Dazai Osamu’s 「メリイクリスマス」(“Merry Christmas”) explores the return of a young man to postwar American-occupied Tokyo from the Tsugaru inaka during WWII as he interacts with a Tokyoite young woman he knew in years prior. The prose reflects on a Tokyo whose infrastructure and society have substantively transformed in the postwar yet harbors a narrator in denial with insistence on “life in Tokyo” being “the same as ever” (Dazai 224). Translated into English by Ralph McCarthy in the 1990s, “Merry Christmas” endures several changes not just in phrasing, but in inverses that in some manners subdue and in others exaggerate the narration’s perception of Tokyo, as well as his own characterization and view of himself. These changes accumulate to warp the lens through which the narrator views Tokyo from one of liveliness to gloom, and the temperament of the narrator from a sense of humor to a lingering of bitterness.

The narrator’s opening line establishes the mood of Tokyo, but the McCarthy translation creates an atmosphere of pessimism, as well as flattens the contrast between the narrator and cityscape. McCarthy’s beginning of “Tokyo presented a picture of effervescent gloom” contrasts its in latter two words against Dazai’s original 「東京は、哀しい活気を呈していた」, 「哀しい活気」literally translating to “sorrowful liveliness” or “sad liveliness” (Dazai 224). “Sorrowful liveliness” gives an impression of subdued busyness, a lively occasion tainted by a sad air or occurrence, where Tokyo’s normal state is one of vitality. However, the translation, an “effervescent glom”, the former word used metaphorically in this case from its literal meaning of “That has the property of rising in bubbles”, creates an inverse impression: a city of lethargy on which a stir of movement (bubbling) is imposed, suggesting an act or forcefulness to movement yet beneath is a truth of melancholy (OED, “effervescent”, adj.). Dazai is intentional in using the verb “presenting” 「呈しています」, which suggests that Tokyo is “display[ing]” or “assum[ing] (e.g. a shape)” that diverges from its usual atmospheric composition (Jisho.org,「呈する」, v.). The difference between presenting a “sorrowful liveliness” versus an “effervescent gloom” lies in the base of what Tokyo is to the narrator, either a “liveliness” (vitality) or a “gloom” (pessimism) (224). Because the narrator follows up this opening observation by arguing that “I found on my return that, as far as I could see, ‘life in Tokyo’ was the same as ever”, or 「私の眼には、何の事も無い相変らずの「東京生活」のごとくに映った」, he makes clear there is a presentation or surface-level quality that defines the city, especially in his use of the verb 映るin the original that reinstates a similar impression of this effervescent gloom “be[ing] reflected” or “be[ing] projected” to the narrator (Jisho.org,「映る」, v.). This opening line carries an impact rooted in how the narrator views Tokyo’s barebones, and in extension its people, as either capable of vitality or antithetical of it.

As the narrator moves from the inaka to Tokyo, Dazai defines him through a characterization of dynamism that boldly contrasts against the cityscape through his sentence structure and use of onomatopoeia. The narrator begins this transition first with 「田舎の或ひとに書いて送り」, and 「そうして、私もやっぱり何の変るところも無く、久留米絣の着流しに二重まわしをひっかけて、ぼんやり東京の街々を歩き廻っていた」(Dazai). In literal translation, this reads, “I wrote and sent a letter to people in the inaka, and in that way, after all, Tokyo really had not changed in any way. I threw on a two-fold kimono and have been wandering around aimlessly in Tokyo (ever since)”. However, the McCarthy translation omits the verb “throw on” and misses the rhythm of the onomatopoeia「ひっかける」(“to throw on (clothes)” and「ぼんやり」(“absentmindlessly” or “aimlessly”) create: “Not that I’d changed much myself (Jisho.org,「ひっかける」, v.「ぼんやり」, adv.). I spent a lot of time aimlessly walking the streets in a plain kimono and inverness” (Dazai 224). The omission of the inaka mention, which serves as the starting point of the transition to the city, as well as the loss of onomatopoeia, which lighten and give rhythm to the sentence, flatten the movement from Tsugaru to Tokyo. The narrator and his actions become nondescript, subduing the contrast between him, an inaka-fied man with dynamic adornment (the two-fold kimono) and onomatopoeic movement, against Tokyo, a backdrop urban scenescape that “hadn’t changed at all” (Dazai 224). A similar phenomenon occurs with other metaphorical language, as in the case of meeting Shizueko, the girl: 「私は今宵の邂逅をできるだけロマンチックに煽るように努めた。」, literally “I was trying to ignite/fan the flames of romance around our chance meeting (as much as possible), with 「煽る」meaning “to fan (the flames)”, “to ignite” or “to incite” (Jisho.org, 「煽る」, v.). However, the translation omits this verb, instead reading “I was trying to make our chance meeting seem as romantic as possible”, but in doing so, it again paints nondescriptly without the colorful language around the narrator’s actions, thus flattening his characterization (229). Thus, Dazai’s narrator loses this vitality and waters down large-scale movement from the inaka to Tokyo in the postwar and small-scale actions with Shizueko.

