影音檔案庫
Translated by Lee Ying-Yi (李盈儀)
If Le Moulin Rouge Poetry Society is considered to be the most important case of modernism poetry during the pre-war Taiwanese, Wu Yungfu (1913-2008) and Weng Nao (1910-1940) are the most iconic symbols of modernism novel. Just like the poets of Le Moulin, they were the generation of Taiwanese writers writing with the Japanese language who were born around 1910, and had come on stage during the 1930s when the colony’s young artists had large ambitions of “advancing into the central literary field.
In the April of 1929, Wu Yongfu transferred from Taichung Municipal Taichung First Senior High School to Nagoya Fifth Junior High School due to the recommendation of his eldest brother, who was at that time enrolled in Nagoya University’s medical school. By the time Wu Yongfu graduated from high school in 1931, his father hoped he would attend a medical school. However, Wu Yongfu who was dedicated to liberal arts enrolled in the literature and arts department of Meiji University, which had the highest teaching and faculty reputation in Tokyo, despite his father’s opposition. His father wanted to cut down his financial support, but kept sending tuition fees because his mother interceded.
Wu Yongfu already had some arts enlightenments when he was in high school that allowed him to primarily ensure his interest. However, it was until he was in Tokyo did his literary practicing truly began. Wu and Riichi Yokomitsu, his mentor as well as the icon of Shinkankakuha, had tight connections. Many researchers have pointed out that Wu’s debut novel “Head and Body” (1933) shares many similarities with Yokomitsu’s “Head and Body” (（頭ならびに腹）) , the famous piece that won the comment of “the birth of Shinkankakuha” from literary critic Chiba Kameo, in terms of both the name of the title and structure.
In addition to learning from famous authors in the literature and arts department of Meiji University and being instructed by prestigious teachers both on the spiritual and writing skill levels, Wu Yongfu also personally attended the founding of “Taiwan Arts Society” by Taiwanese students in 1933 as well as the founding of the pure literature magazine, Formosa. The predecessor of Taiwan Arts Society was “Taiwanese Culture Circle in Tokyo,” an institution with a strong leftist tendency. It was founded in the March of 1932 by Taiwanese young artists who had been strongly influenced by leftist ideologies; these artists include Lin Dui ((1906-?), Wang Baiyuan (1902-1965), Wu Kunhuang (1909-1989), and Zhang Wenhuan (1909-1978). However, “Taiwanese Culture Circle in Tokyo” was dismissed in the September of 1932 because of censorship punishments. When it was reconstructed the following year with the name of Taiwan Arts Society, its leftist tendencies had diminished and had become a neutral, pure arts group. After three issues of the institution’s journal Formosa had been published (between July, 1933 until June, 1934), the study group joined “Taiwan Literature and Arts League” that was founded in the May of 1934 in Taichung to connect literati on the whole island, and became the league’s “Tokyo branch.” This literature group (including its predecessor the Circle, the society, and the following Tokyo branch of the league) is significant regarding the history of Taiwanese literature because it had a high literary tendency; it brought together the youngest and most influential Taiwanese authors who were studying abroad. They were different from the angry youths participating in social movements who wanted to enlighten the people or accuse the colonizer of oppressions through literature. Even though they still had hopes of improving the society, yet they wished to pursue the artistry of literature performances and the enhancement of Taiwanese culture. As they wrote in Japanese and carried the hopes of “advancing into the central literary field,” they were undergoing a strong literary practice in the imperial state, Tokyo, the referral of Western cultures and the pioneer of East-Asia culture.
What exactly did the imperial state Tokyo mean to these young literati who came from the colonized Taiwan? Wu Yongfu’s novel debut “Head and Body” that was mentioned above created a day-to-day landscape of Taiwanese international students following the walking route of narrator “I” and his friend youngster S, starting from the outskirts of Marunouchi, Yasukuni Shrine, to the Army Club House (Kaikosha), Jinbocho, the Imperial Theatre, and Hibiya Park. In the novel, the father of S kept writing to him, asking him to go back to Taiwan to deal with his marriage issues. However, S already had a girlfriend on the basis of romantic relationship. Besides, he didn’t want to break away from the free-living lifestyle he had with the narrator “I,” a lifestyle of visiting bookshops, watching theatrical performances, shopping, and hanging out with friends every day. Therefore, he was facing the dilemma of “the head and the body” contradicting each other. He wanted to stay in Tokyo, but his family wanted him to return. In the structure of this novel, Taiwan is represented as a traditional, backwards and feudal society which indicated a dark and oppressing existence. On the contrary, Tokyo with streets full of bookstores and cinemas symbolizes modern, freedom, improvement, and the land in which the colonized young artists can fulfill self-establishment.
