In this blog post, we will examine the self-centered thinking of the characters in Kanae Minato’s novel ‘Confession’ and the causes of the tragedies that result from it.
The Artistic Merit and Narrative Style of ‘Confession’
At the 34th Japan Academy Film Awards, the movie ‘Confession’ won four awards: Best Picture, Best Director, Best Screenplay, and Best Film Editing. Produced in 2010, the film was also featured in the “World Cinema” section of the Busan International Film Festival and was released in South Korea in 2011. As someone interested in Japanese culture, I watched the movie first and then read the original novel. The original novel was published in 2008, took first place in the 2009 Japan Bookstore Awards, and became a bestseller with cumulative sales exceeding 3 million copies. It also received high praise in various mystery novel rankings in 2008 and garnered significant attention by performing well in the 2009 Oricon Novel Charts. This work goes beyond a simple mystery novel to convey various social messages. While it caused a major sensation in Japan, it remains relatively less known in South Korea, so I’d like to discuss this work.
The novel ‘Confession’ is a work in which Kanae Minato expanded upon the short story “The Clergyman,” for which she received a New Writer’s Award. Kanae Minato is a leading Japanese mystery writer who focuses on themes of death, revenge, and atonement, meticulously depicting the background and motives behind murders, as well as the relationships between people. These characteristics are clearly evident in her debut work, ‘Confession’. By revealing the culprit from the very beginning, the novel shifts the focus away from the process of deducing the culprit and toward the causes of the crime and the characters’ psychology.
The author primarily uses a first-person perspective and unfolds the story in the form of inner monologues, allowing readers to deeply understand the characters’ inner thoughts. Furthermore, the most distinctive feature of this work is that the narrator changes with each chapter. Facts that could not be discerned from one character’s monologue are revealed through the next character’s monologue, gradually piecing together the truth of the incident. While the typical first-person perspective has the limitation of making it difficult to understand the inner thoughts of other characters, the author effectively overcomes this limitation by constantly switching narrators. By capturing the perspectives of the victim’s family, the perpetrator, the perpetrator’s family, and even bystanders—all connected to the murder case—the author demonstrates that each person lives with their own distinct version of the truth.
Main Characters and Plot Development
The characters include Yuko, a teacher; Yoshiki Terada, a newly assigned teacher; Sakuranomiya, Yuko’s lover and Yoshiki Terada’s emotional support; Yuko’s daughter Manami; students Shuya and Naoki; and Mizuki. At the beginning of the novel, Yuko reveals that Shuya and Naoki are the ones who murdered her daughter Manami, and confesses that instead of reporting them to the police, she intends to seek revenge in her own way. Afterward, Naoki stops attending school, and Yuko asks Terada to make regular home visits. Eventually, Naoki suffers a mental breakdown and ends up killing his mother. Shuya, on the other hand, continues attending school and endures being bullied. He later grows close to Mizuki but ultimately kills her and even hatches a plan to blow up the school. However, due to Yuko’s intervention, his plan does not unfold as intended, and Yuko completes her revenge in her own way.
Chapter 1 of the novel begins with Yuko’s confession. Chapter 2 depicts the situation following the homeroom teacher’s departure from the perspective of class president Mizuki. Chapter 3 is structured in a unique format in which Naoki’s older sister reads their mother’s diary; the sister’s thoughts frame the narrative, while the mother’s inner thoughts are revealed in the middle. Chapter 4 examines the events from Naoki’s perspective, and Chapter 5 from Shuya’s. In the final Chapter 6, Yuko reappears, and the story concludes with a scene of her speaking on the phone with Shuya.
Why does the characters’ self-centered thinking lead to tragedy?
Many people tend to act with themselves as the center of their world. This is because it is difficult to know exactly what others are thinking, and it is easy to act without making an effort to understand them. Of course, it is realistically impossible to always put others first in every action. However, the characters in this novel each act according to their own self-centered thinking, and as a result, they face tragedy. So, is this kind of self-centered behavior unconditionally wrong? Furthermore, what efforts are needed to reduce self-centered behavior that harms others? We can reflect on this through the characters in the novel.
