Shūsai, Master of Go, twenty-first in the Honnimbō succession, died in
Atami, at the Urokoya Inn, on the morning of January 18, 1940. He was
sixty-seven years old by the Oriental count.
January 18 is an easy day to remember in Atami. “Remember in years to
come the moon of this night of this month,” said Kan’ichi in the famous
scene from Kōyō’s melodramatic novel of the nineties, Demon Gold, the
parting on the beach at Atami. The night to be remembered is January 17,
and the Kōyō festival is held in Atami on the anniversary. The Master’s
death came the following day.
Literary observances always accompany the festival. In 1940 they were
elaborate as never before, honoring not only Kōyō himself but two other
writers whose bonds with Atami had been strong, Takayama Chogyū and
Tsubouchi Shoyo. And three novelists, Takeda Toshihiko, Osaragi Jiro, and
Hayashi Fusao, who had during the year treated of Atami in their writings,
were presented with testimonials by the city. Being at the time in Atami, I
attended the festival.
On the evening of January 17, the mayor gave a banquet at my inn, the
Juraku. I was awakened at dawn by a telephone call informing me of the
Master’s death. I went immediately to the Urokoya to pay my final
respects. After breakfast, back at my inn, I went with writers and city
officials to lay flowers at Shoyo’s grave, and then to the plum orchard,
where, in the Bushōan Pavilion, there was another banquet. Slipping out
midway through the banquet, I went again to the Urokoya, took pictures of
the dead man, and saw the body off to Tokyo.
The Master had come to Atami on the fifteenth, and on the eighteenth he
was dead. It was as if he had come to Atami to die. I had visited him on the
