The Sailor Who Fell From Grace with the Sea explores children’s disappointment with their adult role models, taken to the extreme. It is like watching a Japanese black and white drama from the 1950s. Think of movies from the era such as the slow, seething burn of Tokyo Story. You might fall asleep in the middle, but you might still appreciate what it’s trying to tell you. Or you can just watch Extraction 2, I recommend that.
The Sailor is a look of suburban middle-class Yokohama, a widower raising an adolescent missing a father figure, a sailor who’s trying to wedge himself in the midst of all this to be that father figure and the said adolescent demanding more than what can be delivered from that father figure.
Like Mishima’s books, there is scantly a story here. There are events in the book, but it is difficult to label it as plot. The human drama between the three main characters — the mother, the son and the sailor is the fulcrum that moves the events forward.
The lost sailor wanders
The Sailor begins with young Noboru locked into his bedroom, and in his vindictiveness, he moved over the boxes in his wardrobe which covers the peephole into his mother’s room. His mother Fusako is 33, tennis keeps her in shape, and her beauty is intact. We know little whether Noboru in his voyeurism of his mother’s nudity is sexually aroused by his mother — thirteen year olds are pretty fucked up — or he saw this as a punishment for her, deliberately perverting himself to spite her. The relationship between the mother and son is fine, but we can barely deem it affectionate. That night, Ryuji the sailor makes love with Fusako and young fella Noboru gets to watch the butcher shop in action.
Noboru wanted to like Ryuji, but through the fault of Ryuji’s character he was not able to gain the respect of the young boy. Noboru wanted a man who is stern, masculine and commanding. A sailor in his suit is an image of that, and at first, Ryuji fits the bill, especially after making the mum his bitch. But after meeting Ryuji at the park, all wet from the clumsiness of his water-drinking, and seeing how much of a wet dog he looked in front of his gang, Noboru was a bit let down. That tough masculine façade quickly crumbles.
What’s worse, Noboru hangs out with a bunch of kids who blame their parents for every single problem in the world. They practice being stoic, but perhaps a little bit too far, as they hunt for kittens to kill for some sick experimentation. We can’t help to think that the boys enjoyed the visceral nature of the task a little as they skin the dead kitten. Noboru sees the skinned kitten as naked — something not too far away from the nakedness of his mother and the sailor. He is confused in the middle of this initiation asking,”What is happening here?” — a question that echoes as Noboru sees the organs of the kitty. However, he realises now that he is capable of performing anything, “no matter how awful”.
Ryuji left Yokohama promptly only to return months later, a changed man. He had been saving his money for years, and now wants to settle down. Fusako wanted to nail him down as well and the glove fits for Ryuji to be the man in the house. Noboru welcomed this news at first, but in a confrontation that determined whether Ryuji can really be that man, he badly falters. The consequences of his failure to assert himself in the house is dire.
The lost sailor unfound
I know very little about Japanese culture and mayhaps should read more about it before making assumptions of the characters in this book. It is a problematic portrayal of the Japanese temperament I feel — the masculine role of the Japanese male is scrutinised staunchly even by small children. It is not something that is taken for granted, and Mishima well knows, is something earned. Perhaps we can forgive Ryuji for his lack of assertiveness as he had been at sea for too long. Human relationships are foreign to him as the country of his birth. He is more comfortable in the open seas and visiting foreign harbour. He does not socialise with his crew and is taciturn.
Noboru tries to fill this gap of the masculine father figure with those around him — the chief, his gang leader who’s not much older than he is, and Ryuji. The choice for Ryuji was straightforward as Noboru is a bit of a fan of anything naval, and the sailor to wedge in to this vacuum is the best choice. The lack of paternal guidance may take Noboru’s thoughts to the extreme — he needs a father figure who would discipline him, where most boys will be happy with father figures who are more lenient. The betrayal of this expectations is a retaliation that cannot be justified at the end of the novel.
Noboru’s world is different from the adult’s. He and his mates are trying to recreate the world based on their own values, perverted and misguided though they may be. It is a nihilistic view of things, a rejection of the conventional world — Noboru’s screaming question “What is happening here?” is his struggle to find the meaning in his actions, though he carries on with it anyway. It is the dynamic between this nihilistic streak of the child and the struggle to fit — such as his passion for ships, that define Noboru’s inner conflict.
The sailor at sea
Like Noboru, I struggle with this book. Noboru’s question of what the fuck is happening is an apt question as I’m actually asking this almost the entire time. I struggle to find the meaning behind The Sailor and what substance that I can extract from the book feel diluted, lacking body. With deeper reading, we can squeeze more out of it. Perhaps. Although I enjoy Mishima’s prose (I struggle to name other Japanese writers whose prose flow better), I find his ideas opaque. The slow-burn of the book does not help either, and the resolution of the book seems out of place, out of tune with the rest of the story. I will continue reading Mishima, because I find him a fascinating man, but there are other things to read in the meantime, and I’ll take my time with him as he does on his stories.
