Kawabata Yasunari in "The Sleeping Flower" If a flower is beautiful, then sometimes I can't help but say to myself...

I think Kawabata is a very sensitive person. He was moved by beautiful people and things, and realized the meaning of life - he lived for beauty. Just like his pure feelings for the little dancer in "The Dancer of Izu". The artist's praise of "he is a good person" moved the author deeply. Also at the end of the art of "Snow Country", after seeing Ye Zi being buried in the fire, Komako ran towards Ye Zi like crazy. The protagonist Shimamura felt that "the Milky Way fell to the ground", showing his despair at the destruction of beauty.

In addition, Kawabata’s childhood and adolescence were very unfortunate. When Kawabata was sixteen, almost all his relatives passed away, and he began a life of dependence on others. During his long misfortune, Kawabata developed an "orphan feeling" and often felt lonely and sad. In addition, after winning the Nobel Prize for Literature, visitors came in droves, which also made Kawabata very upset.

The above are some of my ideas for your reference.

The following is an article I saw before, but I forgot the source. Hope it helps.

The mystery of Kawabata Yasunari's suicide

On June 11, 1899, at nine o'clock in the evening, Kawabata Yasunari was born in Temma Hihanacho, Osaka City. In the second year after his birth, his father Eiji died of tuberculosis. In the fourth year after his birth, his mother also contracted tuberculosis while serving her husband, leaving Kawabata behind.

Kawabata had to live with his sister Yoshiko, grandfather, and grandmother. His grandparents took him back to his ancestral home - Toyokawa Village, Sukuzhuangche Village.

Kawabata’s grandfather was also very popular when he was young. He was a son of an aristocrat. He grew tea, made powder, was proficient in Chinese medicine, did divination and feng shui. "Collection of Miscellaneous Talks", and famous paintings have been passed down to later generations.

However, his aristocratic blood and knowledge did not make him prosperous. On the contrary, it made him achieve nothing. After selling his family property, he moved from one place to another, and he was unsuccessful in his life. , everything he tried failed... Several children passed away before him, no one spoke, deaf and blind, completely lonely - this was his grandfather. "Crying to live" became the words on my grandfather's lips.

I lost my parents when I was young and grew up under the knees of my grandparents. When I miss my parents, I can only look for them through photos. The two old men lost their son and daughter-in-law. They were afraid that something might happen to their grandson, the only male member of the Eiji family, so they fostered Kawabata Yasunari's sister Yoshiko at her aunt's house and brought Kawabata Yasunari back to their hometown. The three of them lived in a low-rise building. In the low, damp farmhouse, the days were spent in desolation and misery. They closely supervised Ogawabata. His grandmother coaxed him to feed him food in mouthfuls, and his movements were restricted to his own dark and humid house. In this environment, Ogawabata was not only extremely willful, but also a bit neurotic. When his clothes got a drop of oil on them, he wouldn't wear them. His grandparents tried to persuade him, but he didn't wear them until he cut out the oil-stained piece of clothing and patched it up.

The weak Kawabata finally reached the age of elementary school under the cautious supervision of his grandparents. However, Okawabata, who only looked at each other with his grandparents all day long, felt terrified when he saw a large group of people. During the entrance ceremony, Kawabata Yasunari burst into tears. In addition, because his grandfather taught Ogawabata to read some simple reading materials in preschool, he already knew that the things read and taught in school were boring to him. The attraction that school has for ordinary children has disappeared for Kawabata. He hates school and does not want to be among the noisy elementary school students.

However, Japanese school rules and regulations are very strict. Unexcused absences are not allowed. There is also an attendance competition among primary school students in each village. Every day, students in the whole village gather together to go to school.

Whenever Kawabata didn't want to go to school, he would excuse himself from going because he was sick. When he said something was wrong, his grandparents were frightened and panicked, and hurriedly made him lie down and gave him medicine.

Grandpa’s eyes were almost blind. Not long after that, his wife suddenly suffered from convulsions. The old man groped out the door and went to a big pomelo tree to call the nanny. His tragic, high-pitched cry left an eternal mark in the heart of the young Kawabata. The scars he will never forget.

After his grandmother passed away, Kawabata and his sister Yoshiko were carried by the nanny's husband and son respectively to the funeral of their grandmother.

From the age of eight to sixteen, this period should be a period of vitality.

