In Praise of Shadows

“Japanese music is above all a music of reticence, of atmosphere. When recorded, or amplified by a loudspeaker, the greater part of its charm is lost. In conversation, too, we prefer the soft voice, the understatement. Most important of all are the pauses. Yet the phonograph and radio render these moments of silence utterly lifeless. And so we distort the arts themselves to curry favor for them with the machines. These machines are the inventions of Westerners, and are, as we might expect, well suited to the Western arts. But precisely on this account they put our own arts at a great disadvantage.”

This passage provides another important contrast between Japan and the West that expands the argument beyond the preference for dark and light to include differences related to sound and voice. Moreover, Tanizaki begins to formulate one of his larger arguments: Western inventions cannot be applied universally to different cultures. He would rather see all nations invent technology that is suited to their distinct cultural preferences.

“There is no denying, at any rate, that among the elements of the elegance in which we take such delight is a measure of the unclean, the unsanitary. I suppose I shall sound terribly defensive if I say that Westerners attempt to expose every speck of grime and eradicate it, while we Orientals carefully preserve and even idealize it. Yet for better or for worse we do love things that bear the marks of grime, soot, and weather, and we love the colors and the sheen that call to mind the past that made them. Living in these old houses among these old objects is in some mysterious way a source of peace and repose.”

Tanizaki returns to his main contrast regarding the aesthetic differences between Japan and the West, but here he deepens his argument by connecting the preference for grime to a love for the past. While Western society loves progress, which means rejecting old and dirty objects for shiny new ones, Japanese society has huge respect and love for the past and thinks that connecting with the past offers one a sense of peace.

“Lacquerware decorated in gold is not something to be seen in a brilliant light, to be taken in at a single glance; it should be left in the dark, a part here and a part there picked up by a faint light. Its florid patterns recede into the darkness, conjuring in their stead an inexpressible aura of depth and mystery, of overtones but partly suggested. The sheen of the lacquer, set out in the night, reflects the wavering candlelight, announcing the drafts that find their way from time to time into the quiet room, luring one into a state of reverie.”

Tanizaki’s use of imagery helps convey the beautiful properties of the materials that Japanese people use for seemingly mundane objects like tableware. He elevates these objects through his emphatic use of language, connecting this visual experience to different emotional and spiritual states.

“There are of course roofs on Western houses too, but they are less to keep off the sun than to keep off the wind and the dew; even from without it is apparent that they are built to create as few shadows as possible and to expose the interior to as much light as possible. If the roof of a Japanese house is a parasol, the roof of a Western house is no more than a cap, with as small a visor as possible so as to allow the sunlight to penetrate directly beneath the eaves.”

As Tanizaki continues to contrast Japan with the West, he employs metaphors. Here, the differences between these architectural features are clarified by evoking the reader’s personal experiences of using a parasol, or umbrella, which completely blocks one from the shade, and a cap, which only shades one’s face and leaves the rest of one’s body open to the sun.

“A light room would no doubt have been more convenient for us, too, than a dark room. The quality that we call beauty, however, must always grow from the realities of life, and our ancestors, forced to live in dark rooms, presently came to discover beauty in shadows, ultimately to guide shadows toward beauty’s ends. And so it has come to be that the beauty of a Japanese room depends on a variation of shadows, heavy shadows against light shadows—it has nothing else.”

This passage strengthens one of the essay’s main themes: that the aesthetic qualities of Japan should not only be understood in contrast to the West but also in connection with a long history of lived experience. Tanizaki shows that this is not just a matter of having a certain preference but of developing a generative relationship to shadows over time.

“We have all had the experience, on a visit to one of the great temples of Kyoto or Nara, of being shown a scroll, one of the temple’s treasures, hanging in a large, deeply recessed alcove. So dark are these alcoves, even in bright daylight, that we can hardly discern the outlines of the work. […] Yet the combination of that blurred old painting and the dark alcove is one of absolute harmony. The lack of clarity, far from disturbing us, seems rather to suit the painting perfectly. For the painting here is nothing more than another delicate surface upon which the faint, frail light can play; it performs precisely the same function as the sand-textured wall.”

This passage combines Tanizaki’s use of point of view with his use of imagery. By calling on a personal experience that is commonly shared with his Japanese readers, he asks them to relive the aesthetic and spiritual qualities of this encounter. This perspective can help a Western reader understand how a painting, which is always brightly lit when displayed in Western contexts, can achieve a different sort of beauty in darkness.

“And yet, when we gaze into the darkness that gathers behind the crossbeam, around the flower vase, beneath the shelves, though we know perfectly well it is mere shadow, we are overcome with the feeling that in this small corner of the atmosphere there reigns complete and utter silence; that here in the darkness immutable tranquility holds sway. The ‘mysterious Orient’ of which Westerners speak probably refers to the uncanny silence of these dark places.”

