Work record
Snow Country
Yasunari KawabataYukiguniSnow Country by Yasunari Kawabata (1935–1937)Snow Country is a novel by Yasunari Kawabata, first published in installments in Japanese magazines from 1935, collected in book form in 1937 and completed in a final version in 1948.Also known as: Yukiguni
1935–1937; completed 1948 · Postwar Contemporary · Novel · Japanese
Abstract
Background. Kawabata assembled this book over thirteen years from stories printed separately in magazines, after stays at a resort reached by a newly opened rail tunnel through the mountains northwest of Tokyo. Its first sentence, describing a train emerging from a tunnel, is among the best known in modern Japanese writing.
Plot. An idle married visitor from the capital returns again and again to a remote spa buried in winter drifts, where he carries on a relationship with a gifted, ardent local entertainer. A second young woman, glimpsed on the train caring for an invalid, haunts him. Across visits in different seasons the lover's attachment grows, while he stays aloof, until a blaze at a makeshift cinema ends the story. Throughout, the changing seasons of the mountain valley mark the passage of time.
Ideas. Through luminous, elliptical prose, the work contrasts passionate commitment with cool aesthetic observation and lingers on transience, solitude and beauty. Gestures, seasonal details and fleeting reflections carry emotions the characters rarely express aloud. Some critics compare the episodic construction to renga, a form of linked poetry.
Reception. Seidensticker's version introduced the book to Western readers in the fifties, and it was central to Kawabata's Nobel Prize of 1968. Japanese film versions appeared in 1957 and 1965.
Main characters
- Shimamura: Wealthy Tokyo dilettante
- Komako: Mountain-resort geisha
- Yoko: Young woman nursing a dying man
Summary
Snow Country is a novel by Yasunari Kawabata, first published in installments in Japanese magazines from 1935, collected in book form in 1937 and completed in a final version in 1948. Edward G. Seidensticker's English translation appeared in 1956, and the novel was among the works discussed in the presentation speech when Kawabata received the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1968. Shimamura, a well-off man from Tokyo with a wife and children, lives on inherited money and writes about Western ballet, which he has never seen performed. He travels repeatedly to a hot-spring town in the mountains on the Japan Sea side of Honshu, where heavy winter snow cuts the region off for months. On his first visit, in early summer, he meets Komako, a young woman who later becomes a geisha, and they begin an affair. The novel opens with his second visit, in winter. On the train he watches a girl named Yoko tend a sick young man, Yukio, and sees her face reflected in the window against the darkening landscape. Yukio is the son of Komako's music teacher, and gossip says Komako became a geisha to pay for his medical care, which she denies. Komako visits Shimamura at the inn, drinks, plays the samisen and speaks of the diary and the notes on novels she has kept for years. When Yukio is dying, she refuses to leave Shimamura at the station to go to him. Shimamura returns again the following autumn. Komako's feelings for him are intense and open, while he regards her love, and his own life, as 'wasted effort'. Yoko asks him to take her to Tokyo. The book ends on a winter night when a fire breaks out in a warehouse used to show films; Yoko falls from the balcony, Komako carries her from the flames, and Shimamura, looking up, feels the Milky Way flowing down into him. The novel is noted for its spare, suggestive style, its use of images of snow, mirrors and light, and an episodic structure that critics have compared to linked verse in the haiku tradition. Kawabata revised and extended it over more than a decade.
Plot or Argument
- Part One: The winter visit
Shimamura arrives by train, watching Yoko and the sick Yukio; he resumes his relationship with Komako, now a geisha, and learns about her past.
- Part Two: The autumn visit
Shimamura returns once more; Komako's devotion deepens while he remains detached, and Yoko asks him to take her to Tokyo.
- Part Two: The fire
A fire breaks out in a warehouse used as a cinema; Yoko falls from the balcony, and the novel closes on the image of the Milky Way.
Characters
- Shimamura, protagonist
Wealthy, idle Tokyo man and amateur critic of Western dance.
- Komako, major
Hot-spring geisha, passionate and disciplined, who loves Shimamura.
- Yoko, major
Young woman with a beautiful voice who nurses Yukio and later works at the inn.
- Yukio, minor
Sick son of Komako's music teacher.
- The music teacher, minor
Yukio's mother, with whom Komako once lived.
Lessons
Beauty and detachment
Shimamura admires Komako and Yoko as he admires landscapes, from a distance. The novel invites reflection on observing life versus taking part in it.
- Where does Shimamura see Yoko and Komako as images rather than people?
- Is his detachment a strength or a failure?
Imagery
Snow, reflections, insects and the Milky Way recur throughout. Students can trace how Kawabata builds meaning through images rather than explanation.
