SWADDLING CLOTHES by Yukio Mishima

No description

by christina martinez on 18 December 2014 1602

Comments (0)

Please log in to add your comment.

Report abuse

Transcript of SWADDLING CLOTHES by Yukio Mishima

Pen name for Kimitake Hiraoka

Japanese author

poet

actorMishima: A Life in Four Chapters, Patriotism, Black Lizard, More

film directer

Born in January 14, 1925, Shinjuku, Tokyo, Japan

Died in November 25, 1970, Ichigaya, Tokyo, Japan

Plays: Madame de Sade

The author of Swaddling Clothes is Yukio Mishima.

.Grandmother took care of him for a while until his father took over.

Graduated from Tokyo University and because a writer.

Nominated for Nobel Prize three times.

Wrote forty novels, eighteen plays, twenty books of essays

Author

Characters

Toshiko:

main character.raised and continues to live in material luxury.thoughtful and sensitive.feels great
sympathy for the newborn.mourns the shameful history that the child will have to live with as an
adult.Toshiko implicitly longs for the more conservative and traditional days of the past, unaffected by
modernization and its attendant loss of tradition and moral values.
Toshiko's Husband:

Toshikos actor husband is never named he is portrayed as a the modernization. His behavior is
associated with his modern lifestyle and attitude.He is entirely self-centered, he would rather be
socializing then be with his wife at home.

nurse:

Negligent not only of her own self-respect and the respect of her employers, the nurse gives birth next
to Toshikos sons crib. Like Toshikos husband, the nurse is the negatively affected by modern,
westernized Japanese life. She is depicted as dismissing traditional moral values by engaging in sex
outside of marriage.

Homeless Man:

He reminds Toshiko of the nurses baby and is the immediate manifestation of the crime, poverty, and
ignominy that the illegitimate baby that is inherited in a social system divided by class. The different
classes can only interact through violence, which is what Toshiko thinks and is comfired when the
homeless youth attacks Toshiko and most likely murders or rapes her.

Setting

The setting takes place in an April night in the following areas of Japan: local park, night club, and
Toshiko's home

Plot

This story is a short story, written in 1955.

Toshiko, the narrator, is severely thinking about the incident throughout the night. her husband has
hired an nurse to take care of her baby only to have the nurse give birth to a child without Toshiko and
her husband knowing she was even pregnant. when the child was born they had wrapped the baby in
dirty newspapers, but because she felt sympathy she rapped the baby in 'Swaddling Clothes' Toshiko's
husband talks freely of incident while Toshiko is saddened because her husband acts as if it was nothing
like if it was social acceptable. she then begins to compare her son and the nurses son, because the
children will be separate classes only to be interacted through violence. she then thinks about the future
of the nurses child in crime. she believes that if the two children meet that the nurses child will kill her
son. she goes for a walk to try and clear her min only to find a young man asleep on a local park bench.
the young man is wrapped in ... newspapers....she imagines that this man is the nurses baby . The story
ends with her approaching the man, and him walking up and he seizes her.

Christina Martinez

SWADDLING CLOTHES by Yukio Mishima

Theme

The story theme represents an empty Japanese marriage, characterized by a husband who is not there
for his wife or child emotionally and physically.
When the nurse had her baby this baby is basically trash, or a bastard. So because he was born with a
poor mother he will always be poor.

Basically the theme is that every man is going to be judged.

Significance of Title

The Japanese title of the story means Newspaper.

The swaddling clothes is said to be translated as waste newspapers.

In the story we find out that the child is wrapped in dirty newspaper, which basically states the child is
trash, or has no worth

Symbols

The scene of the babys birth is described as a butcher shop.

The newspapers represent a poverty life.

Throughout this story, the modernization of Japanese social life is recognized as an unwavering welcome
from the western culture. The story relates to real life and how difficult ans stressful a birth can be.

The baby's birth story will represent the rest of his life because it can be very inspirational to others,
including the birth mother.

These are symbols of Japanese tradition and foreshadows how their traditions will begin to fade due to
western modernization.