Shallow Analysis Of Meiji Spirit In Heart

As we all know, the novel Heart, a great masterpiece in his later years, waspublished by Natsume Soseki in1914. The book is consisted of Mister and I, Parentsand I and Mister and Suicide Note, and about half of the book is occupied by Misterand Suicide Note. This work is clearly arranged with simple structure and fewcharacters and not complicated plots. Heart touches the most obscure problem ofgood and evil in human nature, and incisively and vividly reveals the unhealthysocial trend caused by mammonism and egoism, the anxiety and loneliness betweenpeople caused by egoism, the self-reflection of human nature and devastating rebirth.The “mister” portrayed by Natsume Soseki was like a martyr, who completed a newself like a purification and transmutation when he was choosing to leave the world.The plots of this novel seem simple, but the metaphor of Heart is always the focus ofexploration and research by scholars at home and abroad. It is "meiji spirit" whichfinally appears in Heart and seems abrupt but can closely stick to the article theme. Itis a finshing touch of the article proposed at last but intangibly running through theentire article. The meiji era was the big background in which the characters in thenovel lived and the story happened, which played a very key role for the article andcharacter disposition. The writer was born in1867and died in1916. Meijirestoration began in1868when the Japanese emperor issued the new government’sfive provisions of oath. This time coincidence proves that the author witnessed themeiji period and “meiji spirit”. So while researching Heart and Japanese "nationalwriter" Natsume Soseki, the "meiji spirit" is an inevitable topic.This paper starts from the big background and analyzes the finshing touch andthe main line--"meiji spirit" from several aspects, layers and angles, trying toobjectively and accurately restore the essence of "meiji spirit" in the author’s mind.This paper points out the author’s expectation towards meiji spirit, his meditation ofthose many unreasonable and unbalanced social problems of that period and his innerpain. The sound connotation of meiji spirit the author desired was self-actualizationand social realization combined together, step-by-step and methodical modernization,Chinese and western cultures perfectly matched but not ruined by each other, social people having pioneering backbone inherited from the meiji period, liberal humanrights rather than deification of imperial power and the emperor, and fundamentallydiscarding the drawback of distorted social development. This is the true meaning ofthe passage said by mister at the end of this novel (Meiji spirit began with theemperor and would end up with the emperor. If we who were most deeply influencedby meiji sprit lived on afterwards, it would be inopportune after all.). Misterrepudiated the blind loyalty of Nai Mu general at last to awaken people who haddistorted the sound meiji spirit with his death, still further hoping that Japan andJapanese people could gain new life since then.