Readers seeing The Waiting Years in its initial publication as individual short stories would not have considered these as parts of a novel.. When the novel did appear in its complete form in 1957, it received Japan's highest literary award, the Noma Prize. In the same year, U.S. audiences were viewing the film Sayonara based on the Michener novel about American GI’s and their Japanese wives. Several books about Japan were bestsellers at this time, including a book in which an American woman discusses her marriage with a Japanese man: Bridge to the Sun by Gwen Terasaki. Americans were not able to read Enchi Fumiko’s view of the “traditional Japanese woman” until 1971 when the The Waiting Years finally appeared in English translation.
First of all, make some notes to yourself summarizing the plot and
defining the main characters. Think about how you would answer the
following questions and which of your own you would create:
1. Define the core values that the main character Tomo embodies.
If she, Kae and Otsugi were panelists on a Tokugawa talk show, what
would they have to say to each other?
How would they explain their values, their family relationships,
and their self- identities?
Would they share the same attitude toward men?
2. Like Umpei's sisters in The Doctor's Wife, the concubines that Tomo procures for her husband are subordinate characters in the family and the novels. What do we learn about women, men and power in the family from following their point of view?
3. From the early to mid-1950s, several histories of Japanese
women were written, by both Japanese women and men. Enchi’s novel
traces the history of a family, and in a sense, the history of modernizing
Japan.
If we think of her novel as history, what kind of history does she
present?
What causes people to do what we do?
Do we have agency? Do we have any effect on this world?
How much of our lives are determined by the institutions and processes
around us?
4. There are “good guys” and “bad guys,” “virtuous women” and “loose women” in this novel, but are there any heroes? If so, how do you define heroes?
5. Feminist critic bell hooks has discussed a need for fiction
by marginalized groups to go beyond “chronicles of pain” to imagining new
ways of thinking and living, to “begin the process that transforms reality.”
How could Enchi’s novel help other Japanese women in this process?
Could it help us, her English-language readers?
1945 --August 15th Japan surrenders
to the Allied powers
--The All Japan Women’s [Patriotic] Organization is disbanded
--Every political party establishes a women’s section
--3 million women fired from jobs to make room for returning men
1946 --Emperor’s Declaration of Humanity;
no longer a “divine being”
--Women Receive Voting Rights; 39 women elected to the Diet
--54 women inducted into Police Force
--Uno Chiyo’s fashion magazine Style reappears; sold out the first
day!
--Dance craze sweeps the country
1947 --Establishment of New Constitution;
includes the ERA
--Establishment of Bureau in Labor Ministry for Women & Children
--Labor Standards Law Established; permits menstruation leave; pregnancy
leave; and though they did not take hold: “equal pay for equal work” &
“equal opportunity”; protective aspects of law worked against “equality”
--Beginning of the Baby Boom
--First Postwar International Women’s Day
1948 --New Civil Code enacted; gives
women equal rights in marriage & family
--Housewives Association (Shufuren) established to defend family budgets
from increases in ration prices/food shortages
--Abortion legalized as response to child abandonment, infanticide; and
women’s deaths from illegal abortions; still not enough food & housing
--Enchi Fumiko publishes her translation of Tale of Genji in modern
Japanese.
1949 --Enchi begins publishing The
Waiting Years; continues through 1957
--Korean War begins; Japan Self-Defense-like force established
--Number of girls progressing to high school 42.5%; those going on to Junior
College or Women’s Colleges, 1.2%
--Cooperative Association of All Japan Widows Formed
1951 --Peace Treaty of San Francisco
--First Mother’s Day
1952 --Bloody May Day results from the
crackdown on labor protests
--All Japan PTA takes off
--Housewives’ Council of Japan Coal Miners established to work for peace,
quality of life; “elevate the social and economic status of miners’ wives.”
