A Riot of Goldfish

A Riot of Goldfish (金魚撩乱) is a short story written by Japanese author Okamoto Kanoko in 1937.

Background

Okamoto Kanoko 岡本かの子 (1889-1939) wrote A Riot of Goldfish in 1937. As a Buddhist scholar and an aesthete feminist, their influence appears in the text. Also common in her work is water-related imagery, sensual descriptions of female beauty, the rejection of traditional female roles, an embellished prose style, and a unique use of language. The protagonist in A Riot of Goldfish, Mataichi, attempts in vain to create the perfect goldfish. This obsession with artistry is also seen in Okamoto’s The Food Demon, in which the protagonist Besshiro strives to create the perfect culinary dish. Goldfish breeding is still an art practiced in Japan. Specialty goldfish mentioned in the text include the Ranchu, Ryukin, and Shukin. Okamoto utilizes the natural landscape of eastern Tokyo and the Kansai region to create stunning imagery.

Summary

The short story, set in early 20th-century Japan, follows the life of Maitaichi, the adoptive son of a goldfish shop owner. The story begins in media res, in which Maitaichi reflects upon his life and his obsession with Masako. As children, Maitaichi often teased and tormented Masako, driving her to the point of tears. Eventually, Masako fights back and throws a fistful of petals into Maitaichi’s face. After the fight, Maitaichi changes his attitude towards Masako and falls in love with her. After graduating high school, Maitaichi becomes a research student at a fisheries station with an emphasis on domesticated fish in the Kansai region. When Maitaichi leaves Tokyo, he feels dichotomous feelings of love and resentment towards Masako. Maitaichi becomes involved with Yoshie, the daughter of a fishing family. He flaunts his relationship with Yoshie in his letters Masako and compares the two women. When Masako finally responds to his letters, she confesses that she is pregnant and engaged to be married soon. Maitaichi becomes devastated by the news. After completing his field study, Maitaichi focuses his entire energy on creating the perfect goldfish to mimic Masako’s beauty. He spends over a decade on his attempt to produce a goldfish unrivaled in beauty. Finally, dispirited by his failures, Maitaichi ventures to the pond where he keeps his unwanted, culled goldfish. The story ends with Maitaichi’s discovery of the ultimate goldfish in the muddy pond.

Characters

Maitaichi is the protagonist of the story. His adoptive family owns a goldfish shop, which sparks his initial interest in fishery. Maitaichi studies domesticated fishery in school. He becomes driven by the desire to create the perfect goldfish. Maitaichi falls in love with Masako, a childhood friend.

Masako is Maitaichi’s primary love interest. Known as the ‘young Miss from the big house on the cliff’, Masako is somewhat shy and inconspicuous as a girl. She grows into a beautiful lady. When Masako becomes pregnant she marries the father and starts a small family.

Sojuro is Maitaichi’s adoptive father. He owns a goldfish shop and considers himself a so-called “specialist in goldfish” but lacks the skills to raise fancy varieties aside from the hibuna goldfish. He often compares Masako to a ranchu goldfish because of her slow and exaggerated movements. Sojuro eventually closes shop and teaches ogiebushi singing instead.

Otsune is Maitaichi’s adoptive mother. She encourages Maitaichi to find a wife and settle down.

Teizo is Masako’s father. He is described as scrawny and dark complexioned. A rich man, Teizo lost his wife when Masako was young. Teizo keeps a mistress in a separate house. Teizo is a great lover of goldfish and one of Sojuro’s best customers. During the financial crisis in Japan, Teizo loses most of his wealth and decides to pour his remaining resources into breeding and selling goldfish. He becomes Maitaichi’s patron.

Yoshie is a woman who was briefly involved with Maitaichi. Maitaichi flaunts his relationship with Yoshie in front of Masako and often compares the two: “[Yoshie] is not as beautiful as [Masako], but she’s not as icy as [Masako is] either”(28).

