The Delimma Of The Beast In Kōbō Abe’s Early Novels

Kōbō Abe’s works are regarded as reflections of postwar Japanese’s exploration of their ways of life. Having grown up in an unstable process, Abe transmitted the instability to many characters in his works, and thus on the other hand resulting in the variability and progress in his writing techniques until he formed his unique mature literary style. The exploration of the variability and progress started off from the discussion of the image of "beast".Among the studies of Abe’s writing style progress, some scholars focused on colonial experience, some on behavior pattern and some on critique of the concept "community". By means of exploring the dilemmas and life tracks of the "beasts" in Abe’s early works, this article revealed the changes in his writing techniques and states of mind, and depicted his growth toward maturity. The image of "beast" repeatedly appeared in his early works. Apart from taking it as a metaphor, Abe also made the image of "beast" a template of the ever-alienated and ever-escaping living conditions in modern society. Moreover, the characters in his early works can also be regarded as realizations of "beast" in different stories. The present studies of the imagery "beast" in Abe’s works mainly approached from a surrealism transformational perspective.This thesis focused on the dilemmas of "beasts" in Abe’s early novels and reached a conclusion through a combined discussion with "community" and a methodology of data analysis and discourse analysis.Our discussion on the dilemmas of "beasts" started off from two approaches: when they were within the "community", and when they were trying to escape from it, which respectively corresponded to Abe’s changes in writing techniques and states of mind.As for the dilemmas within the "community", in the stage of earliest works, Abe was heavily influenced by western literature and philosophy, existentialism in particular. His devoted much writing to the descriptions of mental activities and monologue of the characters, thus creating a sense of nihility. Later on in the stage represented by The Wall, he accepted Kiyoteru Hanada’s theory of avant-garde arts and made a new breakthrough in writing techniques. Through protagonists’ transformation, his works revealed the alienation of the characters, and enhanced the understanding of the "community" at the same time.In order to clarify the dilemmas of "beasts" in the "community", Abe brought forth that social signs like name, tile etc. were given to "beasts" to strengthen the governing of them in the "community". Once those signs were deprived, "beasts" lost the recognition from the "community", and then would be faced with punishment.In the final phase represented by Woman in the Dunes, Abe retuned to reality and constructed a real village community. This enabled the comprehensive confrontation between "beasts" and the "community" through which we found more physical and distinct oppression on "beasts" from the "community". This symbolized his maturity in creation techniques.The fourth chapter was about the dilemmas when "beasts" fled from the "community". In the earliest works, the fled "beast" ran into another "community" because Abe’s thoughts at the end of the Second World War were filled with despair and nihility. Then in the following stage, although the protagonist in The Wall obtained temporary stability through transformation, characters in The Red Cocoon and The Crime of S. Karma still could not get away from controlled fates. In the final stage of Woman in the Dunes, Abe realized people should change themselves to acquire the ability to live on in the society instead of count the hope of social reform on certain political groups. The protagonist of Woman in the Dunes could serve as a good example.Finally, we can summarize that the paradox of dilemmas within the "community" and those emerged when "beasts" fled from it was actually the largest dilemma. Abe’s literary techniques moved toward maturity during the process of dealing with those dilemmas.