--National Coordinating Council of Regional Women’s Associations (Chifuren)
est., huge membership of rural women’s organizations;
worked for domestic issues related to home and children, but also
to broader concerns such as “clean elections”
--first women’s underwear fashion show; no men allowed
1953 --Ito Kinuko takes third places
in Miss Universe contest
--Prime Minister Yoshida’s cabinet moves to reinstate old Japanese Family
System, a move defeated, in part, by protests from women
--Yoshida also makes moves toward treaty revision with the U.S. and rearmament
--Translation of Simone de Beauvoir’s Second Sex, bestseller in
Japan
--Refrigerator, washing machine, vacuum cleaner become the new “three jewels
of the imperial regalia”
--Television broadcasts begin
--First supermarket: Kinokuniya in (elite) Aoyama, Tokyo
--Rationalization of home and workplace, meaning “automation”
--Early fifties legislation says women must quit when they marry; major
companies begin to institute mandatory female retirement age of 25
--Kurosawa’s film TOKYO STORY questions loss of traditional values
1954 --Feminist Takamure Itsue published
Women’s History; argues for an early matriarchal power in Japan
--Year’s Bestseller: male critic Ito Sei’s Twelve Points Regarding Women,
gave a frank critique of love marriages from a man’s point of view
--Korean War ends; Japan in recession, hence women lose factory jobs
--Christian Dior holds fashion show in Tokyo; Boom in fashion shows of
women’s underwear spawns articles on “foundation” thru 1955;
bra brings attention to breasts as “sexy;” nursing in public decreases
--Special issue of women’s magazine Fujin no tomo openly discusses menstration
and improvements in sanitary napkins; runs related ads
--Bikini Island Incident; public protests in Japan against US nuclear tests
--Beginning of women’s entry into part-time labor system
--Omi Kenshi Silk Mill strike; first major labor action by women in postwar
--1953 film ROMAN HOLIDAY finally comes to Japan; great success!
--Women working in agriculture decreases to below 50% of female population
--General decline in women in the workforce begins
--Crown Prince attends Queen Elizabeth’s coronation in London
1955 --Liberal Democratic Party formed;
this conservative party rules until late ‘80s
--peak year for abortions; perhaps as many as two million; decreases with
access to contraception,
public health program explaining contraception begun in 1954
--Jimmu Keiki; economic prosperity; things haven’t been so good since Emperor
Jimmu (when Japan was founded)
--Generally 5 people in a household
--First Congress of Mothers; 2,000 women attend this “Congress of Tears”
--Flush toilets become widespread; new dining room/kitchen centered around
table and chairs becomes the rage in new housing
--About 35% of women own washing machines; others yearn for one
--Housewife Debate begins; continues until 1957
1956 --The “Postwar” is declared “Over”
--Japan admitted to the United Nations
--First National Conference of Trade Union
Women
--Koyama Itoko writes popular book on Empress Nagako
in order to humanize the Japanes royal family yet also build interest in
rituals of court life; published in t he U.S. in 1958
--Anti-prostitution law passed
1958 --Educational change emphasizes differences between boys
and girls
--Dissemination of
appliances
--Enchi Fumiko publishes
MASKS
1959 --Economy experiences another upturn
--First Japanese Miss
Universe crowned
--Crown Prince marries Shoda
Michiko; one million television sets bought by people who want to see the
royal wedding parade on TV
--Women’s magazines grow
in number; much reporting on the new royal couple
1960 --Student protest in Tokyo against renewing U.S.-Japan Security
Treaty; it is renewed anyway; one female protester killed
--Averge number in household 4.5
--% of married women working: 37.6%
--Birth of instant ramen, instant coffee
--Rate of women going on to college and jr.
college: 10.3%
--Stainless steel kitchen sink has become
widely available
In the 1960s, Japan’s GNP grew at a remarkable rate. The nation
hosted the Olympics in 1964 as a mark of its postwar success and aspirations
to take a part on the international stage. Television shows from
the U.S. such as “Bewitched” popularized the U.S. home, especially the
kitchen, as the ideal for Japanese homes as well. Stores began to
offer more and more luxury goods, fashion also went from utilitarian to
“designer,” and an interest in gourmet food, both regional Japanese and
European, boomed. The M-curve in women’s employment became even more
marked in the 1960s and 70s, with women leaving the workplace to bear and
raise children, before returning, often in part-time jobs. There
was also a huge increase (250%) in the 1960s in women who do piece-work
at home for extra income. As Japanese life expectancy increased,
there was a dramatic increase from 1965-1985 in number of elderly households.
Ariyoshi Sawako wrote the The Doctor’s Wife in 1967.
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