In Praise of Shadows
First published 1933 · Japanese · 88 pages
- Poetry
- Philosophy
This is a short essay, not a novel, in which Tanizaki reflects on Japanese taste and the way modern life has changed it. He considers houses, lacquerware, toilets, paper, food, theatre and the quality of light, and argues that traditional Japanese beauty depends on dimness, subtlety and shadow. Electric light and Western convenience, he suggests, bring gains but also quiet losses. The tone is gentle, witty and sometimes teasing rather than strict. The essay is widely read as a classic meditation on aesthetics and on how cultures adapt to technology.
Quotes
The quality that we call beauty...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 towards beauty's ends.
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.
Were it not for shadows, there would be no beauty.
There are those who say that when civilization progresses a bit further transportation facilities will move into the skies and under the ground, and that our streets will again be quiet, but I know perfectly well that when that day comes some new device for torturing the old will be invented.