Japanese Literature Summaries
日本語

Matasaburō of the Wind — Summary and Characters

A strange new boy who came with the wind

Author
Miyazawa Kenji
Published
1934
Genres
  • Fantasy
  • Coming of Age
Length
30,341 characters
Reading time
About 1 hr 1 min
Orthography
Modern script and kana

About this work

One of Miyazawa Kenji's major works, published after his death in 1934. Over a few days around the two hundred and tenth day of the year, the village children convince themselves that the strange new pupil who arrived with the wind is Matasaburō, the wind spirit himself. Through the play of dialect against standard speech and the shifting moods of the boys, it conveys Kenji's characteristic weave of the fantastic and the ordinary.

Summary

On the first of September, just before the two hundred and tenth day of the year, a peculiar new pupil arrives at a small school in the mountains: Takada Saburō, red-haired, with round black eyes. He appears in a high wind and speaks not the northeastern dialect the others use but something different, and the village children, wary at first, take him in. Kasuke in particular becomes convinced that Saburō must be a reincarnation of Matasaburō of the Wind, the wind spirit who comes and goes with the wind itself. Watched over by Ichirō and the older children, Saburō roams the pastures, the river and the mountain fields with them and gradually warms to them. One day, going up the mountain after a horse that has strayed from the grazing ground, Kasuke is caught by the wind in a deep fog, loses consciousness, and sees a vision of Saburō riding away on the wind in a cloak and shoes of glass. Then, a few days later, Saburō leaves as suddenly as he came, his father's work taking him elsewhere, and the strong wind carries him off no one knows where.

Characters

Chapter-by-chapter synopsis

The app covers this work chapter by chapter (full text in the app).

  1. 1. About This Work
  2. 2. Main Characters
  3. 3. Major Supporting Characters
  4. 4. September 1 — The Red-Haired Child in the Classroom
  5. 5. The Second Day — Footsteps and a Pencil
  6. 6. The Upper Pasture — A Glass Cloak in the Fog
  7. 7. The Day of Gathering Grapevines — “The Wind Did It”
  8. 8. Saikachi Pool — Blasting and the Tobacco Monopoly
  9. 9. Poison-Fishing and a Game of Tag — “Rain Goes Zakko-Zakko, Rain-Saburō”
  10. 10. The Morning of the Two Hundred and Tenth Day — Saburō's Departure
  11. 11. Key Motifs and Foreshadowing

The opening (original text)

Dodo do dodou do dodou do dodou blow the green walnuts away blow the sour quinces away dodo do dodou do dodou do dodou There was a small school on the bank of a mountain stream. There was only one classroom, but there were pupils in every year except the third, from the first to the sixth. The playground was about the size of a tennis court, but right behind it rose a pretty grassy hill with chestnut trees, and in one corner of the playground there was a hole in the rock where cold water came bubbling out. It was a fresh, clear morning on the first of September. The wind roared in the blue sky and the sunlight filled the whole playground. Two first-year children in black snow trousers came round the bank into the playground, and seeing that no one else had arrived they cried by turns, "Ho, I'm first! I'm first!" and came through the gate in high delight. But when they took a look into the classroom, both of them were so startled that they stood stock still; then they looked at each other and shook all over, and at last one of them burst out crying.

Matasaburō of the Wind by Miyazawa Kenji (Aozora Bunko)

The ending (original text)

There was a rattling sound from the direction of the night-duty room. The teacher took up his red fan and hurried off that way. The two stood a while without speaking, looking into each other's faces as if to find out what the other really thought. The wind had not yet dropped, and the windowpanes, clouding over with raindrops, rattled again.

Matasaburō of the Wind by Miyazawa Kenji (Aozora Bunko)

Famous passages

Doddo-do, dodo-udo, dodo-udo, dodo-u Blow away the green walnuts too Blow away the sour quinces too Doddo-do, dodo-udo, dodo-udo, dodo-u

An opening song that turns the sound of the wind directly into words. It ushers in twelve strange days in September, during which children come to believe that the transfer student Takada Saburō is Matasaburō, a spirit of the wind.

Read the original

The original Japanese text is available at Aozora Bunko, and the app downloads the same text for its vertical-text reader.

Aozora Bunko library card

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