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Writing the love of boys: representations of male-male desire in the literature of Murayama Kaita and Edogawa Ranpo

Angles, Jeffrey Matthew

Abstract Details

2004, Doctor of Philosophy, Ohio State University, East Asian Languages and Literatures.

During the twenty-five years between the beginning of the Taishō period in 1912 and the Japanese invasion of China in 1937, the spread of medical psychology and sexological discourse helped contribute to the development of new ideas about masculinity and gender in Japan. Popular literature represented one forum in which people explored, promoted, and qualified these new ideas. The manifestations of male-male desire that one finds in the literature of the period, however, do not just passively reflect changes in contemporary ideology. Literary developments also helped shape the idioms that writers used to describe the subject.

This dissertation examines the representations of male-male desire in the bestselling works of two authors active during this window of change: the poet, writer, and painter Murayama Kaita (1896-1919) and the mystery author Edogawa Ranpo (1894-1965). Through critical analysis and original translations of their works, this dissertation shows that their depictions of desire between men were shaped not only by changing ideas about gender relations but also the artistic movements and genres with which both authors were associated. By combining elements of gender studies and literary history, this dissertation examines the thematic interests, genre-related assumptions, and social expectations that molded their treatments of the subject.

Chapter One examines the florid representations of boyish desire in Kaita's poetry and diaries from the early 1910s. These writings reflect Kaita's pseudo-symbolist notion of the poet as a visionary who drew upon manifestations of beauty to create art. Chapter Two examines the relationship between decadent sentiment, male beauty, and Kaita's own artistic aspirations in "Bishōnen Saraino no kubi" ("The Bust of the Beautiful Young Salaino"), a story about a dream-like competition with Leonardo da Vinci for the love of one of Leonardo's disciples. This chapter also examines the connections between pre-modernity, decadence, and male-male desire in Kaita's story "Tetsu no dōji" ("Children of Iron") and the play "Shuten dōji" ("The Saké-Drinking Youth"). Chapter Three examines "Satsujin gyōja" ("The Murdering Ascetic") and "Akuma no shita" ("The Diabolical Tongue"), two mystery-adventure stories from 1915. Both describe antisocial outlaws who act upon their desire for other men; however, the texts describe the characters' desires as displaced by the logical order of modern civilization.

Chapter Four examines Ranpo's essays on representations of male-male desire in Kaita's work, which he saw as embodying an innocent and especially poignant form of boyish affection. These essays, along with Ranpo's autobiographical essays about his crushes on other schoolboys during his youth, implicitly attempt to disassociate the love of boys from the moralistic and pathologizing rhetoric of sexology. As Chapter Five shows, some of Ranpo's early fiction, including "Ningen isu" ("The Human Chair," 1925), Issun-bōshi ( The Dwarf , 1926-1927), Ryōki no hate ( The Fruits of Curiosity-Hunting , 1930), shows an ambivalent attitude toward male homoeroticism. These works contain caveats reassuring readers about the "strangeness" of male homoeroticism even though they cater to the scopophilic curiosity of readers by incorporating scenes of male-male attraction. Similar dynamics are visible in the novel Kotō no oni ( The Demon of the Lonely Isle , 1929-30), which features a man who prefers sleeping with men. Although the narrative voice describes the character's feelings in sensational terms, at other times, Ranpo allows the character to describe his feelings in ways that make them comprehensible to the audience. Chapter Six examines Ranpo's essays from the 1930s on same-sex desire in the writing of other authors, including Edward Carpenter, John Addington Symonds, and Walt Whitman. These essays represent a product of Ranpo's ongoing explorations of the meaning and historical manifestations of same-sex love. Although these essays deal gingerly with the subject of male homoeroticism, these essays, like Ranpo's autobiographical essays, defend boyish love and male camaraderie as beautiful and socially useful while arguing for the important position of male-male desire has played in literary history.

William Tyler (Advisor)
400 p.

Recommended Citations

Citations

  • Angles, J. M. (2004). Writing the love of boys: representations of male-male desire in the literature of Murayama Kaita and Edogawa Ranpo [Doctoral dissertation, Ohio State University]. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1071535574

    APA Style (7th edition)

  • Angles, Jeffrey. Writing the love of boys: representations of male-male desire in the literature of Murayama Kaita and Edogawa Ranpo. 2004. Ohio State University, Doctoral dissertation. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center, http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1071535574.

    MLA Style (8th edition)

  • Angles, Jeffrey. "Writing the love of boys: representations of male-male desire in the literature of Murayama Kaita and Edogawa Ranpo." Doctoral dissertation, Ohio State University, 2004. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1071535574

    Chicago Manual of Style (17th edition)