"The Eyes at the Final Moment" (From Wikipedia)
"The Eyes at the Final Moment" (Matsugo no Me) is an essay by Yasunari Kawabata. Written when he was 34 years old, the piece reflects on his personal views on art and life and death through associative reflections on the fates and deaths of artists such as Ryūnosuke Akutagawa, Harue Koga, Motojirō Kajii, and Yumeji Takehisa, as well as the mysterious and wondrous nature of their artistic creations.
Scattered throughout the essay are expressions of Kawabata's resolute stance as a novelist and artist, along with aphoristic and manifesto-like statements that mark a turning point in his artistic philosophy. Because of this, the essay is almost invariably cited in discussions of Kawabata’s work. It is also frequently noted for its connection to his nihilistic novel The Birds and Beasts (Kinjuu), written in the same year.
The title, "The Eyes at the Final Moment," which represents Kawabata’s perspective as an author, is taken from a phrase in Ryūnosuke Akutagawa’s farewell note "A Note to an Old Friend." Kawabata’s choice of this title helped bring greater fame to the passage in Akutagawa’s will that mentions "the eyes at the final moment."
Publication History
The essay first appeared in the December 1933 issue (Vol. 1, No. 2) of Bungei magazine. It was later included in the 1934 publication Selected Works of Yasunari Kawabata, Volume 1: Essays and Criticism, published by Kaizōsha.
As a standalone book, it was included in The Voice of Purity, published on June 18, 1939, by Kinseido, and later in Prose, published on April 17, 1942, by Tōhō Shobō.
Summary
One summer, Yasunari Kawabata visited the Ikaho Hot Springs and happened to catch sight of Takehisa Yumeji. For Kawabata, who had associated Yumeji—an artist who dominated the Meiji to early Taishō era with his genre and lyrical paintings—only with the "dreams of boyhood," the aged figure of Yumeji he saw for the first time was unexpectedly startling. Yumeji, a painter of decadence, seemed to have hastened both physical and mental aging through that very decadence, though the impression was one of a sweet kind of decline.
“Though decadence seems a detour that leads to the divine, it may actually be the quicker path. Had I encountered a truly great artist aged by decadence before my eyes, I might have been more deeply shaken. (omission) In Yumeji’s case, however, the impression was gentler—an indirect realization that the path he had walked as a painter had not been the proper one, a realization Yumeji now expressed with his very being. As an artist, it was likely an irrevocable misfortune. Yet, as a human being, perhaps a form of happiness. Of course, this is a lie. Such vague phrasing shouldn’t be tolerated, but it is in this very compromise that I now sense the southern wind whispering, ‘Forget.’ I feel as though humans know more about death than they do about life—that’s what lets us keep living.”
—Yasunari Kawabata, The Eyes at the Final Moment
From this reflection on Yumeji, Kawabata transitions to a memory of Strindberg’s romantic tragedies, which arose from his attempt to reconcile with humanity through women. Kawabata muses:
“If it is wrong to advise all couples to divorce, then might it not also be wrong, in terms of conscience, to expect even myself to be a true artist?”
Although there are rare cases of parent-child writers, Kawabata asserts that no writer wishes for their child to follow in their footsteps. He believes artists are not born in a single generation; rather, they are:
“A single flower blooming after generations of ancestral blood.”
While the inherited artistic culture of an old family might produce a writer, Kawabata suggests the weakened and diseased blood of such old lineages often bursts into final brilliance like a dying flame—thus creating an artist. But this is already a tragedy. He doubts the descendants of such artists will flourish robustly.
Referencing Shiki Masaoka as an example of a great artist who, even on the brink of death, struggled through illness to produce more works, Kawabata acknowledges that while such determination is common among the gifted, he himself would prefer to forget all about literature when lying on his deathbed. He adds that he has not yet written anything worthy of being called a true work of art. Even in death, he may feel unfulfilled—but perhaps that very “regret” would free him, allowing for a peaceful departure.
Kawabata claims to dislike suicide, noting that one reason is that suicide requires thinking about death, though he immediately contradicts himself. He concedes that when the moment comes, he might find his hand trembling, still grasping his manuscript. He admits he was surprised that even someone like Akutagawa wrote "A Note to an Old Friend," calling the will a "stain on Akutagawa’s death," though he still quotes the note extensively.
“What we call vitality is, in truth, merely another name for animal instinct. I, too, am one of the human beasts. But seeing how I have grown weary even of food and sex, I must be gradually losing that animal vitality. The world I now live in is like a sheet of ice—clear, yet painfully sensitive. Last night, I discussed a prostitute’s fee (!) with her, and felt deeply the sorrow of us humans, who live only in order to survive. If only we could willingly embrace eternal sleep, it may not bring happiness, but surely peace. Still, I doubt whether I can ever muster the courage to die by my own hand. And yet, nature appears all the more beautiful to someone like me. You may laugh at the contradiction—that I love the beauty of nature, yet seek to end my life. But nature is beautiful because it is reflected in the eyes at my final moment.”
