The Senses of Modernity in Tayama Katai’s “Shōjobyō” (1907)

Abstract

This essay examines “Shōjobyō” (The girl watcher, 1907), a short story by Tayama Katai (1872–1930). It focuses on the discourses on the senses in the narrative construction of its protagonist, Sugita Kojō. The sense of sight and the condition called shōjobyō play a major role in this construction. I argue that the interplay between the pathologically inflected inclination called shōjobyō and the technology-enhanced regimes of sensory perception (view through glass, modern means of transportation) described in “Shōjobyō” is crucial in the interpretation of this story as a reflection on the modern condition itself.