Literary youths in the solitary and barren environment of Taiwan often yearn for Tokyo. Weng Nao graduated from National Taichung University of Education and fulfilled his five-year compulsory job in common schools in Yuanlin City and Tianzhong Township in turn. When he finished his compulsory teaching career in 1934, he immediately set out for Tokyo, and started living in the suburbs of Tokyo in Koenjikita. However, long before he departed for Japan, Weng Nao had already sent his works to Tokyo for publication. The fact of sending his poetry to Tokyo revealed not only his yearning for the central literary field, from the perspective of information and communication, it is clear that even in the countryside of the southern-colonized land, Weng Nao who had not yet had the experience of studying abroad was able to keep up to date with the publication of mainstream literary magazines without much time difference. This was also why once he completed his compulsory five-year teaching career he left for Tokyo directly and had never returned to his home country.
He moved from place to place for a while after he arrived in Tokyo; eventually, he decided to live in the suburbs of Tokyo in Koenjikita and became a wandering artist. Why did he choose Koenjikita? Material conditions were his main concern. Since Koenjikita was located in the suburbs, daily expenses were more affordable. Additionally, it was closer to Shinjuku and Ginza where art events flourished, and transportation fares were also inexpensive. More importantly, Koenjikita was a place of diversity and flowing with cosmopolitan atmospheres. Here, there were possibilities of coming across people of all artistic and political spectrums and youths from different colonies and races. It is noteworthy that on a more general scale, Wu Yongfu and Weng Nao were both writing about “Tokyo.” However, the Koenjikita Tokyo full of wanderers’ romance depicted by Weng Nao obviously differs from Wu Yongfu’s Yamanote Line Tokyo, which in other words, the Tokyo which follows the route of starting from Yasukuni Shrine, heading towards the Army Club House, and encircling the Imperial Palace. Overall speaking, both are considered as modernist writers. While modernism was used to express the metropolis Tokyo (this is the iconic scenery of both Western and Japanese modernism), it was also utilized to represent the sceneries of people of the lower social status that were rich in Taiwanese domestic features. Although Koenjikita was where leftist gather, the works of Weng Nao, who lived around Koenjikita, were no more leftist than that of Wu Yongfu’s, whose activity area were around the Yamanote Line. A slight yet decisive difference was that Wu Yongfu’s depictions of the metropolis Tokyo and the traditional rural Taiwan were binary oppositions. Additionally, under this binary contradiction, the rural Taiwan existed to fulfill the “painful scenery.” This “painful scenery” was created due to the deep-rooted feudalism and anti-modernism which contradicted the metropolitan, modern civilization. On one hand, it is a form of Taiwanese “regional trait” under the gaze from the central literary field; on the other hand, it is also a modernist “novel mechanism” that triggers various mental status, such as anxiety, trembling, and illusion. However, the “painful scenery” of Taiwan that Weng Nao depicts is not one caused by feudalism or cruelty, but one of modernity that was brought upon by the empire. How did the rural areas of Taiwan become strongly intertwined with the networks of the empire and of the modern world from an isolated and self-sufficient place through the medium of modernity? What were the impacts of this connection and establishment? The contradictions and paradox of modernity (or colonial modernity) brought to Taiwan and rural Taiwan were the themes of Weng Nao’s novels. For instance, in his novel Lo Hanjiao he depicted how a child forms his “worldview.” One day, a child named Lo Hanjiao met a chubby man with a small round basket (pronounced as Enaa in Taiwanese) who said that he was going to Yuanlin (also pronounced as Enaa in Taiwanese). However, since Lo Hangjiao had never left his hometown, he didn’t know what Yuanlin was, and therefore, he thought the man meant the round basket. Lo Hanjiao wondered, how is it possible for a grown man to fit inside a small basket? Yuanlin and round basket is a mechanism of the Taiwanese language which symbolizes a magical and unknown place far away. He longs for a faraway place. However, the first time he had the chance to leave the street he grew up in was due to his need to transfer to another hospital due to a car accident. As the handcar slowly departs, Lo Hanjiao would come to realize the “faraway place” which the handcar railway and roads led to is the modern world. However, what did “modernization” actually bring to the colonized Taiwan? Weng Nao did not depict the oppressions or the structure behind the oppressions of which the Taiwanese rural areas were enduring; instead, with whimsical and ironic writing styles, he revealed that although there are many advantages of modernization, it is bound to be accompanied by suffering. Although Weng Nao hadn’t leaned to the left-wing during his stay in Koenjikita, the insights for imperial mechanisms and reflections on modernity as well as his affection and homesickness for Taiwan’s rural areas seems to be a unique perspective that Koenjikita, a place which “confronted the imperial country with the Yamanote Line as its core,” brought to him.
Editor: Yeh Hsing-Jou
Proofreading: Yizai Seah
