Minae Mizumura - The Fall of Language in the Age of English

Meanwhile, airfare dropped dramatically, a phenomenon giving rise in recent years to more and more events with the word “international” somewhere in the title. Writers too are now frequently invited to foreign countries for one reason or another, though typically to a university. Universities are usually modestly funded — university literature departments in particular. I have no doubt that Nobel laureates are treated differently, but someone like me has to fly economy as a matter of course. I do not have the money to pay out of pocket to upgrade to business class. Consequently, if I accept an invitation, I have to squeeze myself into a seat so cramped that it feels like I’m being transported by a prison security van or cattle truck, eat meals served as unceremoniously as if they were fodder, and, unless I am going to Korea or China, remain stuck in my seat for well over ten hours. It is on these occasions that I curse my fate in being Japanese and living in what is literally the “Far” East. When I finally reach my destination, rarely is there someone to pick me up; most of the time, I nervously get into a taxi alone. Of course, my stay is filled with tiring events, and what with strain and lack of sleep and the cold I always catch, after I get back to Japan I am as depleted as if I’d been through a major illness. And I make a firm promise to myself that I’ll never travel abroad again.

Then some time later, there is another invitation. My immediate reaction is always, “No, thank you, I’ve had enough.” Foreigners, even those who teach Japanese literature at a university, cannot read novels written in Japanese with any ease. More than likely I am invited not because the host read and liked my novels, but because I conveniently speak English. I feel a bit like I am being cheaply used. Besides, what difference could it possibly make if a novelist goes to a foreign country and speaks about her work or reads out passages from it in front of a small audience who might not even know who she is? And yet, though I mumble and grumble, every so often I do accept an invitation — in part because it is gratifying to be invited, after all, but also in part because the palm reader’s oddly confident prediction remains engraved in my mind. It could well be that some higher power is at work, unbeknownst to me, and if so I figure it can’t hurt to do its bidding every once in a while.

The invitation from the IWP came at a rather tricky time. That is, it came only two years after my health abruptly fell apart.

Life is a tiring business indeed.

Soy sauce runs out. Milk runs out. Dishwashing detergent runs out. Even Lancôme lipsticks — I thought I had stockpiled several years’ worth — run out. Dust underneath the dining table becomes dust balls. Newspapers and magazines pile up, and so does laundry. E-mail and junk mail keep coming. When occasion demands, I make myself presentable and I present myself. I listen to my sister’s same old complaints on the phone. I withdraw money for my elderly mother, whose tongue works fine but whose body is a mess. I contact her caseworker. And now I have reached a stage in life when my own health is prone to betray me.

On top of all this, I had just suffered the stress of writing an inordinately long novel and having it serialized in a monthly literary journal. Every single minute of that time, my mind was obsessed with the panic-stricken idea that if I wasted even one day a month I would be publishing something one-thirtieth poorer in quality. For days on end, I was at my desk before even brushing my teeth in the morning and remained virtually nailed there until I collapsed into bed at night.

It happened one summer night when I sat in a restaurant for hours with my neck exposed to air-conditioning. The occasion being a festive one, I was wearing a dress cut rather low in the back, which only made matters worse. I began to feel strange and then increasingly awful; finally it was all I could do to leave the table, stumble to the ladies’ room, and squat down in my high heels — but by then it was too late. My cheeks were like ice; my blood was not circulating.

Beginning that summer, I had something called “autonomic dysfunction.” I could no longer drink tap water because it tasted too cold. I shivered just opening the refrigerator. I had to avoid air-conditioned subways, buses, and taxis. Merely looking at brightly lit convenience stores from the outside, knowing how freezing they are kept to lure customers, made me sick. A year later, after somehow managing to finish the inordinately long novel, I finally visited a psychosomatic clinic and received a prescription for medications to release my built-up tension: an antidepressant, an antianxiety drug, sleeping pills. It was about a year after this that the invitation from the IWP reached me through an American scholar of Japanese literature, also a well-known translator.

One thing I learned from having my health fail so miserably is that having no physical energy makes socializing a burden unimaginable to a healthy person. Just the idea of seeing someone caused pain and tension to spread through my back, as if blackish liquid lead had been injected down my spine. While I was actually meeting with someone, I often found myself reaching for the medication in my handbag, like a drug addict. When finally home and alone, I would throw myself on the bed, close my eyes, and sleep with my jaw sloppily open like an old woman. Being transported on a plane like a prisoner or a cow I might somehow tolerate, but a program like the IWP would entail extended interaction with other writers, I thought. I was not sure I would be able to survive the obligation. My hesitation was exacerbated by the feeling that I was at an age when I had little to gain from new encounters.

At the same time, the invitation did offer one attraction: I could go someplace for a change of air and get some truly needed rest — health resort therapy, if you will. The fantasy of health resort therapy had haunted me as I anxiously worked to finish my novel amid my ailments. My fantasy resembled something from a foreign film set in a lushly bucolic location, or an advertisement in a high-end women’s magazine portraying vacationers sipping aperitifs. With my novel finally out in two volumes, I would have just received my royalties, conveniently double the usual amount. I could leave Japan, stay for a month or two in a small, quaint hotel overlooking some wonderfully soothing scenery — perhaps a Swiss lake — and spend my days reading and walking, free from daily chores, letting my exhausted mind and body unwind in the tranquil flow of time. I pictured myself in a tweed skirt that fell just below the knees and low pumps — things I never actually wear — looking (apart from my decidedly Japanese features) like a behind-the-times middle-aged English lady. This particular element of the fantasy must have arisen from my habit after finishing my novel of lying down and mindlessly listening to Agatha Christie audiobooks. The images in my mind were illusory, but my desire to be free from the tedium of daily life, to live in a magically beautiful setting, and to enjoy an entire life’s worth of rest was quite real. The fantasy kept haunting me, but I did not have the energy to decide on a destination, let alone take any action. According to the IWP brochure, participants had merely to continue their work, and they would each be provided a room by the Iowa River in which to do so. True, “Iowa River” did not have quite the same appeal as “Swiss lake,” but given that scenery with flowing water would be nearby, it was a compromise worth considering. Should I decline because the burden of international exchange would be too much? Or should I succumb to the temptations of a health resort idyll?

As I debated in my mind, the palm reader’s words about my fated tie to foreign countries kept coming back to me, and that sealed the deal. Officially participants were obligated to stay for three months, but I could not imagine leaving my elderly mother alone that long; I could not imagine that my own health would sustain itself for that long either. The host kindly agreed to reduce my stay to one month, and before I left, as I have mentioned, I had secretly made up my mind to hold my participation to a minimum without being ungracious.