戦時下の祖母を支えた　「アン」の翻訳

　 Like any proud granddaughter, Eri Muraoka doesn’t want the world to forget her late grandmother.

　Especially when her grandmother’s accomplishments have enriched the lives of Japanese readers for generations.

　Eri is the granddaughter of Hanako Muraoka (1893-1968), the first Japanese translator of the classic children’s novel “Anne of Green Gables,” by Lucy Maud Montgomery.

　To preserve Hanako’s work and to mark the 100th anniversary of the publication of the Canadian author’s masterpiece, Eri wrote a biographical account of her grandmother, which was published in June under the title “An no Yurikago” (Anne’s Cradle).

　“It was originally my mother’s intention to write Hanako’s biography, but she passed away all of a sudden in 1994,” said the 40-year-old freelance writer, who was born the year before her grandmother died.

　“Since I was little, my mother had kept filling me in on my grandma and her belongings. And I took my mom for granted as a source of information about my grandma,” she added.

　Her mother’s death meant for Eri a disappearance of a “link” connecting her and Hanako. But the misfortune propelled Eri into action to painstakingly assemble materials over 10-plus years for the reconstruction of her grandmother’s life.

　Born in Yamanashi Prefecture, Hanako attended Toyo Eiwa Jogakuin, a Canadian mission school in Tokyo. She was taught every subject in English while living in an on-campus dormitory as a boarding student on scholarship.

　“The school life, surrounded by female Canadian missionaries there, had a great impact on the shaping of her character and became an important asset when she eventually translated the stories of Anne,” Eri said.

　After graduating from Toyo Eiwa in 1913, Hanako worked as an English teacher, writer, translator and editor. Then came her introduction to “Anne of Green Gables” in 1939, shortly before the outbreak of World War II.

　The copy of the book was actually a farewell gift from her Canadian colleague Loretta Shaw at their Tokyo publishing company. Shaw had dedicated herself to the improvement of women’s status and children’s education in Japan for 35 years, but the impending war forced her to return to Canada.

　On the day of her departure, Shaw handed the book to Hanako and asked her to introduce it to Japanese girls during peacetime, which Shaw believed would surely come again.

　Hanako, who had long deplored the absence of good young adult literature in Japan, was moved by Montgomery’s novel of a skinny, red-haired and freckled orphan named Anne Shirley, growing up on Prince Edward Island, a tiny island off Canada’s east coast.

　Eri said that because Shaw was a compatriot of her former Canadian teachers, Hanako must have felt a strong emotional attachment to the book, which depicted a similar lifestyle she shared with the missionaries in her youth.

　As the war intensified, air raids and blackouts became a daily routine. But the diminutive Hanako was desperate to keep working on her translation scripts despite fervent anti-Western sentiment. She also ran the risk of being arrested by ruthless special political police, formed to stamp out anti-government elements.

　“Under such extreme circumstances, I guess my grandma regarded the mission as a living testimony for herself,” she said.

　Hanako finished her work toward the end of war, and the translation came out in 1952 after some twists and turns. The title of the Japanese rendition, “Akage no An” (literally Red-hair Anne), was chosen by her then 20-year-old daughter, Midori, Eri’s mother, from among several candidates.

　The book immediately captured the hearts and minds of Japanese readers. Hanako fulfilled her promise to Shaw, but the two never saw each other again, as the Canadian woman had died in 1940.

　Hanako would go on to translate 16 of 21 Montgomery’s works in her lifetime. She died of a cerebral thrombosis at age 75 while working on the 17th novel. In spite of her fascination with Montgomery’s stories, Hanako never set foot on Prince Edward Island.

　“Probably, she had put the role of writer and wife as well as mother before the visit to the island,” Eri said. “Or she maybe wanted to keep intact her own image of the island.”

　Eri remembers that Hanako once wrote somewhere that had she had a chance to meet Montgomery, who died in 1942, they would have be-come best friends.

　“I think my grandma was one of a very few lucky translators who were able to find the very right chemistry with the writer to such a great degree.”