- Choose an image that recurs and track its appearances.
- How does the final image of the Milky Way connect to earlier scenes?
Wasted effort
Shimamura calls Komako's diaries and devotion 'wasted effort', yet she persists. The novel raises questions about the value of effort that has no visible result.
- What does Komako work at, and why?
- Do you agree with Shimamura's judgment?
Context
Hot-spring resorts in Japan's mountain regions employed geisha who entertained guests at inns, often under debts to their employers. The Shimizu Tunnel, opened in 1931, connected Tokyo by rail to the snowy Niigata region, where the resort town of Yuzawa is generally taken as the model for the setting.
Composition
Kawabata stayed at Yuzawa in the mid-1930s and published the novel's sections as separate stories in several magazines from 1935; the first book edition appeared in 1937. He continued revising and added a final section, and the definitive version was published in 1948. Seidensticker's translation was published by Knopf in 1956.
Reception
The novel established Kawabata's reputation in Japan and, through Seidensticker's translation, abroad. The Nobel committee cited his narrative mastery and sensitivity in expressing the essence of the Japanese mind. It has been filmed in Japan, notably in 1957 and 1965.
Comparisons
- Kokoro
Soseki's novel, another major modern Japanese work, also explores loneliness and the distance between people.
- Mrs. Dalloway
Woolf, like Kawabata, conveys experience through images and impressions rather than explicit statement.
- Swann's Way
Proust's study of desire and perception offers a European parallel to Shimamura's aestheticized love.
- Anna Karenina
Tolstoy's novel opens and closes on a railway and treats a love outside marriage at far greater length and with moral seriousness.
- Death in Venice
Mann's novella likewise follows an aesthete drawn to beauty at a resort, with fatal consequences.
- Botchan
Soseki's comic novel of a Tokyo man in a provincial town gives a lighter view of city and country in modern Japan.
Quotes
“The train came out of the long tunnel into the snow country.”
For Students
A reading companion for classical Christian high school students. See the student guide.
Reading Guide
Watch for
- The reflection in the train window in the opening pages.
- Komako's diary and her music.
- Shimamura's phrase 'wasted effort'.
- Images of snow, insects and the Milky Way.
Key terms and names
- Geisha
- A professional entertainer trained in music, dance and conversation.
- Samisen
- A three-stringed Japanese instrument.
- Onsen
- A Japanese hot-spring resort.
- Haiku
- A short Japanese poem, often built on an image from nature.
- Ellipsis
- The omission of details the reader must infer.
Seminar Questions
- Comprehension Why does Shimamura keep returning to the hot-spring town?
- Comprehension What is Komako's connection to Yukio?
- Interpretation What does the reflection of Yoko's face in the train window suggest?
- Interpretation How should we understand the ending?
- Big Question Can one love another person while remaining detached?
- Big Question Is any effort truly wasted?
Faith Connections
- Ecclesiastes 1:2-3 (Scripture)
The Preacher's 'vanity of vanities' and question of what profit a person has from labor echo Shimamura's view of Komako's efforts as wasted.
- Natsume Soseki, Kokoro (Great Conversation)
Soseki's portrait of isolation in modern Japan offers a companion study of solitude and responsibility.
Logic and Rhetoric
Central argument: Through an aesthete who watches more than he loves, the novel suggests that beauty observed without commitment leaves both observer and observed unfulfilled.
Rhetorical device: imagery. The opening reflection in the train window, where a girl's face floats over the passing landscape, sets the pattern of seeing people as images.
Debate: Resolved: Shimamura is responsible for Komako's unhappiness.
Writing Prompts
Essay: Analyze Kawabata's use of snow and light imagery in Snow Country.
Comparison with Kokoro: Compare the treatment of loneliness in Snow Country and Kokoro.
Creative Prompts
- Fiction
Write a page of Komako's diary from the winter of Shimamura's visit.
- Essay
Discuss how Kawabata uses reflections, windows and mirrors to portray the relationship between Shimamura and the two women.
- Poetry
Write a sequence of three haiku that capture the novel's opening, its middle and its ending.
Further Reading
- Thousand Cranes, Yasunari Kawabata
- The Sound of the Mountain, Yasunari Kawabata
- Japan, the Beautiful and Myself (Nobel lecture), Yasunari Kawabata
- Kokoro, Natsume Soseki
Verification notes
Abstract-only record of a copyrighted work; no text is stored. The single quotation is the opening sentence of Seidensticker's translation, widely reproduced and checked against published excerpts. The division into two parts follows the standard edition.
- Identification of Yuzawa as the model for the setting is traditional rather than stated in the novel.