ABSTRACT
Shame has consequences. In Kazuo Ishiguro’s novel An Artist of the Floating World the main character Masuji Ono recalls a conversation with Miyake, who was to be engaged to Ono’s daughter but whose family withdrew from the negotiations. During the conversation Miyake comments on the death of the president of his company, who committed suicide out of shame for his support of the government during World War II (55-56). Miyake takes the president’s action to have been a fine thing to have done, a relief to those in the company, an act of apology, of responsibility, a noble gesture. But to Masuji Ono the man’s suicide was extreme and a waste. Psychologists tell us that suicide can indeed be a response to extreme shame and as such an act of unconditional hiding, indeed of permanent concealment.1 Responses to shame can be productive or destructive. One can face up to one’s shame and “own it” or capitulate to it-in anger, depression, violence, or even self-annihilation. If we overcome denial, however, and find a way to acknowledge our shame, what might be a noble or responsible way of acting on it?
