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Parody, Irony and Ideology in the Fiction of Ihara Saikaku by David J. Gundry (review)

Reading David J. Gundry’s detailed analysis of four of Ihara Saikaku’s fi ctional narratives reminds us of the extraordinary breadth of subject matter Saikaku (1642–93) has left us. Starting with his successful career as a haikai poet and teacher in the urban contemporary Danrin school of group composition, Saikaku went on to explore new modes of fi ction writing within the narrative subgenre of ukiyozōshi (fl oating world fi ction, p. 1). Saikaku’s works were so distinctive compared to the fi ction and courtesan critique narratives preceding them that writers began emulating his style, resulting in the establishment of ukiyozōshi as the dominant form of contemporary fi ction for the next eight decades. For readers today, however, Saikaku’s fi ction presents an enigma: how do we reconcile the perspective of the narrator at the start (and sometimes the end) of Saikaku’s stories with the often opposite, or at best unrelated, “message” found within the text of the narrative proper? Gundry’s study provides us with new ways of reading Saikaku that help us transcend our original naive question regarding the relationship(s) between narrator and narrative, leading us toward more sophisticated ways of reading and appreciating his craft. In order to accomplish this, Gundry utilizes the dialogic theories developed by Mikhail M. Bakhtin (1895–1975), in particular Bakhtin’s notions of dialogism and of polyphony that he identifi es in the early European novel. Gundry sets his aims as follows: