THE INLAND SEA Donald Richie Introduction by Pico Iyer Stone Bridge Press • Berkeley, California Published by P.O. Box • Berkeley, California - - • - -
[email protected] • www.stonebridge.com The publisher gratefully acknowledges Lucille Carra of Travelfilm Company for permission to use images from The Inland Sea, a documentary by Lucille Carra, produced by Brian Cotnoir and Lucille Carra, directed by Lucille Carra with cinematography by Hiro Narita. VHS release by HomeVision; DVD release by Janus Films through Image Entertainment, www.image-entertainment.com. Text copyright © , Donald Richie. Introduction © Pico Iyer. Images © Travelfilm Company. All rights reserved. Front cover design by D. S. Noble. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form without permission from the publisher. Printed in the United States of America. - - Richie, Donald. The Inland Sea / Donald Richie; with an introduction by Pico Iyer. p. cm. ISBN - - - . . Inland Sea Region (Japan)—Description and travel. I. Iyer, Pico. II. Title. DS . .I R . ' —dc Contents “A Call from the Mist” : Introduction by Pico Iyer A map appears on pages – . Photographs appear on pages – , – , and – . Afterword “A Call from the Mist” Introduction by Pico Iyer , more than anywhere, stands at the edge of an intimacy that is closing slowly in his face. He walks along a beach, perhaps, as darkness falls, with a young, a beautiful girl, and they talk of loneliness, and all the places he has seen, the nights. The girl offers to introduce him to a local inn, where he will be taken care of, and they walk together up to a private room and sit by the window, looking out at the sea. Then he touches her arm, and the spell is broken. Giggling, she makes her diplomatic retreat. The next morning, when he rises to leave the small town by boat, sailing away into the mist, he sees her there, on the pier, with two friends, waiting for him with presents and goodbyes. It is a haunting moment, and one that stands for a lifetime of such moments for those of us who find ourselves on this island of half-opened doors. It is made more touching by the fact that the girl knows she will never see the places that she dreams of; all her days will be spent in this forgotten town. And it is made more plangent by the fact that the foreigner confesses to himself (and to us) that 5 Introduction 6 the encounter is perplexing to him because he is “innocent despite experience”—and innocent not only because he sees no point in guilt. The plumbing of innocence and loneliness, the incarnation of a deeply Japanese freedom from cynicism and openness to wonder, the attentiveness to all the fine print, emotional and otherwise, in every fleeting moment are part of what make Donald Richie the most lasting and graceful foreign writer on Japan since Lafcadio Hearn (and before). He apprehends Japan (in all senses) on its own terms, yet puts it in a larger picture. He catches the sound of the sea through the mist, the fisherman’s no-nonsense explanation of how it will bring him a living, and then the sense of loss that is what the sound, and the explanation, mean. Japan keeps its visitors permanently enchanted—and vexed—Richie has told us, through its teasing mix of intimacy and distance; it is that same mix, brought to us thro