Comparative Commentary

  There is a rather popular saying that goes, ‘The journey is more important than the destination.’ In the midst of contrasting cultures, backgrounds, characters and outcomes, this saying seems to have created a common ground between Hermann Hesse’s Siddhartha and Yukio Mishima’s The Temple of the Golden Pavilion, both of which depicting young boys on a soul-searching journey. As such, it has been made possible for the two novels to become the parallel representation of one another. 

  To truly begin to understand how the two seemingly opposite pieces are parallel to one other, not unlike two sides of a coin, one must begin, inevitably, at the beginning, with the centre of both stories, the protagonists.

Siddhartha and Mizoguchi in certain aspects are like two peas in a pod. First and foremost, they are both intellectual beings who come from religious backgrounds. Second, they are both ‘outcasts’ in their respective societies, not understood by others. This fact was blatantly displayed by Mizoguchi who stated that ‘the fact of not being understood by others had been my sole source of pride since my early youth,’ and implied by Siddhartha who ‘brought joy to all, he delighted them all. But Siddhartha did not bring joy to himself, he did not delight himself.’ Finally, because of the above two traits, they both seek peace of mind, which in a sense, is what pushed them to embark on their respective ‘journeys’. This is not to say however that one should equate Siddhartha to Mizoguchi and vice-versa. Whilst they do share similar qualities, these qualities are expressed in very different manners. In terms of being intellectual, Siddhartha chooses to direct his intellect in an extrovert manner, by exerting himself in religious studies and voicing his opinions and thoughts outwardly. Mizoguchi on the other hand, chooses to be introvert with intellect, thinks to himself for most part and rarely speaks his mind. As for being outcasts amongst their peers, Siddhartha is alienated for being wise beyond his years whereas Mizoguchi is isolated from his peers for being a brooding stutterer. Perhaps if Siddhartha was born a stutterer, he would have become a brooding introvert; whereas if Mizoguchi was born in India, he would have taken the same path Siddhartha had. One can say that Siddhartha and Mizoguchi are equitable in essence; two of the same souls born into different bodies and families that lived out two opposing but parallel possibilities.

Interestingly, if one would fast forward to the end of both novels, Siddhartha and Mizoguchi have both attained the peace of mind that they have been seeking; godhood for Siddhartha and in stark contrast, humanity for Mizoguchi, once again another expression of parallelism between the two. As stated previously, nurture and circumstance are the cause of the contrasting similarities between the Siddhartha and Mizoguchi, thus this would mean that the respective realities of Siddhartha and Temple of the Golden Pavilion too are in a sense, parallel.

  With religion evidently the centre stage for both novels, when one seeks to compare the two realities, one would inevitably be comparing the religious background of both stories. Set in Japan where Shinbutsu shūgō (literally syncretism of Shinto and Buddhism) is the main religious practice, Temple of the Golden Pavilion is surprisingly compatible with Siddhartha, where Buddhism and Hinduism act as the fundaments for India; both realities share common grounds in Buddhism. As such, many concepts within the two novels are congruent. For example, the concept frugality and discipline, as demonstrated throughout both novels where Mizoguchi and others at the temple share the daily routine of waking up ‘no later than five o’clock’ and are only served thin gruel, whilst both the lifestyles of the Brahmin and Samanas involve either diligent meditation, praying and other rituals or fasting and asceticism. In relation to the concept of frugality, another associated idea that is largely advocated in both novels is the disproval of indulgence and materialism, which is prominently featured in many parts of both stories. For instance when Mizoguchi made a habit of visiting the brothel, Mariko commented ‘But if you come here every day like this, won’t your Superior scold you?’ in Temple of the Golden Pavilion and in Siddhartha during Siddhartha’s time with the Samanas, it is described that ‘His gaze grew icy when it encountered women; his mouth curled in scorn when he walked through a town with people in lovely clothes.’ Both examples imply both directly and indirectly that materialism and pleasure are frowned upon in the two protagonists’ environment. Nevertheless we cannot assume the two realities to be the same if even merely due to the differences in geographical location, culture and history. Religion alone however, does not constitute an entire reality, which is essentially defined by the individuals who exist within it.