Yuko, seeking revenge for her daughter’s death, does not report the crime to the police but punishes the perpetrators in her own way. In the process, not only do Shuya and Naoki’s lives come to a tragic end, but Naoki’s mother also meets a tragic fate. Although her intention was to make the perpetrators suffer the same pain felt by the victim’s family, Naoki—who was mentally unstable—ultimately ends up murdering his own mother. Considering this outcome, it is difficult to view Yuko’s revenge as entirely justified. If her goal had been to prevent similar incidents from recurring, she could have sought to resolve the issue through institutional reforms or legal procedures. This serves as an example illustrating that revenge can create further victims.
Naoki’s mother trusted only her son’s words and refused to accept Yuko’s account. Furthermore, believing that her son being investigated by the police was a disgrace to the family, she attempted to take her own life without even engaging in a proper conversation with him. However, even if they had committed suicide together, the remaining family members would eventually have learned that Naoki and his mother were the ones involved in the incident. This action, too, was a self-centered choice made by viewing the problem solely from her own perspective. If Naoki’s mother had not made a decision on her own but had sought a solution by consulting thoroughly with family members or someone she trusted, a better outcome might have been possible. Furthermore, if she had had a sincere conversation with her son, it might have been possible to prevent the tragic outcome in which Naoki—who loved his mother—ended up killing her.
Naoki participates in the murder of Manami because of his inferiority complex toward Shuya. However, even if such actions earned him Shuya’s approval, he could never have gained the acceptance of others. In particular, his mother failed to properly understand her son’s actions, which ultimately led to tragedy. If Naoki had calmly accepted this reality and instead saved Manami, he might have lived a completely different life, one in which he was accepted by those around him.
Terada intervenes with the intention of changing the awkward classroom atmosphere, but instead makes the situation even worse. Furthermore, by visiting Naoki every week, he shows greater interest in proving that he is a good teacher. However, his actions ultimately do nothing to help resolve the problem. If Terada had carefully examined the root causes of the classroom atmosphere and made an effort to understand the students’ psychology, the situation might have turned out a little differently.
Shuya’s mother was an outstanding scientist, but due to the stress of raising a child, she sometimes displayed violent behavior toward Shuya. After she began living apart from the family, she had almost no contact with Shuya, and this indifference influenced Shuya to gradually develop distorted values. Shuya considers everyone except himself to be foolish and does not value the lives of others. This self-centered mindset led him to take the extreme step of attempting to blow up the school. If his mother had taken responsibility for her child to the very end and continued to provide consistent care and guidance, the situation might have turned out differently. Furthermore, if his family had not neglected Shuya but had consistently cared for him, this tragedy could have been prevented. Ultimately, indifference was one of the key factors that further reinforced Shuya’s self-centered mindset.
How can we reduce self-centered thinking?
What efforts are needed to avoid such self-centered behavior? Above all, we must recognize that others are beings who share the same emotions and values as ourselves. If we adopt a dichotomous way of thinking—like Shuya—that categorizes others as inferior to ourselves, it becomes difficult to show consideration for them. We also need to cultivate the habit of pausing to consider how our actions might affect others. In the course of seeking revenge against Naoki, Yuko ultimately caused the tragedy in which Naoki’s mother was murdered by Naoki. As a result, the rest of Naoki’s family also became victims. Even though Yuko understood the grief of the bereaved family better than anyone, she chose revenge. Had she recognized that revenge can create further victims, she might have made a different choice.
Self-centered behavior means acting solely according to one’s own standards without fully considering the thoughts, values, and emotions of others. In ‘Confession’, most of the characters act based on this self-centered mindset, and as a result, they only exacerbate each other’s tragedies. Of course, people cannot always live with a selfless mindset. However, at the very least, in situations where one’s actions might potentially harm others, it is necessary to make an effort to consider the other person’s perspective and show consideration. If such small acts of consideration accumulate, not only will personal conflicts diminish, but so will social conflicts, and our society could become a more peaceful community than it is today.
