Short Story Review: The Symbolism of Hell Screen
Ditulis oleh
Made Nurulita Pertiwi Raka
In Hell Screen by Ryunosuke Akutagawa, the focus may lay on Yoshihide the painter and his journey and sacrifice to finish the ‘Hell Screen’, a commission of the Buddhist Hell from Lord Horikawa. However, I believe the biggest symbolism lays on the narrator of the story. He is one of Lord Horikawa’s servant. His position was high enough as he was almost always at Lord Horikawa’s side thus his ability to tell a detailed story regarding Lord Horikawa and Yoshihide’s relationship. He was very loyal and always looked up to Lord Horikawa highly, even depicting him as a God-like entity. It could be seen in the first few pages when Lord Horikawa accidently killed someone and he said it was a blessing.
A couple of articles argue that this narrator is foolish however I believe he is just biased. He is biased by his loyalty to Lord Horikawa to the point he normalized every bad thing that he made. He is the symbol of biased supporter.
His bias that shaped the story was regarding his opinion of Yuzuki, Yoshihide’s daughter, and Lord Horikawa himself. As someone who followed Lord Horikawa nearly everywhere, he should be aware of Lord Horikawa’s forbidden interest towards Yuzuki yet he kept pushing it away and gave himself an explanation that would satisfy his bias. This kind of action was first showed when Yoshihide asked Lord Horikawa to demoted Yuzuki from her position as a lady in waiting so they could live together again. Lord Horikawa did not allow it, of course, and the narrator depicted Yoshihide as egoist and obsessed by his own daughter. He said Yoshihide should be proud that Lord Horikawa put his daughter, a commoner, in such a high place and he should be ashamed to even ask Lord Horikawa to demote her. He did not even once think that Yoshihide was simply a loving father who wanted to live the rest of his old life with the only family he had, his daughter. He was biased that he pushed away a very rational reason and put his own reason that he found the most fitting.
Even the climax of the story was shaped around the narrator biased toward Lord Horikawa. At the end of the story, Lord Horikawa burned a royal carriage with a young woman tied inside. It was a request from Yoshihide. In order to complete the commission, he had to see the actual hell itself, and it included to see a burning carriage with a young woman inside. However, the plot twist was, the woman inside the burning carriage was Yuzuki, Yoshihide’s own daughter. Yoshihide was devastated by the incident, and later killed himself after finished the beautifully horrifying Hell Screen. The narrator was shocked by Lord Horikawa’s action and he tried to seek for explanation. However, he found one that was, again, biased. He believed Lord Horikawa’s did such a horrible thing to punish Yoshihide’s dareness to ask him to burn a royal carriage and a woman. He basically believed Lord Horikawa was powerful enough to play God.
He pushed away a rumor that Lord Horikawa killed Yuzuki because she rejected his love. It was indeed a rumor however more than anyone, he should be the one who believed it. In the middle of the story, he was being led by Yuzuki’s pet monkey, Monkeyhide which named after her own father, to a room located near Lord Horikawa’s pond. He founded Yuzuki in the room alone however in a distress. She was crying but she said thank you to him for a reason he did not understand. I believed this part implied that Yuzuki was harassed by Lord Horikawa however he was stopped because of the narrator’s arrival. The monkey is a symbol of Yoshihide. Yuzuki herself said, as the monkey bear her father’s name than he is as good as his father. Even in the shape of a monkey, Yoshihide still protected her daughter. The narrator had all the facts on his hands to support the rumor, yet he still pushed them away in order to support his biased mind.
He is the symbolism of a biased supporter. We, at some point of our life, must be a biased supporter. It can be to our parents, friends, lovers, or our favorite actors. We tried to rationalize the thing they did even though it is necessarily a good thing. It was because we exclusively only see their good part and we could not believe they are capable to do such bad thing. So, we rationalize it and trying to find the most fitting reason for their act. Just like the narrator, we pushed away all the facts and stood still with our biased reasons.
This kind of behavior could be harmless but to a bigger extreme, it could bring a lot of harm. I would like to us a killer as an illustration. This bias could cause us unknowingly hiding and protecting. However, we maybe already know we are hiding a killer but just do not want to admit it. Because the killer, for example, is your loving husband and you believe your husband will not do such thing as murder. Because you try to justify yourself that you are not married to a killer. This is probably what the narrator thought. He did not want to believe Lord Horikawa killed Yuzuki because he is having an affair with her. He did not want to believe a loving husband such as Lord Horikawa could cheat on his wife. He did not want to believe that he is serving a cheater and a killer.
However, the biggest harm would be the killer will kill again because we justify his act through our bias. He will keep killing because we support him. We may not verbally say “Yes honey you can keep killing people” however it is shown from our act. Even though all the facts are laid in front of your own eyes that your husband is a killer, you will not believe it. It is as big as a support your husband need to keep killing. It is also what justify Lord Horikawa’s act to kill Yuzuki. His castle is filled with loyal servants just like our narrator. All of them are going to support them and justify his acts because they are loyal to him. He will kill another Yuzuki and his servants will find another reason to justify it. It will never end.