Not only in movement, but furthermore in humor and self-awareness does the narrator’s characterization change in the translation. A defining line in the translation, “It couldn’t be helped. It was love”, when speaking about the narrator’s attraction and motivation with Shizueko, in the original reads「こいを、しちゃったんだから」, or, literally, “Accidentally/Regrettably, I fell in love” (228). The Verb-ちゃう form in this sentence that describes falling in love is used for situations in which the speaker accidentally or mistakenly does something, often to lighten a situation or express an “Oops!” sentiment. If the narrator truly felt he could not help falling in love, Dazai might have used the Verb-て仕方がないform or its variations, but he chose a Verb-ちゃう form instead. Thus, the narrator’s falling in love is meant to be both 1. self-aware of his emotions and the not-so-good situation he’s found himself in, and 2. a humoristic irony (falling in love is an “oops” situation). Similarly, when talking about Shizueko’s sullen mood on mention of her mother, the narrator admits「ひどい嫉妬だ、と私は独り合点した。」, literally “I made the rash assumption that it was bad jealousy”, but the McCarthy translation reads, “I could only conclude that hers was a particularly bad case of jealousy.” (228). The narrator is aware of his hasty thinking in Dazai’s original, as well as aware of the gray zone around pursuing Shizueko romantically as aforementioned. However, because this awareness is erased in translation, he loses redeeming qualities and the story reads more seriously. The translation takes the narrator more seriously than he takes himself, and thus his character becomes more of a pessimistic, bitter man returning to Tokyo, one who perceives Tokyo with a base of “gloom”, contrary to his original counterpart, who takes Tokyo with a base of “liveliness” (224). He flips from an arrogant but light and self-aware Tokyo outsider to a haughty and blind egoist, thus transforming the story’s reading from a humoristic observation of an unserious narrator to more of a critical exposé of particularly his bitter view of Tokyo and Tokyoites.

Outside of the narrator, the depictions of the Tokyoites are lost in translation, thus stripping the luster of Tokyo as a city. A most notable and nostalgic scene, the narrator’s somber sharing of the mother’s eel with Shizueko at the end, is interrupted in Dazai’s original not only in the situation, with a garrulous and strident drunk Tokyoite cracking unfunny jokes at the staff and American soldier, but also is visually interrupted by the use of the katakana alphabet.「トカナントカイッチャテネ、ソレデスカラネエ、ポオットシチャテネエ、リンゴ可愛イヤ、気持ガワカルトヤッチャテネエ、ワハハハ、アイツ頭ガイイカラネエ、東京駅ハオレノ家ダト言ッチャテネエ、マイッチャテネエ、オレノ妾宅ハ丸ビルダト言ッタラ、コンドハ向ウガマイッチャテネエ、……」(in McCarthy’s translation: “…That's what he said, and of course that bowled me over, then he started singing, ‘Apples are so pretty, I know just how you feel…" Ha, ha, ha, ha! He's sharp, that fellow, I'll tell you, he said, ‘Tokyo Station is my home.’ That killed me, so I said, ‘My mistress lives in the Mam Building’" and now it was his turn to be bowled over…”) (231). This section’s exaggerated humor is missing in the English version, in that aside from the joke not making sense in either version, that English does not have an additional alphabet that can make fun of speech like the Japanese katakana allows. Thus, this moment of interruption, meant to be substantial, especially because the drunkard afterwards yells 「メリイクリスマス」(“Merry Christmas!”) at an American soldier who is occupying and changing Tokyo in all its political, structural, and societal respects, does not come across as significantly or boldly in English (231). The Tokyoites are watered down in some of their characterization due to this visual and alphabetical untranslatability, and thus the irony of Tokyo being unchanged, yet in reality being very changed as depicted with this katakana speech and American soldier, is not painted as strikingly to English readers.

As much of the humor is omitted or uncoveyed from Dazai’s original, the story takes on a more pessimistic and bitter atmosphere. The narrator presents the characterization of Tokyo as an indescript “effervescent gloom”, does not poke fun at himself as in the original when talking about love or his rash conclusions, and omits much of the vivid language that evokes a humoristic or lighter impression of his actions (such as fanning the flames of love) (224). Moreover, the dynamism of the narrator and Tokyo, of the narrator’s movements against a Tokyo landscape and the irony of Tokyo’s change unapparent to the narrator, are not as strongly imprinted in the translation due to these small changes and untranslatable parts. These changes ultimately warp how the narrator views Tokyo from a city perhaps more lively and with drastic characters to one more static and watered down. Likewise, the temperament of the narrator moves from one of self-awareness and perhaps capacity for redemption to one of pale bitterness, reflecting the atmosphere of the city and conversely integrating as a part of it rather than setting himself apart with the unique perspective of an outsider that Dazai communicates in his original.