The House on the Slope has a seemingly simple, mundane premise: Risako Yamazaki is a full-time housewife with a working husband and a three-year-old daughter. Her ordinary life is interrupted by the arrival of a court letter informing that she is to serve as an alternate lay judge in a criminal case. The defendant is Mizuho Ando, a housewife who is about the same age as Risako and is charged for drowning her eight-month-old baby girl in a bathtub. The following ten days of trial not only shed light on the evidence and truth behind the tragedy, but also bring about a series of reflections on Risako’s experiences as a gendered subject in the patriarchy advocating and consolidating domestic-public dichotomy.
The most significant takeaway from this novel, in my opinion, is that motherhood is more than a matter of childbearing. It is also about meeting both familial and societal expectations that pose mental health challenges as well as physical demands. In other words, motherhood as a social construct exposes the reality of childbearing process that is marked by loneliness and helplessness. Such a phenomenon is suggested in both Risako’s and Mizuho’s experiences. Sitting in the court and listening to Mizuho’s testimonies, Risako cannot help but notice the vivid resemblance between the former’s words and what she has been through. It is exactly this resemblance that makes Risako feel sympathy for Mizuho and prompts Risako to rethink her roles as a mother. In fact, the questions she keeps asking herself throughout the pregnancy implies the scepticism towards her suitability and ability of being a ‘perfect’ mother. “Am I really cut out to be a mother?” “Can I be a good mother?” Her ambivalence towards motherhood is marked by both her excitement and apprehension about the baby’s arrival. Such an internal conflict is heightened by various difficult childbearing moments: low breast milk production; the baby’s refusal to sleep at night; relentless tantrums of the child during the “terrible twos.” There are times when she feels the urge to break her silence and express her frustration. Yet, doing so makes her feel guilty and promises herself not to ever let such a thing happen again. As if for a mother to lose herself is unpardonable. Being a mother has certainly altered her individuality. However, in Mizuho’s impassioned words, Risako finds solace and kinship shared unknowingly between the two mothers, to the point that the latter is able to stand in the former’s shoes and imagine what Mizuho has gone through and done. In these moments, Risako is Mizuho, and Mizuho Risako. The emotional and cognitive empathy - preceded by Risako’s interminable questioning about the testimonies by Mizuho and other parties - ultimately serves as a catalyst for her to reach a reconciliation between herself and the society. It is not only Mizuho’s trial, but also that of Risako.