Tanizaki, Master of Subtlety in 'Four Criminal Cases'

Junichiro Tanizaki (1886-1965), a central figure in Japanese literature, continues to astonish readers with his aesthetic precision and exploration of the deepest human desires. Initially fascinated by Western modernity and the avant-garde, he later turned to Japanese tradition. Tanizaki authored the beautiful essay 'In Praise of Shadows' and novels like 'The Key' and 'Some Prefer Nettles', which delve into desire and sexuality, exploring the enigma of women. Beyond the eroticism that permeates his work, Tanizaki, a perennial Nobel Prize contender, also wrote mystery and horror stories. An example is 'Four Criminal Cases', recently published by Satori with a translation by Rumi Sato.

Marta Marne, the book's prologue writer, highlights that the four stories reveal Tanizaki's interest in embedding stories within stories, his concern with madness and mental issues, and his immersion in mirror games that plunge readers into ambiguity and uncertainty. The selected tales often investigate the dark corners of the mind, featuring "a blend of rational analysis and subjectivity that resonates both in the Japan of that era and with today's readers."

The volume includes the turmoil of a young painter visiting a lawyer to determine whether he committed a crime or if it's all a product of his delusions. It covers a casual conversation between an office worker and a detective, leading the former down an unexpected path. In another short piece, a theft in a student residence proves that appearances are often deceiving. The book concludes with a case of a writer helping a friend solve a supposed crime.

With 'Four Criminal Cases', Tanizaki once again demonstrates his desire to distance himself from naturalistic style, although traces of this literature type are evident in the final result. As previously mentioned, Tanizaki prefers to focus on sensual and captivating atmospheres rather than a faithful reproduction of social realities.

The earthquake and subsequent fires that devastated Tokyo and Yokohama in 1923 marked a turning point in Tanizaki's literature. Forced to relocate from the capital to Kansai, he was captivated by classical Japanese culture and the beauty of pre-modern Japan. However, these stories are not products of this period but of the earlier one, when Tanizaki adored urban themes and sought inspiration in Western topics.

As an heir to Edgar Allan Poe, Tanizaki mastered the art of fiction to keep readers engrossed through the concealment of information, creating invisible gaps that lead to reading between the lines. Like all writers of the Meiji era, Tanizaki was seduced by European and American men of letters, which allowed Japanese authors to expand their expressive capabilities. In this sense, he was influenced by Baudelaire, Oscar Wilde, and Flaubert, whose narrative principles he integrated into the Japanese literary imagination.

Despite this acknowledged heritage, Tanizaki does not strictly adhere to canonical mechanisms to unravel mysteries. In several stories, he employs the framed narrative technique, where a character recounts the main plot to others, accentuating subjectivity and psychological focus. This is evident in 'The Case of the Yanagi Bath', where an unreliable perspective adds ambiguity to the story.

In 'Along the Way', one of Tanizaki's finest fictions, the shadow of Sherlock Holmes, the detective created by Arthur Conan Doyle, is visible. While Holmes solved cases in his sitting room, Tanizaki's detective pieces together clues while strolling with a suspect.

The book concludes with 'Devils in Daylight', a story where Takahashi is summoned by Sonomura to witness a murder. A chilling tale where characters desperately cling to the belief that mental disorders are hereditary, a notion frequently challenged by the author. In these short pieces, Tanizaki once again appeals to subtle prose and aesthetic narration to illuminate an atmosphere laden with tension, intrigue, and eroticism. The writer suggests that beyond solving a crime, the true enigma lies in the hidden motives that drive humans to confront the forbidden.