Kawabata Yasunari spent his days looking at his father's photos, or staring at his grandfather's face like a photo.

The days when he stared at his grandfather’s face for a long time, his lonely childhood, and his desolate childlike innocence. At that time, he often walked on the dewdrops on the ground with bare feet to watch the sunrise in the Osaka wilderness.

It was still dark, but he couldn't wait any longer. He climbed to the top of the mountain and squatted alone under a small pine tree on the empty mountaintop. The leaves and trunk of the pine tree rose with the sun. The scene when it turned from dark to light, the moment when the sun jumped out of the sea of ​​fog into the sky, was still vivid in Kawabata Yasunari's mind many years later.

Unable to resist the loneliness of sitting alone with his grandfather, Kawabata Yasunari said to his grandfather:

"Can I go and play?" "Oh, go." Grandfather was in a very good mood. He smiled easily, which revealed the sadness in his old, thin voice. Kawabata Yasunari ran out quickly.

The house Kawabata often visited was right next door to him. The housewife is gentle and kind, and Kawabata always sits around the fire with the parents and brothers of the family, chatting. This warm family is like heaven, making the Kawabata family one foot away even more cold and empty. The little warmth and joy that Kawabata Yasunari found here disappeared as soon as he walked to the door of his own house, and even more showed his own sadness.

How can such a huge gap and stark comparison be tolerated by a childlike heart?

Besides the loneliness, there is always the sadness of losing a loved one that hits this lonely child.

When his parents died, he didn't know the sadness when he was still a baby. But when his grandmother died when he was eight years old, and his sister died when he was eleven years old, he already felt the sadness from his grandfather's sadness.

When Kawabata Yasunari received the news of his sister's death, he couldn't bear to tell his grandfather. After delaying for several hours, he had to read the letter to his blind grandfather. Because the letter writer's handwriting was illegible, the eleven-year-old child couldn't read it fully, so he had to trace it on his grandfather's palm. The scene was very miserable.

“Every time I think about the feeling of holding my grandfather’s hand when I was reading the letter, to this day, I still feel that my palms are cold.”

The most miserable thing is that this fate has The old grandfather, who was deaf and blind, was not allowed to stay with Kawabata. It was twelve o'clock in the night on May 20, 1914. My grandfather died and left the sixteen-year-old Kawabata Yasunari behind.

When Kawabata Yasunari was a child, he lost his father at the age of one, his mother at the age of two, his grandmother at the age of seven, his sister at the age of 11, and his grandfather at the age of 16. Not only did he pay tribute to his relatives one after another, Moreover, I stayed in the homes of relatives and frequently encountered funerals of relatives. One summer vacation, Kawabata Yasunari attended a funeral, and also attended the funeral for his middle school English teacher and a good friend. His cousin gave him the nickname "Celebrity Attending the Funeral", and his cousin even said that Kawabata's "clothes were all..." "The smell of the grave" gave him the nickname "Mr. Undertaker".

"During the funeral for my grandfather, to be exaggerated, all fifty families in the village shed tears because of their pity for me. The funeral procession passed through the village, and I walked directly in front of my grandfather's coffin. When I walked through a crossroads, the women standing at the crossroads cried out, and I always heard them say: How pitiful, how pitiful!”

But, unexpectedly, People's pity actually caused harm to the young Kawabata.

"When I was young, when I was called pitiable, I was usually very disappointed. At the same time, I felt some kind of incomprehension, some shame, and some anger. But because I could neither defend nor protest, Therefore, I, who was regarded as pitiful, temporarily stayed in the pitiful eyes of others, while the real me quietly hid aside, waiting for this short period of time that I could not express anything to express, for the adults to express their pity. Children naturally understand warmth, but it leaves a cold shadow in their hearts."

In his later years, these shadows must have dominated him as strongly as they did in childhood. Because it is said that in old age, people live in the memories of childhood, but forget the things closest to themselves and think of the things farthest from themselves. Therefore, Kawabata ignored the great achievements in creation in his life and ignored the Nobel Prize for Literature. After being overwhelmed with honors, thoughts and behaviors, I suddenly returned to my childhood. I began to hate people and wanted to hide.

The trip to Izu changed his life

As a teenager, he hid alone in the mountains and rivers. Watching the sunrise and flowing water. Climb up to the thick bark oak tree in the yard of your home, read and think on the branches.