  Just as how Siddhartha and Mizoguchi are parallel to one another, many other characters that play pivotal roles in the respective protagonists’ lives are comparable to each other as well; the most notable of which are Gautama and the Golden Temple. Of course, arguably, the Temple is an inanimate object, however as Mizoguchi has personified the Temple into a sentient existence in his life, as shown in the line ‘The Golden Temple was no longer an immovable structure. It had, so to speak, been transformed into a symbol of the real world’s evanescence.’ In retrospect, it is worth debating if Gautama, who is the ‘Buddha himself, the Illuminated one’, can be considered as person given his status of godhood. This aspect of both Gautama and the Golden Temple being sentient beings with debatable statuses as human characters is but the first dimension of parallelism between the two.

  What really identifies the Temple with Gautama is their existence as objects of self-perceived salvation by Mizoguchi and Siddhartha respectively. Mizoguchi saw the Golden Temple as the ultimate representation of beauty, that ‘the very characters with which  the name of the temple was written and the very sound of the word imparted some fabulous quality to the Golden Temple that was engraved on my heart’ and that ‘it was essential that the Golden Temple be beautiful.’ Inevitably, to Mizoguchi, who in his opinion was ‘estranged from beauty’, the Golden Temple was a connection to beauty as by merely contemplating and obsessing over something of its caliber of beauty would somehow alleviate his own ugliness and at the same time, the Temple was a physical existence and not an intangible concept was reassuring as it meant beauty is within his reach. Gautama to Siddhartha is a ray of hope that he thought would hold answers to quench his thirst for knowledge, and despite his cynicism, ‘Never had Siddhartha venerated a human being so deeply, never had he loved a human being so deeply as this one.’ Furthermore, his encounter and conversation with Gautama had though ‘robbed’ him, ‘But he has given me Siddhartha, has given me my self’, which at first seemed to have delivered Siddhartha from his agony. Ironically, both Gautama and the Golden Temple became the propagator of Mizoguchi and Siddhartha’s inner conflict; a third dimension in which the two are parallel in. The fact that the Temple failed to live up to Mizoguchi’s expectations, as he pondered’ Could beauty, I wondered, be as unbeautiful a thing as this?’ propelled his obsession of the Temple to new heights that in the future hinders Mizoguchi’s search for belonging in humanity. Whereas Siddhartha’s newfound awakening brought upon by Gautama has left him more curious and yearning for newer experience which eventually led him to become captured in worldly pleasure that caused him to be ‘so lost, so forlorn, so forsaken by all the wisdom that he had sought death’. It is indeed curious how Gautama and the Temple are so contrastingly similar in the respective protagonists’ lives.

  Gautama and the Golden Temple symbolized the perfection and entirety of the reality that Mizoguchi and Siddhartha sought, the former, the epitome of all that is holy and otherworldly and the latter, the essence of all that is worldly and humane. As such, it is of little wonder that at the end of their respective journeys, Siddhartha arrived at godhood whilst Mizoguchi finally found humanity, which with a hint of dramatic irony, was right where the two began their journeys; Siddhartha, the man wise beyond his years and Mizoguchi, the stutterer who wanted belonging, only with a different outlook of life and peace in their hearts. 

  Despite the many parallelisms though, one constant does exist between the two alternate egos and realities, and that is inevitably the fact that more often than not, the destination is the beginning and it is the journey that defines the meaning behind any conclusion.

  Siddhartha and The Temple of the Golden Pavilion, two contrasting novels by two very different authors that convey the same message with very contrasting stories, would you not agree? 



Citations:

1.          Hesse, Hermann, & Neugroschel, Joachim. (1999). Siddhartha. Penguin Classics.

2.          Mishima, Mishima, & Y., Y. (1959). Temple of the golden pavilion, the. PeriplusEdition.