiko will want to protect Taeko against the wider world, but there is no way that Sachiko can lock Taeko inside Osaka.

Her dislike for the modern comes out more and more throughout the novel and comes out more and more explicitly as the tensions with Taeko and Yukiko build up. These include her discontents with Tokyo and its commercial skylines:

“Sachiko did not really like Tokyo, however. Radiant clouds might trail from His Imperial Majesty, but for Sachiko the beauty of Tokyo was the beauty of the palace and its pine-covered grounds, and no more: the beauty of that island in the most modern part of the city, a medieval castle with mossy walls and banks along its moat, set off against the finest modern buildings…” (p.229)

It shows that even though the biggest parts of Japan are modernising, Tokyo and even parts of Osaka, Sachiko can only seem to see beauty and character in the old. Her tradition gets in the way of her reason and causes her to behave in an overwhelming manner.

In conclusion, Sachiko’s character is just as interesting at the beginning as it is to the end. Her three-dimensional tension is caused by her requirement to modernise in some aspects of her life, but her want and need to keep her family traditional for the sake of the Makioka name. Her husband, though not as traditional, sometimes pushes her to modernise with his encouragement of her poetry writing etc. but Sachiko is still very much set in her ways and would prefer it if her daughter Etsuko is set in the same ways even though she is well aware that this will not, and never will be the case. Sachiko’s tradition is the one thing that is holding the very fabric of the book and the family together.

Citation:

Tanizaki, J (2000). The Makioka Sisters. UK: Penguin Random House.