Trapped in the Funhouse: Gotô Meisei’s “The Unwritable Report”

This article examines Japanese writer Gotô Meisei’s (1932-1999) story “The Unwritable Report” (“Kakarenai hôkôku”). The plot is set in a danchi (massive apartment complex) built to address the chronic housing shortages that abounded during Japan’s high-speed growth period (1955-1973). The nameless protagonist is convinced that he is at one with his apartment unit, a spell that is later broken by his discovery of a water stain on the ceiling. By contrasting the danchi as viewed “straight” and “awry,” I argue, Gotô mounts an immanent critique of the reifying discourses that colonized Japanese desire for the instrumentalist pursuit of increasing Japan’s GNP.