Major Themes

Buddhism

The author Okamoto Kanoko is a Buddhist scholar, which is reflected in her short story. The protagonist Maitaichi is a secular man consumed by his desire for the beautiful girl Masako and driven by his ambitions to breed elaborative goldfish. He is not in the slightest a practitioner of Buddhism, which emphasizes emptiness and the need to break away from all worldly desires. The removal of all desire includes attachments to living beings: “The Dharma knows nothing of living beings, because it is removed from the defilement of such concepts as ‘living beings'(38). Buddhism advocates detachment to other humans, including parents, friends, and family. However, Maitaichi possesses a maniacal desire for Masako. He even attempts to breed a goldfish unparalleled in beauty to recreate Masako’s loveliness. Driven mad by his desires and ambitions, Maitaichi ruins his reputation, his livelihood, and his life.

At the end of the story, Maitaichi experiences a change of heart: “Having once fainted from shock and then recovered, Maitaichi had entered a clear-headed trance. He remembered nothing and thought of nothing, but beheld the beauty of nature as it was, transforming into ecstasy itself” (52). Here is when the author’s Buddhist influences become apparent. Maitaichi’s trance is amazingly similar to meditation, a common Buddhist practice to empty the mind and enter a state of complete tranquility. As Maitaichi meditates and reflects upon his life, “Maitaichi’s desire was gradually overcome, sucked out of him and scattered by sheer fascination” (53). Buddhism serves as a spiritual function and emphasizes the spiritual cultivation that happens within the individual. Maitaichi frees himself and makes spiritual progress when he abandons his worldly desires. By the end of the story, Maitaichi becomes free of his existential suffering and is at peace with the world.

Obsessions

Another central theme of the short story is obsession. Maitaichi is driven by his obsessions: his obsession for the beautiful girl Masako and his obsession to create the perfect goldfish. These obsessions nearly drive Maitaichi to ruin; by the end of the story, Maitaichi appears older than his years. “He was not yet thirty, but his body and mannerisms were those of someone already ravaged by age.”

Human manipulation of nature

Throughout the story, Maitaichi attempts to create the perfect goldfish by genetically engineering goldfish and breeding different varieties of goldfish together. He is unsuccessful in his attempts of human manipulation of nature and the resulting goldfish are tossed into a small pond. Eventually, Maitaichi visits the small pond to discover that nature has created what humans could not: the ideal goldfish.

Main Scenes and events

Pivotal childhood encounter: After numerous encounters with Mataichi’s incessant teasing, Masako finally retaliates. The girl who lives on the hill has started to bloom into a woman in Mataichi’s eyes, and her actions cement a cherry blossom in the back of Mataichi’s throat.

Sponsorship: Teizo sponsors Mataichi’s secondary vocational education at a school in the Kansai region. At school, Mataichi is praised as an artist and he remains away from home for four years.

Correspondence between Tokyo and Kansai: Masako writes to Mataichi that she is pregnant and set to marry a man that Mataichi has never met. In the same letter she mentions that she is more interested in the goldfish he will create than her future child. Soon after, Teizo informs Mataichi that he is experiencing financial hardship and prefers that Mataichi stop treating his work scholarly and instead focus of the goldfish enterprise. Mataichi becomes more determined to succeed in creating the perfect goldfish. He knows that he and Masako will never be together.

Return to Tokyo: Teizo calls Mataichi back to Tokyo due to financial hardship and Mataichi does not complete his degree. He returns to his decrepit fishponds, which were damaged in the Great Kanto Earthquake. Without Masako in his life, he devotes himself entirely to goldfish. Change: Teizo dies and his son takes over the business. Increasingly less amount of money is given to Mataichi as he becomes more and more obsessed with creating the perfect goldfish.

Heavy rains: Rainstorms wash away the fishponds leaving everything behind in disarray. The water sweeps Mataichi down hills to the pond designated for rejected experiments. Muck and debris left behind by the storm float in the pond.

Ending: In contrast to the beginning of the novel, which highlights Mataichi’s repeated failures in goldfish breeding, Mataichi finds the one fish that he had desired to create for over ten years swimming amongst the sludge. Mirroring the beginning, he finds himself in a reclining position on the mud, but now he is overwhelmed by a sense of peace.

Available Translations

James Keith Vincent [1] , a professor of Japanese and comparative literature at Boston University, translated the novel into English. It was first published by Kodansha International in 2004 in the book Kingyo: The Artistry of Japanese Goldfish. [2] In 2010, Hesperus Press published this translation along with one of “The Food Demon” [Shokuma] by Okamoto.