Hayashi Fumiko 林芙美子, "The Accordion and the Fish Town" 風琴と魚の町

Warm-up questions:

1. Have you ever moved to a new place?

2. Have you ever had trouble fitting in?

3. How does education help people?

4. Can people change their status/position in society?

Reading analysis questions:

1) Describe the role of the first paragraph. How does it introduce the characters, the most important subjects and themes, and complications?

2) What does the second paragraph tell us about the setting of the story, the historical background, and other possible subjects?

3) Describe the scenes of poverty in the second section. How does this influence the character’s actions and their general situation?

4) Describe the scenes of the town, especially in the third section. What kind of town is it? What are the professions of the people that work there? What do you imagine life must be like for them? In terms of class, how do the main characters compare to the villagers?

5) What is the father’s job? What do we know about his past, and how might this influence the family’s current fortunes? How might the father’s job relate to why they are unable to stay in one place for very long?

6) Talk about the older couple who lives downstairs from them (section six). What happened to them that forced them to live in poverty? What do their experiences reveal about the story’s views on class, poverty, and crime?

7) How do the characters and society in general relate to outsiders?

8) What is the father arrested for in the final scenes? How is he treated at the police station, and why is this the case?

9) What do you think of the ending? How might things eventually turn out for the characters?

10) What kind of social critique does the story present? What are the story’s views on class, poverty, crime, and education?

11) What subjects, themes, and metaphors did you notice in the story?

短編の日本語版、「風琴と魚の町」は青空文庫にて。