42 pages • 1 hour read
Yasunari KawabataThousand Cranes
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 1952A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Part 1Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Part 1: “Thousand Cranes”
Part 1, Chapter 1 Summary
Mitani Kikuji, a young, orphaned businessman, attends a tea ceremony held by his deceased father’s former mistress, Kurimoto Chikako. She plans to introduce him to one of her students, a young woman named Inamura Yukiko, and arrange a match between them. Kikuji is conflicted about attending the ceremony because he is troubled by childhood memories of Chikako and the large, dark birth mark that she has between her breasts. Kikuji once visited Chikako with his father and observed her cutting the hairs that grew from it. The sight deeply disturbed him, as did his father’s deception on the subject in conversation with Kikuji’s mother. Chikako has never married for fear of exposing the birth mark to a husband or nursing an infant from the marked breast.
Kikuji crosses paths with two traditionally dressed young women also heading to the tea ceremony. One of the girls is very attractive, and Kikuji notices that she carries a pink crepe handkerchief with a white thousand-crane pattern. He later finds out that this is Yukiko.
Part 1, Chapter 2 Summary
Upon arriving at the designated temple, Kikuji is greeted by Chikako who informs him that Mrs. Ota, another of his father’s former mistresses, is also in attendance along with her daughter, Ota Fumiko. Kikuji’s father discarded Chikako after a brief affair in favor of Mrs. Ota, his friend’s widow, with whom he stayed until his death. The jilted Chikako suppressed her sexuality, becoming “sexless” and undesirable. She joined Kikuji’s family household as Kikuji’s mother’s companion and to conduct tea ceremonies for guests and help out in the kitchens. Chikako informed Kikuji’s mother of her husband’s infidelity with Mrs. Ota and took it upon herself to harangue and terrorize Mrs. Ota over the affair.
Mrs. Ota greets Kikuji with pleasure, seemingly oblivious to any awkwardness, although Fumiko appears very uncomfortable. Yukiko conducts the tea ceremony, and Kikuji thinks that she looks particularly fresh and lovely when compared with the older women and their sordid histories.
Part 1, Chapter 3 Summary
Kikuji drinks from a cup that used to be his father’s, and Mrs. Ota requests to drink from the same cup, which shocks Kikuji and seems to embarrass Fumiko. After the tea ceremony is over, Chikako pulls Kikuji aside to discuss Yukiko. Kikuji is taken by Yukiko’s beauty, but he is reluctant to move forward with Chikako’s matchmaking plans and quickly excuses himself from the conversation.
Mrs. Ota is waiting for Kikuji outside, and as they walk together they discuss his father. Mrs. Ota seems to see him in Kikuji and talks nostalgically about the old days. She mentions how Fumiko was initially cold toward Kikuji’s father but warmed up to him during the war and made a point of caring for him and protecting him even when it meant putting herself at risk. She would, for instance, procure supplies for him from the countryside and escort him home even during bombing raids.
Part 1, Chapter 4 Summary
Kikuji and Mrs. Ota have sex together at an inn. Initially Kikuji feels satisfied and at peace with the encounter—neither guilty nor ashamed. However, as they lie in bed together, he feels the urge to be cruel toward Mrs. Ota. He tells her about Chikako’s birthmark and then about Chikako’s plans to arrange a match between him and Yukiko. Mrs. Ota is deeply upset and ashamed at having slept with Kikuji when he was on his way home from what she believes to be a miai (a formal initial meeting between a prospective bride and groom) but still spends the night with him.
Part 1, Chapter 5 Summary
Fumiko visits Kikuji unexpectedly at his house and explains that she persuaded her mother to stand Kikuji up at their arranged meeting in the days following their liaison. Fumiko is visibly uncomfortable and ashamed of the affair between Kikuji and her mother. She apologizes on Mrs. Ota’s behalf and entreats Kikuji to forgive her. Before leaving, she asks that he end his relationship with Mrs. Ota and no longer contact her.
Part 1 Analysis
Similar to the traditional Japanese poetry styles of haiku or renga, Part 1 of Thousand Cranes is a short vignette written in sparse lyrical prose. Just as individual poems typically fit into the larger context of collections or associated works, this section fits into Kawabata’s body of work as a thematic sequel to his earlier novel, Snow Country (1948), and as the opening section of the extended Thousand Cranes novel. It provides an ephemeral glimpse into the lives of the novel’s characters, and due in part to its original serialized form of publication, it functions as a standalone piece.
As the female characters are introduced, Kawabata takes care to describe Kikuji’s impressions of their physical appearances. This is typical of a time period during which women were expected to cultivate attractive qualities in order to secure a husband and thereby fulfil the role of wife and mother. Kikuji’s attraction to Mrs. Ota and Yukiko, as well as his revulsion to Chikako, reflect the theme of The Juxtaposition of Beauty and Ugliness. Mrs. Ota’s beauty foreshadows her suicide since it is ephemeral, like many of the celebrated forms of beauty in Japanese culture.
Kikuji is not accustomed to attending tea ceremonies since he does not share in his father’s fondness for the art of tea. This truncation of intergenerational transmission is key to the theme of Legacy: Imperfect Transmission and Inevitability. Kikuji represents a generation cut off from the legacies of the disgraced Imperial regime after World War II. He is flanked by characters who are either orphaned, too, or floundering in uncertainty after his father’s death. At the beginning of the novel, Kawabata introduces this theme to establish the context of a modern Japan grappling with its legacy and generate a sense of inevitability in how characters will cross paths after loss.
The tea ceremony conducted by Chikako is the most formal and traditional of the ceremonies described in the novel. However, it is tainted by an uncomfortable atmosphere and Chikako’s sullying of the practice by using the ceremony as a means to introduce Kikuji and Yukiko. Chikako’s tense version of a tea ceremony pales in comparison with the peace, tranquility, and careful aesthetic appreciation that a proper tea ceremony elicits. This sense of degradation hints at the Decay of Traditions and Values and evokes nostalgia for properly acknowledged tradition.
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By Yasunari Kawabata
