这是亚洲文学的最后一个作业，姐得了95分，可以晒晒这个作业。供英文爱好者和小留学生参考。

作业要求：

Write a response of approximately 400-500 words that offers a comparative analysis of TWO of twentieth-century Japanese fiction listed below.  By a comparative analysis, I mean looking for similarities and differences between the two works.  You might also note any generalizations about modern Japanese fiction that a close inspection of the two works suggests.

--"Rashomon" by Akutagawa Ryunosuki 

--"The Mole" by Kawabata Yasunari

--“The Magic Chalk” by Abe Kobo

--“Martyrdom” by Mishima Yokio 

--Aghwee the Sky Monster” by Oe Kenzaburo

--Excerpt from Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World by Murakami Haruki 

我的答案

My answer:

I would like to compare and analyze the two Japanese modern fictions :  “The Mole" by Kawabata Yasunari (川 端 康 成) and “Aghwee the Sky Monster” by Oe Kenzaburo(大江健三郎). These two Japanese writers are Nobel prize winners in Literature.

I pick up these two stories because they share the similar story theme. Both fictions deal with family life in 20^th century of Japan. In these two stories, the two different male characters share the similar personalities. They both are not nice to their wives and they do not respect their wives at all.  For example, the husband in “The Mole”   cannot tolerate his wife’s personal habit. The way that his wife touches her mole bothers him so much that he has doubts on his wife and misjudge that his wife thinks of the other man when she touches her mole. This husband even blames his wife and beats her due to the little mole problem.  In “Aghwee the Sky Monster”, the husband D ignores his wife in labor and even has a sex with his mistress on the day when his wife gives birth to their baby.  The scenes in these two stories indicate that Japanese men neither trust their wives (“The Mole”) nor are loyal to their wives (“Aghwee the Sky Monster”.  This situation indirectly suggests that the social status of Japanese women is very low.

In these two stories, I also feel that Japanese men are not willing to face the reality and solve the family problems in a positive way. For example, the husband in “The Mole” chooses divorcing to leave his wife. The husband D in “Aghwee the Sky Monster” isolates himself from the real world after his daughter is mistakenly killed due to a wrong diagnosis of benign tumor in his daughter ‘s brain as a double head. Eventually D commits suicide to a big truck.  

The difference between these two fictions is obvious.  “ The mole” uses first person as a narrator and tells a story  in a woman’s tone by a letter style. It is short and only two main characters plus lady’s mom are involved.  The story is straightforward and easy to understand.  “ Aghwee the Sky Monster”, on the other hand,  tells a story in a longer form. There are more people involved in this story. Also there are some kind of suspense and horror in this story.

The endings of these two stories are very depressing, dark and hopeless. These are the generalizations about modern Japanese fiction in my view.  Ironically, Kawabata Yasunari (川 端 康 成) who writes “The Mole" kills himself in his real life. Therefore I reason that the male characters in these two fictions really represent the true faces of Japanese men.