—Ryūnosuke Akutagawa, A Note to an Old Friend
Kawabata admits that, being significantly younger, he didn’t deeply respect Akutagawa as a writer. But upon reading The Gears—written close to Akutagawa’s death—he was moved to bow his head in sincere admiration. He felt that this was where Akutagawa’s "eyes at the final moment" could be seen most clearly. Kawabata considers The Western Gentleman and The Gears to be works purchased at the price of death.
“For a monk living in a world as clear as ice, the sound of burning incense may resemble a house fire, and the falling ash, the crack of thunder. That, too, is real. The secret of all great art must lie in this ‘eye at the final moment.’”
—Yasunari Kawabata, The Eyes at the Final Moment
When Ryūichi Yokomitsu published his revolutionary novel The Machine three years earlier, Kawabata wrote at the time that it inspired both happiness and “a certain deep sorrow.” While that initial unease has mostly faded, he now sees that Yokomitsu himself has taken on even greater personal suffering.
Kawabata cites J.D. Beresford’s Experiment in the Novel, which states:
“Our best novelists have always been experimenters,”
and
“All the canons, whether in prose or verse, had their origin in the work of men of genius.”
To Kawabata, the start of artistic experiment may be joyful—even if slightly pathological—but “the eyes at the final moment” are experiments too, often akin to a premonition of death.
Kawabata, who says he is seldom plagued by the “demon of regret,” whether due to forgetfulness or a lack of self-reflection, nonetheless feels everything happens as it must. He observes that works by artists who died young often contain “a foretelling of death.” Art, he suggests, has a terrifying aspect—it defies modern science's logic of body and mind.
He adds that while events may later appear inevitable in hindsight, it’s not surprising. Perhaps it is the grace of the gods. Or the sorrow of humankind. Either way, this line of thought may be in harmony with the logic of heaven. Even the most ordinary people may reach a moment akin to Natsume Sōseki’s motto: “Submit to Heaven, Renounce the Self.” For example, in death. And even those who seem unlikely to die—when they finally do—leave one thinking, “Ah, they too were mortal.”
Touching on his friends Kajii and Koga—great artists who had recently passed—Kawabata reflects on how artistic friendships differ from romantic separations. With friends in art, there is only death, never separation by choice. He never felt he’d lost friends just because they had a falling-out or lost touch.
Kawabata, unable to finish proper eulogies for Kajii and Koga, remarks on Takashi Ogana’s work Two Paintings, which sought to illuminate Akutagawa’s death. Kawabata suspects the intensity of Ogana’s words, suggesting that the more an author tries to be truthful in such roman à clef novels, the further they drift from reality. Even Chekhov and Joyce never replicated their models exactly.
He brings in Paul Valéry’s theory that fiction's vitality comes from the deliberate weaving of “true yet arbitrary” details, which, in their lifelike quality, link the reader’s real existence to the fictional lives of characters. These simulations, imbued with uncanny life, invite readers to project themselves into them—because our capacity to live includes the capacity to bring others to life in our minds.
“When Akutagawa said in A Note to an Old Friend that he might die by suicide as though succumbing to illness,” Kawabata considers, “we are ultimately drawn back to the idea that dying of illness may be best. No matter how deeply we loathe this world, suicide is not the face of enlightenment.”
Though both Kajii and Koga lived reclusive lives, Kawabata believes they were deeply ambitious. While seeming kind and gentle, they may have been possessed by demons—especially Kajii. Yet both were unmistakably Japanese and Eastern in spirit and likely never expected any grand tribute after death.
Kawabata interprets Koga’s often-spoken phrases like “There is no art greater than death” and “To die is to live” as expressions not of Western fatalism but of deeply embedded Buddhist thinking. Kawabata, also regarded as a seeker of new literary styles and sometimes called a “magician,” wonders whether someone as frail as Koga ever felt a similar melancholy brush his heart.
“I am seen as one who constantly chases new trends and forms in literature. I am believed to favor novelty, to show interest in new talent. I have even earned the dubious honor of being called a ‘magician.’ (omission) But were we truly good magicians? My opponent, who hurled that insult, may have thought it derision, but I smiled quietly. My sorrows didn’t reflect in the eyes of that blind seer. If he truly believed it, he was simply a fool enchanted by my illusion. Yet I don’t perform tricks to deceive. My ‘magic’ is simply the trace of my weak struggle with inner sorrow. Call me what you will—I don’t care. As for that great Western brute, Pablo Picasso, I don’t know—but I do wonder whether Koga, frail in body and spirit like me, even while producing great works, never once felt the same kind of sigh brush across his chest.”
—Yasunari Kawabata, The Eyes at the Final Moment