Sound of Waves Essay
Steegan Mewart
Oct 2013
In the novel The Sound of Waves the love story between Hatsue and Shinji was captivating. The novel included a great story with an even better conflict that arose to try and break up the lovers. This conflict involved a character names Yasuo, who was interesting because he was so different than the main character Shinji. Both Shinji and Yasuo found Hatsue attractive and had intentions to marry her. The two men were almost polar opposites throughout the story. The ending to the story included a choice by Hatsue’s father that involved both men. Their character and personality vastly set them apart and in the end decided who would have the privilege to marry Hatsue. Yasuo was a young man on the island who came from a very rich family. He was first described as “quite fat” (Mishima 22) as he entered the meeting of the Young Men’s Association, to which he was the leader. Yasuo was relatively smart for his age. As he was returning from a business trip, Yasuo was portrayed as taking “great pride in showing this girl from a Tokyo university how well he could speak, without any trace of island dialect” (Mishima 59).
On the other hand, the story introduces a very different young man named Shinji. Shinji did not come from a rich family like Yasuo. He is specified as “tall and well-built” (Mishima 6) and possessed great strength as he could “swim the circumference of Uta-Jima as many as five times without stopping” (Mishima 33). Unlike Yasuo, Shinji was not very smart and “had made notably bad grades in school” (Mishima 6). Shinji almost flunked out of school if it was not for his devoted mother who talked to the lighthouse keeper who knew his principal. These people are the reason he possess a job on the island as a fisherman. Even though the boys were around the same age, they were different in their ways with women. Shinji was so naïve with Hatsue throughout the story; this characteristic was displayed perfectly during one of the lovers’
Oct 2013
In the novel The Sound of Waves the love story between Hatsue and Shinji was captivating. The novel included a great story with an even better conflict that arose to try and break up the lovers. This conflict involved a character names Yasuo, who was interesting because he was so different than the main character Shinji. Both Shinji and Yasuo found Hatsue attractive and had intentions to marry her. The two men were almost polar opposites throughout the story. The ending to the story included a choice by Hatsue’s father that involved both men. Their character and personality vastly set them apart and in the end decided who would have the privilege to marry Hatsue. Yasuo was a young man on the island who came from a very rich family. He was first described as “quite fat” (Mishima 22) as he entered the meeting of the Young Men’s Association, to which he was the leader. Yasuo was relatively smart for his age. As he was returning from a business trip, Yasuo was portrayed as taking “great pride in showing this girl from a Tokyo university how well he could speak, without any trace of island dialect” (Mishima 59).
On the other hand, the story introduces a very different young man named Shinji. Shinji did not come from a rich family like Yasuo. He is specified as “tall and well-built” (Mishima 6) and possessed great strength as he could “swim the circumference of Uta-Jima as many as five times without stopping” (Mishima 33). Unlike Yasuo, Shinji was not very smart and “had made notably bad grades in school” (Mishima 6). Shinji almost flunked out of school if it was not for his devoted mother who talked to the lighthouse keeper who knew his principal. These people are the reason he possess a job on the island as a fisherman. Even though the boys were around the same age, they were different in their ways with women. Shinji was so naïve with Hatsue throughout the story; this characteristic was displayed perfectly during one of the lovers’