Distance creates beauty; mystery creates profound beauty. Among the many traits that attract men to women—beauty, cuteness, sexiness, gentleness, mystery—mystery undeniably ranks first.I adore Snow Country. In this heartbreakingly beautiful novel, Kawabata crafts two strikingly different young women: the passionate, forthright Kumiko and the enigmatic, taciturn Yoko—one radiating pure beauty, the other a sorrowful kind.
The male protagonist, Shimamura, a young dancer, finds himself torn between his affection for Koma and an unspoken admiration for Yoko. Though Yoko appears only briefly in the story, she haunts Shimamura's thoughts. Why? Because she embodies an indescribable, profound beauty—the very essence of traditional Japanese aesthetics.
The novel opens on a snowy twilight as Shimamura travels by train to the Snow Country. Sitting bored by the window, he suddenly glimpses a girl's eyes reflected in the glass—his first sight of Yoko.
A woman's charm lies not primarily in beauty, but in mystery. Why do most men in love favor women with flowing hair? Jet-black locks resemble a veil, obscuring half her face while stirring a man's desire to uncover what lies beneath. Conversely, many men dread when a woman, after marriage, cuts her hair short, gains weight, becomes nagging, and stops working.
To men, women are perpetually mysterious, peculiar, and perpetually unpredictable—like cats, like foxes. How else could enchantingly beautiful women be called fox spirits?
This disparity fuels men's universal ambivalence toward women: on one hand, they fear their strength will be usurped, their wealth seized, and that a woman's mystery and allure will become an abyss swallowing them whole. This is vividly reflected in ancient Chinese literature, where heroic figures are often portrayed as "devoid of sexual desire."
For danger signifies challenge and thrill—no risk, no reward. Two women, pursued by demons and cornered, encounter a goddess who commands them to expose their private parts. They obey, and the demons flee. This tale endures, revealing how in both Chinese and Japanese cultures, a woman's most secretive region possesses infinite destructive power.
This aligns with Freud's analysis in The Psychology of Love, explaining why men are irresistibly drawn to "dangerous, bad women."