Helix - In-Depth Analysis - Research Paper Example

?Helix: An In Depth Analysis I. Introduction Helix is a short story narrated through a first person perspective in a relationship, particularly that of a man. He discusses the feelings that undertake him in his duration of being a part of a pair, his sentiments, his fears, and his attachment towards the woman that he is in relationship with. The story is in a first person point of view of a man who lazily goes off to meet his long time girlfriend. Their status seems to be a bit stale enough to be called boring. It may even be classified as a stagnant relationship amidst the realization that the woman the narrator is dating is an excitable kind of person. The story goes on with the fiance informing the guy that she will be leaving for a certain seminar where people are invited to return to their clear state of mind. This brings them into discussion and some reminiscing of the past, back when they were nineteen and young, when they have made love for the first time inside the spa. Here they stand now, with the man being dragged of the idea that he has to meet up with his girlfriend where they’d usually meet. Meanwhile, the title is a projection of how the narrator felt after their conversation and looking back of the past. He realizes how their lives as a couple have transcended time, thus using the phenomena of a helix into picture. He relates how the phenomena of a helix can be compared to two lovers who is nothing in the vastness of the universe, yet they are joined together in a spiral, like a dance, intertwined and related to each other. II. Background The text was written by a Japanese writer with the pen name Banana Yoshimoto. Its time frame could have been written during the 20th century modern Japan where cafes quiet establishments along sidewalks. Another thing is that Banana is born in 1964 which makes her one of the contemporary writers in Japan at the present. She was a poet’s daughter and she had a sister, Haruno Yoike, who is also a minion of literature. This is because Banana’s sister is one of the famous cartoonists in Japan. Banana usually writes about her experiences as a writer and novels that deal with Japanese individuals caught up in frustrations of issues concerning life, love, relationships, and existence instead of writing personal issues that she face as a wife and a mother. Two of her famous novels were turned into movies by famous producers in Japan. Her novel, Kitchen, was created into TV Movie series in two different versions while also having another version in Hong Kong in 1997. Banana graduated from Nihon University with a degree in Literature which explains her fondness in writing. According to Yoshimoto’s official online site, she actually won with her first work, "Kitchen", in the 6th Kaien Newcomer Writers Prize in November, 1987 and then the 16th Izumi Kyoka Literary Prize in January, 1988. Her other awards included the 39th edition, Best Newcomer Artists by the Minister of Education in August, 1988 with "Kitchen" and "Utakata/Sankuchuari”. She also had more awards in the field of literature for other stories outside Japan, particularly in Italy, such as; Literary Prize Scanno in June, 1993 and Fendissime Literary Prize in March, 1996 and Literary Prize Maschera d' Argento in November, 1999. (Yoshimoto Banana Profile 2011) While her ever successful novel, Kitchen is published in 20 different languages all over the world. III. Contemporary Japan The Old Japan is an exclusive culture after shutting from the rest of the world on its own after the Second World War. Meanwhile, the Modern Japan has started to acquire influences from European and Western counterparts. Their culture remains to be greatly intact by the closing of Japanese trade after the war. The busy streets of Tokyo where people find their way during rush hours are seen in periodicals and movies, but this is just a part of the whole of Japan’s culture. What people do not usually understand is the individuality that Japanese people tend to exhibit in their everyday undertakings. Statistics show how the Japanese lifestyle tends to be inclined with their certain fondness on entertainment. This may be caused by the high demand of hardwork in their culture. Certain seriousness is exhibited by people in showing the surface of their emotions in Japan. They are reputation oriented which makes them usually known for separating their feelings with their everyday dealings. Due to this, a healthy and balanced emotional health for a Japanese is hard to achieve since they usually box their feelings by hiding them. According to statistics, 62% of the population has unstable emotional conditions. One of the key players for this is the social pressure that Japanese face, while also having a social culture of boxing their emotions to themselves. With this, a good 92% of the population complains of drug addicted neighbors, 58% of the neighborhood in Japan are also heavy drinkers, and so on. These are just a few of the ways Japanese people cope up with their sentiments in life. Such attitude may be seen in the story. We can see that as the adults have become accustomed to each other, and even though they had been together for long, their conversation is not as connected to each other. There is a projection of them still not being familiar of the other. A lack of description of another person is described even if they had known and had been together for a long time. IV. The Main Character and the Synthesis The main character, which is also the perceived narrator of the short story acts as a bridge with the details that are not mentioned in the lovers’ past. He starts of the short story with a description about how he was that day, and even the night before. He introduces himself as a screwed up writer who cannot think of the captions he was due to finish with the deadline given to him. It showed how uninterested he was with his current project which was only assigned to him because the person who asked for his favor was a close friend from which he owes. Though he likes the set of art works that he was collaborating with to make the captions, he was out of words at this point. The main character may probably be simply a typical striving Japanese citizen, sorrowful as he might live alone while supporting himself through writing. He speaks of a terrible hangover that he has gotten into from the night before. He speaks of how a little girl from the next room is practicing her violin which he relates to his current mood. This approves of the impression that he is actually bored, and even stressed by his day in and day out lifestyle. Not sooner, he mentions about his particular girlfriend whom she views as philosophical yet simple—wherein he wished he also had such virtues. The characters remain generally unnamed in the story only referring to them as entities and not as personalities toward the audience. Amidst these, they are presented in a manner that cross-examines them with the things they have been thinking and desiring about at the moment their lines are spoken. As we continue with the main character, he is then forced to meet up with his fiance even though he has decided on calling her to cancel their date. His fiance was already gone to their rendezvous when he tries to contact her to send his intentions. This forces him to