Japanese
A Postcard from Wildcat |
Japanese A Postcard from Wildcat |
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Vivid depiction in the opening paragraphs |
"Acorns and Wildcat" is placed in the beginning of Kenji Miyazawa's "The Restaurant of Many Orders", a collection of children's stories (including one of the same title) and the first of his published books. From this we can infer that Kenji was confident of this work, and especially of its opening paragraphs. |
| A peculiar postcard from a wildcat to Ichiro | "One Saturday evening, a strange postcard arrived at Ichiro's house. This is what it said:
Is good to no you are fine. Yours Truly, Wildcat  He slipped the postcard away in his school satchel and went hopping and skipping all over the house.Even after he crawled in under the quilts that night he kept on imagining Wildcat's meowy grin, the scene at this supposedly bothersome trial and so on, and didn't get to sleep until really late." Reading this opening, the reader is immediately infected by Ichiro's anticipation and excitement of what is to come the following day. |
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| A dispute among acorns | But what the card described as a difficult case was, in fact, an insignificant dispute among acorns as to who was the best acorn of all: the biggest, the roundest, or the one with the pointiest head. Amusing about this story is the curious situation Kenji has set and his imaginative casting: Wildcat, the judge, calling on the boy Ichiro to be his advisor in coming to a decision for some argumentative acorns. | |
| The wildcat, a noble, dignified resident of the forest | In "Acorns and Wildcat," the wildcat is depicted, as he is in "The Restaurant of Many Orders," as a noble, dignified resident of the forest. He lived "in the beautiful glade with golden grass that whispered and soughed in the wind, encircled by that tall, olive-hued forest of plum yews." and when he appeared, "gusting wind sent waves rippling over the grass." He stood "in a sort of yellowish surcoat, his green eyes round as moons." | |
How the wildcat treated Ichiro |
There is another aspect to "Acorns and Wildcat," one that emerges from the broader context of a number of Kenji's works and which seems to be a recurring theme: his treatment of the relationship between the animals and other elements of nature and human beings. In "Acorns and Wildcat," Wildcat invites Ichiro, who loves the forest, to help him with his trial, and he treats the boy as an honored guest; but in "The Restaurant of Many Orders," Wildcat takes to task two city gentlemen who have come to the forest to hunt and plunder. |
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Material in quotation marks is from The Works of Kenji Miyazawa, translated by C. W. Nicol & Gan Tanigawa, published by Monogatari-Bunka-no-Kai. |
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