The Aesthetics of Shiga Naoya

Abstract

In this article we focus on the aesthetical views of the writer Shiga Naoya, famous for his laconic and restrained style of short stories, lack of an entertaining plot. This author is recognized as an extraordinary sensualist able to intuitively grasp the beauty of his surroundings. The analysis of Shiga’s aesthetic values on the basis of his essays and fiction enables us to explain the effect of his prose on the Japanese reader. According to Shiga, the main purpose of a true artist is in the immediate, nearly physiological impact on the reader, in creating a rhythm in prose that resembles the life rhythm of its author. These views Shiga attempted to implement in his own work. The understanding of Shiga’s concept of art is necessary for comprehending the attractiveness of his prose and in the attempts of transferring it to the Western reader in translation.