No sooner had the thought crossed his mind than Ryūnosuke grasped the spider thread and started climbing with all his might, higher and higher, hand over hand, climbing and climbing.
Hell and Heaven, though, are thousands of leagues apart, so it was not easy for Ryūnosuke to escape. He soon began to tire, to tire until he could not raise his arm for even one more pull. He had no choice but to stop to rest, and as he clung to the spider thread, he looked down, far, far down below.
Now Ryūnosuke realised that all his climbing had been worth the effort: the River of Sins was hidden in the depths of the darkness. And even the dull glint of the terrifying Mountain of Guilt was far down beneath his feet. At this rate, it might be easier than he had imagined to climb his way out of Hell. Twining his hands in the spider thread, Ryūnosuke laughed aloud. ‘I’ve almost done it! I’m almost saved.’
But then what do you think he saw? Far down on the spider thread, his selves, his legion of selves – son and father, husband and friend, lover and writer, Man of the East and Man of the West – had followed after him; his selves and his characters, too – Yoshihide, Yasukichi, Tock and all the rest – his many creations and, of course, his sins, his countless, countless sins: his pride, his greed, his lust, his anger, his gluttony, his envy and his sloth. All had followed after him, clambering up the thread with all their might like a column of ants! This slim thread seemed likely to snap from his weight alone: how could it possibly hold so many of his selves, his characters and his sins? And if the fragile thread were to break midway, then Ryūnosuke would plunge back down into the Hell he had struggled so mightily to escape. Yet from the pitch-dark River of Sins, still the unbroken column of his selves, his characters and his sins came squirming up the gleaming silver thread in their hundreds – in their thousands – and Ryūnosuke knew he would have to do something now or the thread would break in two.
Ryūnosuke raised his head again, looking up the spider thread. He was so close to Paradise, so very near. He could see the light of the water, he could glimpse the face of Jesus, even hear His weeping, now feel His tears wet upon his own face. But no matter how hard he tried to pull himself up, no matter how far and fast he climbed, Ryūnosuke knew his selves, his characters and sins would always follow after him, always catch up with him.
Ryūnosuke let go of the spider thread.
And at that very instant, at that very moment, as Ryūnosuke fell back down into the darkest depths, the spider thread broke at the very place where he had been hanging from it.
Behind Ryūnosuke, all that remained was the dangling short end of the spider thread from Paradise, softly shining in the moonless, starless sky.
3
At the edge of the Lotus Pond in Paradise, Buddha and Christ watched everything that happened. And when, in the end, Ryūnosuke sank back into the River of Sins, Buddha resumed His stroll, His face now tinged with sorrow. But Christ remained kneeling beside the pond, before the water, staring down through the lotus leaves, watching the pictures in the peep-box, weeping, weeping and weeping into the crystalline pool –
In girum imus nocte et consumimur igni …
We go round and round in the night, the endless night, consumed by fire, by fire, in the night, by fire –
Fire consumed by fire …
But the lotuses of the Lotus Pond still swayed their perfect pearl-white blossoms, and from their golden centres still wafted a never-ending fragrance. Yet I think it must be close to twilight in Paradise now.
Hell Screens
In that suburban house, on the second floor, many times
he asked himself why those who loved each other
caused each other such pain,
as the eerie tilt of the floor filled him with foreboding …
The Life of a Foolish Man, Ryūnosuke Akutagawa, 1927
Once upon a time, beneath the branches of a red pine, before a blackened gravestone, the man said to the child, These are the stories you told yourself, tell yourself, then and now, now and then, of scenes remembered, on screens erected …
1. Up and Down and Out
A voice comes to you in the dark, up the tunnel, through the waters –
‘Can you hear me in there? Do you want to be born …?’
Your father has his mouth to your mother’s vagina –
‘Please think seriously before you reply, but …’
Behind the sliding screen, crouching on the floor, his mouth level with her vagina, as though he is speaking into a telephone, asking you, ‘Is it your desire to be born into this world, or not?’
And each time, after asking his question, while awaiting your answer, he reaches up for the bottle on the table, takes a mouthful of disinfectant, gargles, rinses and spits into the metal bowl on the floor beside your mother’s arse, then resumes his position, his mouth to her vagina, asking again, ‘Come on! Come on! Do you wish to be born into this world, or not?’
Up the tunnel, in the water, you are shaking your head and saying, ‘No, no! I do not want to be born. The first act of the human tragedy starts when an individual becomes the child of certain parents. You are asking me if I want to be born, but you do not even know if you want me; you have already lost one child, and now you are both at ill-omened ages. Should I agree to be born, in order