gussy up and go on his way to their meeting place in the now dusk sky. The scene at the cafe was a quiet one. The author described the atmosphere of the place without telling much vivacious of the detail, and yet the vividness of the scene can be formed by the reader through how the main character simply described of some key pieces in the scene. He sat in the dark with his girlfriend soon after climbing the steps since his girlfriend wanted them to have privacy where there would only just be the two of them. His fiance seemed to be really thrilled of the idea of talking in the dark while he was simply nonchalant about it. He was even being mildly sarcastic with his comments to his girlfriend as they started their conversation in the dark. This again proves the assumption that is formed in the earlier part of the story for a typical reader’s mind, the assumption that the relationship status from the man’s perspective has been a stagnant and unexciting. Meanwhile, as his fiance continues with her agenda of setting up the date, she mentions of going to a seminar that teaches about clearing memories. This inwardly alarms the narrator in the story. He realizes the perils of having his girlfriend’s memory erased. This may exhibit a change in the attitude of the main character in the story. He realizes that such action may endanger his position in the life of his girlfriend. He even objects the idea that her girlfriend should go. But she replies with the commitment she has already set to accompany her friend somewhere. His sentiment sends them to reminisce memories they shared during their first trip together. He states how it would be terrible to forget things and, finally admit to both of them, that it would be terrible if the girl would forget about him because of what her girlfriend will learn in the seminar. His girlfriend assures him how only those memories that are unnecessary will be removed. At this point, we can say that the narrator deems himself unnecessary to his fiance’s memory. This may be the reason why a pinch of insecurity starts to well up from the narrator, who at the beginning of the story exhibits his uninterested demeanor to the meeting they have set. This may be the part that he realizes how he could simply be erased from his partner’s memory after she comes back. This fear may have awakened his senses of questioning his importance in being a half of a pair. Late in the story, the audience learns of the narrator special fondness of his girlfriend’s way of shutting her eyes before she would answer hard hitting questions and simplifying them into easier answers. He mentions this many times in the story where he puts a stress on it. At the end, he explains how his fondness for his girl is simply just plainly different, as well as how it is different from other lovers. The narrator then explains how the title of the short story, is actually related to them as lovers. V. The Fiance The fiance’s character exhibits a rather cheerful vibe throughout the story. She may be a typical bubbly Japanese woman who also works during daytime and projects a happy-go-lucky sense of being in the story. She may also hide her sentiments from her lover, especially being strongly interested in going with the memory clearing seminar her friend is actually up to. She may appear a very concerned friend for her recently divorced and depressed girlfriend but there must also probably be a bigger reason why she would be interested in the seminar where thoughts may be forgotten. The things that bother her may not be included anymore but such may be related to her romance life where she would even break this news to her beau in such a rendezvous place. One may think she may also have become bored in their relationship as lovers. Although at the end, she specifies how every single thing that she does and sees is linked with her fondness to his boyfriend. Her personality may be that type that exhibits a jolly kind of outlook in life and yet, hide her true feelings even from her boyfriend by creating a facade of an excitable person who sees fun in a lot of ways. She refers to their sitting in the dark as fun, instead of romantic. She also mentions the fun in their love making during their first trip—interestingly, also not romantic. Their love for each other is that like it is not as much evident in how they talk to each other. This is maybe because the setting of the story is that both have withered their fondness for each other throughout the years. VI. Social Prevalence The attitude of people towards relationships especially in the Western cultures has been rather abuzz with the idea of having a rapid change of partners in just a short span of time. Concepts such as speed dating and online dating have been a fad in the young generation nowadays that the emotional connectedness of people is already set a-blur. In the story, the couple has been together for maybe a few years that they have advanced in aged while knowing each other, at the same time, the feeling of being very familiar with each other has also made them strangers to each other. At the same time, their once fondness for each other are overthrown by the things they have now acquired, such as work. People nowadays tend to keep on looking and looking for a compatible partner, but then after settling with them for a while, they get bored and start on the cycle once again for their quest. This makes dating a game to many. In comparison with the characters in the story who have managed to stay together for a long while, the challenge for them is to retain the flames they once knew and felt for each other. A time far from each other on the week the characters have discussed about may be an opportunity for them to rekindle the passion they once had by making them fonder for each other if they part for a while. Also, with such happening for the couple, the intentions of the main character are put into light especially when a threat of him being eradicated from his fiance’s memory is brought up. He then realizes what is important that maybe he has forgotten for a long time, something that has been lost in the consistency of their relationship. VII. Conclusion The culture of Japanese people has tremendously also affected how people would relate to even the closest people in their lives. They are usually stuck in romantic ideals but then, in real life, have been culturally suppressed emotionally due to their high importance in self honor and respect. Issues such as high suicide rates in their country make this a topic to ponder upon. How it is related to both the characters relationship with each other is a faint reflection of how relationships in Japan bloom, stay, and sometimes, also wither. The two lovers in the short story may also mirror a growing trend of bored lovers throughout the world as they struggle in the challenges of how to keep their interest level for each other aflame. References: Benedict, Ruth. 1946. The Chrysanthemum and the Sword : Patterns of Japanese Culture. Boston : Houghton Mifflin. Banana Yoshimoto. Helix. The Art of the Story: A Compilation of Short Stories by Daniel Halpern. p.650. Banana Yoshimoto. Kitchen (1994). English Translated. Washington Square Press:Washington. The Japan Lifestyle: Demographics for Japan. World Database of Happiness, Happiness in Nations. Rank Report 2004/3b. Read More