A trip to Izu Hot Spring changed his life. A beautiful girl's praise unlocked his frozen heart, because women in the boy's heart are flowers and represent beauty.

The journey to Izu began when Kawabata Yasunari was twenty years old.

Wearing a high school student cap, a navy blue top with white floral patterns, a skirt, and a schoolbag hanging on his shoulders, he traveled to Izu alone. On the way to Yushima, near Yukawa Bridge, he met a singing girl. The singer looked to be about seventeen years old, with a surprisingly large old-fashioned bun on her head, which made her oval face look very small, making her look beautiful and harmonious. She was as beautiful and vivid as a portrait of a girl in a historical novel with extra-luxuriant hair. Kawabata Yasunari was fascinated by this wonderful girl.

He followed this beautiful idol all the way, but he concealed his thoughts for fear of being discovered. When he caught up with their group in the heavy rain, his heart was pounding. In order to get closer to that beautiful figure, Kawabata began to please her brother and the geisha woman who the singer called mom. His heart that had been closed since childhood was filled with the sunshine of beauty. The little singer was only fourteen years old, which represented It’s the most beautiful time in a girl’s life.

Kawabata would be satisfied when he listened to the thumping drum she beat in the distance. The sound made by the girl's delicate fingers made his heart brighten.

The flower of perfection illuminated Kawabata Yasunari’s twenty-year-old soul and the path of his life.

Back at school, Kawabata Yasushi seemed like a different person. He changed his depressed appearance and talked endlessly about his experiences in Izu to his classmates. He was so excited that he couldn't contain himself.

Because he was admitted to liberal arts, one of his classmates in the school was a child prodigy named Otaku Sou, who was a star contributor. In addition, his classmates also published works, which encouraged Kawabata Yasunari, so he wore "A clog worth fourteen or five cents" went to the newspaper office in person to submit an article. Moreover, "Lieutenant H" and four or five short poems he submitted were published soon after, when he was in the fourth grade of middle school.

From then on, his articles began to appear in newspapers and periodicals, and that year, he was selected as the eleventh among the twelve talents by "Article World". In 1920, his novel "A Scene from the Conjuring Festival" was published in "New Trends of Thought" and won praise from the literary world. At that time, he was already a student in the Chinese Language Department of Tokyo Imperial University.

The vitality of life inspired by the Izu singers pervades his works and actions.

"Izu Dancing Girl" is deeply rooted in the hearts of the people and has been adapted into movies five times. People have heard the pure female voice of "Hahaha" in the radio drama and seen the beautiful appearance of the dancing girl on the screen. The Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology's Chinese textbook selected "Izu Dancing Girl". Monuments to Izu Dancing Girl can be seen in many places in Japan. These monuments are engraved with the figure of the dancing girl alone, as well as the double figure of her and "me" together.

Kawabata Yasushi has left an eternal image of beauty in the Japanese nation and the world literary world.

A walk in heaven

Kawabata had two nicknames in his life: the celebrity who attended the funeral and the celebrity who moved. This means that since he was a child, he attended the most funerals and moved the most.

From Izu to Azabu, and from Takaoka to Atami, Asakusa, and Omori Riki, the postwar world, customs, and reality are getting further and further away from beauty.

Kawabata Yasunari was greatly disappointed. He could no longer bring his beauty into the hearts of millions of readers, so he began to escape from Japan and went to Western Europe and abroad.

However, after the Second World War, the whole world changed. People were spiritually empty, ideologically sinking, and moral standards declined. Material desires represented pursuits and ideals. Kawabata Yasunari traveled around the world, but found that he Even more lonely, he discovered beauty, but no one was willing to share it. He mocked himself and said that he had become a "rogue idler".

On October 17, 1968, Kawabata had just finished breakfast at home when a reporter from a foreign news agency called him to tell him that Stockholm had decided to award him the 1968 Nobel Prize for Literature.

After Kawabata Yasunari received the news, his first reaction was to say to his wife: "It's terrible, hide it somewhere!" He panicked because he was afraid of being noisy and disturbed.

My wife said: "With the official notice, I have to meet with journalists no matter what today. This is a common courtesy in the world."

For the sake of courtesy in the world, Kawabata Yasunari I had to accept everything.

