ABSTRACT Kōda Rohan’s (1867–1947) ‘Tai dokuro’ (Encounter with a Skull) is often treated as a tale of karmic retribution and transcendence. In addition to drawing on Buddhist philosophy, the text is rich in allusions to classical literature and philosophy. Yet, as this paper argues, Rohan’s tale is decidedly modern. His depiction of illness places his story in dialogue with modern regimes of health, gender, and class, while also drawing on traditional notions of illness and Buddhist aesthetics of decay as associated with the Kusōzu (Nine Stages of Death Scrolls). For centuries, Hansen’s disease was feared as an illness that reduced sufferers to a living corpse, and the 1873 discovery of bacilli that caused the illness did little to assuage public fear – rather, the new attention to the disease increased social stigma. Rohan’s 1890 piece, written before Japan’s 1907 legislation calling for quarantine of sufferers in some cases, draws on modern understandings of Hansen’s disease while at the same time complicating the stigma surrounding the disease. Through a close examination of ‘Encounter with a Skull’, I draw attention to the meaning of illness and the abject woman, as well as the play between archetype and innovation in this distinctly ‘modern’ text.

中文翻译：

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幸田洛汗《大独行》（遇见骷髅）中的下贱女人与疾病的含义

摘要 Kōda Rohan (1867–1947) 的“Tai dokuro”（与头骨的相遇）通常被视为业力报应和超越的故事。书中除了借鉴佛教哲学外，还对古典文学和哲学有丰富的典故。然而，正如本文所论证的，罗汉的故事绝对是现代的。他对疾病的描述使他的故事与现代健康、性别和阶级制度进行对话，同时也借鉴了与 Kusōzu（死亡九阶段卷轴）相关的传统疾病观念和佛教衰败美学。几个世纪以来，人们一直担心汉森氏病是一种使患者变成活尸的疾病，1873 年发现引起这种疾病的杆菌并没有缓解公众的恐惧——相反，对这种疾病的新关注增加了社会耻辱感。罗汉 1890 年的作品，写在日本 1907 年立法要求在某些情况下对患者进行隔离之前，它借鉴了对汉森病的现代理解，同时使围绕该疾病的耻辱感复杂化。通过对“遭遇头骨”的仔细研究，我提请注意疾病和卑鄙女人的含义，以及在这本明显“现代”的文本中原型与创新之间的游戏。