Welcome to Gaia! ::

Few words can illustrate succinctly the reaction Tanizaki desired to illicit when publishing his Diary of an Old Man, possibly because Tanizaki never anticipated any kind of audience reaction in the first place. While we may never know for certain what thoughts drifted through the brain of this literary pioneer at the time of it’s composition, we can draw reasonable conclusions by examining key historical facts. Growing ever nearer to his own death, a mere four years after the 1961 publication, Tanizaki composed a fictionalized autobiographical account, or I-Novel of an idealized relationship in less than ideal conditions, conditions remarkably close to his own. For example, Utsugi is only a year older than the real life author. Both share similar infirmities, and in some ways, the various medical conditions associated with Utsugi likely reflect either the historical or anticipatory conditions of Tanizaki’s real life. The Key, bundled together in the English translation with The Diary of an Old Man, also speaks about an older man, the professor who inevitably suffers from a very similar death to Tanizaki’s own heart attack. In retrospect, while every author writes about what they know, and that inevitably originates with the author’s own life experiences, Tanizaki’s approach stands out as almost surreal – too real to be taken seriously, perhaps frighteningly so.
Tanizaki pays close attention to the accoutrements of the elderly, and consistently makes references to medications, practices, exercises, and therapies consistent with someone desperately attempting to overcome death, armed with a cane in one hand and a bag of prescription medications in the other. Through the milieu of the Watakushi shōsetsu, Tanizaki creates a window for the audience illustrating Utsugi’s perspective, and transforming traditional roles of a stereotypical victim into the elevated status of main protagonist and anti hero. In his own way, Tanizaki encourages us to not only empathize, but even cheer for the dirty old man – a caricature while socially reprehensible on the surface, represents a telling revelation of the inevitable condition for most of us – whether we want to admit to it or not. Contrary to idealized social norms, like most real elderly people, Utsugi, despite his physical infirmities and impotence, is not a Bodhisattva or Saint, he is a sexual being, a human being, with attachments and sexual desires like anyone else. With consideration to the extremely taboo nature of focusing on the sexual fantasies of an elderly man, it is easy to make the case that Tanizaki wrote the novel with the intent of ruffling a few more feathers before going down to his grave, except for one important element: Satsuko.


Satsuko is no ordinary woman, more like an amalgam of several women, largely modeled on femme fatales of previous novels.

Satsuko is his mother, his lover, his bondage queen, his mistress, his ballerina dancer, his vindictive power hungry sexual predator all rolled into one. Through the imagined pen of Utsugi, Tanizaki reveals his ideal woman “QUOTE: vampire section”.


Tanizaki exploits the pitiable condition of the old man's infirmities to draw in the audience close enough to listen, and then rewrites the traditional narrative of a pitiable old man into a romantic, though perverse hero, in constant conflict between his own sexual desires and the dastardly activities of Satsuko's manipulations. While the rest of the household merely perceives a perverted old cripple caught up in the snares of dementia, the Diary of an Old Man reveals a whole new reality, one where the old man struggles tragically against the wiles of the succubus to no avail. Inevitable as it wee, in his infirm and weakened state, the Old Man surrenders to his desires in this war of love, but along the way, stands his ground on many battle fields, suffering injury (a slap), near heart attack/fire (blood pressure), holding back for a kiss, and even being betrayed by his family (swimming pool/cat's eye). In these moments, (cats eye and swimming pool), The Old Man (name) demonstrates great courage despite his infirmity and stands his ground.

In some ways, as is hinted at throughout the Novel, (the old man's name) has much more in common with Don Quixote seeing giants in Windmills and conniving harlots in his bed chambers.