An Artist of The Floating World

by Kazuo Ishiguro

looking from under my umbrella at those skeletal remains. I remember there were workmen wandering around that day, and so at first I paid no attention to the figure standing looking at one of the burnt-out buildings. It was only as I walked by that I became aware the figure had turned and was watching me. I paused, then looked around, and through the rain dripping off my umbrella, saw with a strange shock Kuroda looking expressionlessly towards me. Beneath his umbrella, he was hatless and dressed in a dark raincoat. The charred buildings behind him were dripping and the remnant of some gutter was making a large amount of rainwater splash down not far from him. I remember a truck going by between us, full of building workers. And I noticed how one of the spokes of his umbrella was broken, causing some more splashing just beside his foot. Kuroda’s face, which had been quite round before the war, had hollowed out around the cheekbones, and what looked like heavy lines had appeared towards the chin and the throat. And I thought to myself as I stood there: ‘He’s not young any more.’