Tanizaki furthers his argument by connecting the tranquility of darkness to a productive relationship with silence, which recalls his argument on Japanese music. Moreover, he ties this idea back to his contrast with the West, where the specific qualities of Japanese culture cannot be understood, so they are falsely deemed “mysterious.”

“The light from the pale white paper, powerless to dispel the heavy darkness of the alcove, is instead repelled by the darkness, creating a world of confusion where dark and light are indistinguishable. Have not you yourselves sensed a difference in the light that suffuses such a room, a rare tranquility not found in ordinary light? Have you never felt a sort of fear in the face of the ageless, a fear that in that room you might lose all consciousness of the passage of time, that untold years might pass and upon emerging you should find you had grown old and gray?”

This use of imagery regarding the shoji style of paper window helps explain the distinct aesthetic experience that emerges from this seemingly mundane use of material. By invoking the reader through a second-person point of view, the author aims to produce powerful emotions that help tie this preference for darkness with a unique and open relationship to time.

“The darkness in which the Nō is shrouded and the beauty that emerges from it make a distinct world of shadows which today can be seen only on the stage; but in the past it could not have been far removed from daily life. The darkness of the Nō stage is after all the darkness of the domestic architecture of the day; and Nō costumes, even if a bit more splendid in pattern and color, are by and large those that were worn by court nobles and feudal lords.”

The author connects his interest in the beauty of shadows and darkness with a different cultural form via Noh theater. In addition to his aesthetic appreciation of this theater form, Tanizaki is particularly interested in the ways that these elements of Noh theater help connect viewers with the social realities of the past.

“But the Kabuki is ultimately a world of sham, having little to do with beauty in the natural state. It is inconceivable that the beautiful women of old—to say nothing of the men—bore any resemblance to those we see on the Kabuki stage. The women of the Nō, portrayed by masked actors, are far from realistic; but the Kabuki actor in the part of a woman inspires not the slightest sense of reality. The failure is the fault of excessive lighting.”

In contrast to Noh theater, Kabuki theater has a certain artificiality of which Tanizaki is quite critical. In this quote, he addresses Kabuki theater’s assignment of women’s roles to men. Though older productions may have been able to present a more realistic depiction of women, as dim lighting would not have made the actors’ masculine features so conspicuous, the introduction of electric lighting further decreased the Kabuki’s connection with social realities.

“And there may be some who argue that if beauty has to hide its weak points in the dark it is not beauty at all. But we Orientals, as I have suggested before, create a kind of beauty of the shadows we have made in out-of-the-way places. There is an old song that says ‘the brushwood we gather—stack it together, it makes a hut; pull it apart, a field once more.’ Such is our way of thinking—we find beauty not in the thing itself but in the patterns of shadows, the light and the darkness, that one thing against another creates.”

This is one of Tanizaki’s most overt uses of rebuttal. He confronts the counterargument that a beautiful thing should not be hidden. Consistent with his overall argument, he uses a culturally specific proverb to make his rebuttal, showing that Japanese people do not see beauty in isolated objects themselves, as they might easily change form. The beauty is, instead, found in the way these objects play out the relation between darkness and light.

“But what produces such differences in taste? In my opinion it is this: we Orientals tend to seek our satisfactions in whatever surroundings we happen to find ourselves, to content ourselves with things as they are; and so darkness causes us no discontent, we resign ourselves to it as inevitable. If light is scarce then light is scarce; we will immerse ourselves in the darkness and there discover its own particular beauty. But the progressive Westerner is determined always to better his lot. From candle to oil lamp, oil lamp to gaslight, gaslight to electric light—his quest for a brighter light never ceases, he spares no pains to eradicate even the minutest shadow.”

This passage provides Tanizaki’s main thesis regarding the differences between Japan and the West. While Japanese people are content with their surroundings, and can make beauty from what is already present, Western people are always seeking something new and neglect to see the beauty of what they already have at their disposal. This produces tension between traditionalism and modernism.

“Yet of this I am convinced, that the conveniences of modern culture cater exclusively to youth, and that the times grow increasingly inconsiderate of old people. Let me take a familiar example: now that we cannot cross an intersection without consulting a traffic signal, old people can no longer venture confidently out into the streets.”

This passage relates to one of Tanizaki’s later arguments in the essay. He starts to discuss the ways in which cities, places where the effects of modernization are most greatly felt, increasingly exclude elderly people in their design. Here he points out that the complicated nature of street infrastructure, where it is not clear which of the many traffic signals to look at, makes it unsafe for elderly people to cross the street.