As a result, there was an endless stream of congratulatory calls and a swarm of news readers, which crowded the Kawabata residence in Kamakura. The narrow road leading to Kawabata's residence was packed with cars of visitors, congratulators, and reporters. Until late at night, the living room was brightly lit, and the interview lights of reporters from newspapers, radio stations, and TV stations flashed dazzlingly, and temporary lights had to be installed in the courtyard, completely breaking the usual darkness and quiet of the courtyard.

That night, the news force of more than a hundred people, as well as the government officials, relatives and friends who came to congratulate, caused an unprecedented noise in the Kawabata family. Kawabata was wearing a navy blue kimono. From time to time he showed a helpless smile, and from time to time he became angry and silent. He forced himself to suppress the urge to leave and had to answer reporters' questions in front of twenty microphones.

He just said lightly: "It's because of good luck and my good motivation. My literature is just a so-called feeling thing."

On October 19, the Swedish Embassy in Japan The ambassador visited Kawabata and personally delivered the official telegram of the award and an invitation to attend the award ceremony. On this day, the narrow road tens of meters outside the gate of Kawabata's house was full of news reporters and vehicles. There was a winding motorcade parked on the wide road, and several traffic policemen came to maintain order.

This world-class honor brought no happiness to Kawabata, but only made him feel bored and tired.

Tiredness and unhappiness appeared on his face, and a pair of sharp eyes flashed with an unhappy look.

He told reporters: "The reason for winning the award is, firstly, thanks to Japanese tradition, because my works express Japanese tradition. Secondly, it is thanks to the excellent translation by translators from various countries, but it was censored in Japanese. It would be better. Thirdly, thanks to Mr. Mishima Yuki, he was a candidate the year before last. Because he was too young, I met him." He emphasized: "I am a lazy and useless person. "On November 29, the Japanese Parliament held a celebration ceremony for Kawabata to commemorate the award, and the Japanese Prime Minister and his wife also went to the venue. Standing on the splendid podium, Kawabata said very casually: "My wife is here, I can't speak." He said a few words, then walked off the podium and blended into the congratulatory crowd. And when Kawabata was about to go from Haneda Airport to Stockholm to attend the award ceremony on December 3, he suddenly said angrily: "Everyone, please do it, I'm not going!"

Finally, he finished the entire series During the ceremony, Kawabata said: "I'm tired." We went to the hotel and fell asleep, relieved.

In the middle of the night on April 16, 1972, news spread that shocked not only the Japanese archipelago but also the world's literary world: Kawabata Yasunari committed suicide.

At 2:45 pm on April 16, Kawabata said to his family: "I'm going for a walk." These were his last words in the world. In mid-January of this year, Kawabata Yasunari purchased a room on the fourth floor of Marina's apartment as a studio, and took his assistant to write three times a week.

He left home alone in the afternoon and did not return until the evening. His family asked Kawabata's assistant Shimamori Toshie to go to the apartment to search. When Shimamori arrived at the studio at 9:45, he found that Kawabata was dead.

The time of his death was 6 pm. The apartment management said that Kawabata arrived at the apartment at 3 pm. When the assistant went to the apartment, they saw him lying on the quilt in the dry cleaning room with a gas pipe in his mouth and no longer breathing. Next to the pillow, there is an open bottle of whiskey and a wine glass. No suicide note was left.

We have discovered the mystery of Kawabata Yasunari’s suicide: he was a man without worries. He devoted his whole life to the cause of beauty. Until he was seventy-three years old, he still wrote at his desk three times a week. However, he was in poor health. After writing "Ancient Capital", which is as famous as "Snow Country", he was admitted to the internal medicine department of the hospital. He continued to use sleeping pills for many years. Before writing "Ancient Capital", he reached the point of abuse. Kawabata, who had wanted to get rid of sleeping pills for a long time, took the opportunity to finish writing "Ancient Capital" and suddenly stopped taking the pills one day. However, he developed withdrawal symptoms and adverse reactions. He was sent to Tokyo University Hospital and remained in a coma for about ten days. Without waking up, he wrote to the limits of his body. As an ordinary person, he did his best, traveled around the world, and worked for beauty until he grew old.

As an artist, he feels that "death is the highest art, and death is life." So, he died in the line of duty, especially leaving home and walking to the studio to end his life, which further illustrates the depth of his intentions.