@inproceedings{oai:kokubunken.repo.nii.ac.jp:00002944,
 author = {Guarini, Letizia and GUARINI, Letizia},
 book = {国際日本文学研究集会会議録, PROCEEDINGS OF INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON JAPANESE LITERATURE},
 issue = {39},
 month = {Mar},
 note = {pdf, Motherhood, and the mother/daughter relationship are recurrent themes in contemporary Japanese novels, as well as in researches about Japanese literature. On the other hand, not much has been said about fathers, to the extent that some critics have argued that the absence of the father could be considered the tendency of Japanese fiction in 2012, as well as a prophecy about the future of Japanese society. Uchida Tatsuru (2014) has claimed that as a result of the collapse of patriarchy, mothers’ right to speak, and their decisional power have been increasing, and fathers have been brushed aside within the family: according to him, this is a hot literary material within contemporary Japanese literature. Furthermore, Takahashi Gen’ichiro (2012) has claimed that the tendency in Japanese fiction nowadays is to depict fathers leaving their houses, and the resulting conflicts between mothers and daughters.
In this paper I will analyze the novel Nazuna (2012) by Horie Toshiyuki, which has been defined an ikumen shōsetsu (ikumen novel). Nazuna is the story of a man who takes care of his younger brother’s two months old daughter. The protagonist is an ikumen, a man who actively takes care of his child; moreover, he is a single father. In their talk about the absence of the father in Japanese literature, Uchida and Takahashi has argued that Nazuna depicts a pseudo father, and that we cannot find a “normal father figure” in the novel. Uchida and Takashi’s words show us that the contraposition between the new fatherly figures represented by ikumen and the traditional father’s role is still alive nowadays.
In this paper I argue that Nazuna does not depict the absence of the father, but rather a change in the way we consider fatherhood. Through the analysis of the novel, focusing on the phenomenon of ikumen, I will explore new definitions of “fatherhood” and “family” in contemporary Japanese literature, as well as contemporary Japanese society.},
 pages = {114\n(15)--103\n(26)},
 publisher = {国文学研究資料館},
 title = {研究発表　「父親の不在」を文学は告げている？――『なずな』におけるイクメン――},
 year = {2016},
 yomi = {グアリーニ, レティツィア}
}