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As Toshiko rides home alone in a taxi, she sorrowfully contemplates the details of ‘‘the incident.’’ The nurse she and her husband had hired to take care of their son has given birth to an illegitimate baby in their house, revealing nothing of her pregnancy until the moment of delivery. Toshiko is saddened by the attenuation of moral values in modern Japanese society as she contemplates the nurse’s situation and her husband’s blithe treatment of the event. Unlike his wife, Toshiko’s husband, a handsome, popular actor, is seemingly undismayed by ‘‘the incident’’ and freely chatters about it to his friends as if it were nothing more than fodder for entertainment. Toshiko feels alienated from her husband not only for his inability to share her concern for the nurse’s apparent loss of moral values in modern society, but also for his own lighthearted, non-reflective participation in modern, ‘‘western’’ influenced life. Toshiko’s husband’s acceptance of and participation in modern western culture is also expressed through the American style clothing he wears and the ‘‘western’’ style, parquet- floored house he chooses to live in.
Observing the scenery on the ride home, Toshiko also notes the damage modernization has wrought on the landscape of Japan. Parting from her husband, she notices the fake, paper cherry blossoms that decorate an entertainment district theater and compares them to the real cherry blossoms ‘‘in all their purity’’ lining the park adjacent to the Imperial Palace, which stands against a background of glittering office buildings. In contrast to the solemn, looming figure of the Imperial Palace, the surrounding park is littered with empty bottles and waste paper, and populated by vagrants. Another contrast that Toshiko ponders on is the immense rift between a young boy born in material privilege, like her own son, and one born in poverty and shame, such as the nurse’s baby. She accepts that these two babies can only live in mutually exclusive worlds divided by class where they can only interact through violence. She imagines the future of the illegitimate baby as being desolate and eventually ending in a life of crime. She is jolted by fear thinking about the potential chance meeting of her own educated and privileged son with the nurse’s baby, a meeting she imagines would inevitably result in the ‘‘other boy’’ assaulting or murdering her son.
Unsettled by her wandering thoughts, Toshiko capriciously stops the cab and gets out at the park, despite the impropriety for a young, married woman to be walking alone at night. She meanders through the park thinking about the nurse’s baby and the newspapers that the doctor had disrespectfully wrapped him in. Having sympathy for the baby, Toshiko had replaced the newspaper ‘‘swaddling clothes’’ with a piece of new flannel cloth. Toshiko’s thoughts take an eerie manifestation as she comes across a homeless youth sleeping on a park bench. He has blanketed himself in newspapers for warmth, and the white bundle on the bench reminds Toshiko first of cherry blossoms and then of the newspaper ‘‘swaddling clothes.’’ Toshiko imagines that this is what the nurse’s baby will grow up to be—a homeless, poverty-stricken and criminal vagrant. Startled that ‘‘all her fears and premonitions had suddenly taken concrete form,’’ but curious, Toshiko dangerously approaches the sleeping figure to get a closer look. The youth is awakened by Toshiko’s gaze and seizes her. The story ends at this point making it unclear whether Toshiko is murdered, raped, or both, but at any rate, concluding on a note of violence.

THEMES * The ‘‘culture clash’’ depicted in ‘‘Swaddling Clothes’’ is unique because it is expressed through the struggle of traditional Japanese morals and ethics sustaining itself under the powerful influence of western modernization. * In this story, modernization of Japanese social life is represented primarily as an unwelcome import from the west. As the figure who most readily embraces western, modern influence, Toshiko’s husband is portrayed negatively. * Unaffected by the nurse’s loss of moral values, he recounts ‘‘the incident’’ with humor and nonchalance to his nightclub friends, commenting that he was more worried that his ‘‘good rug’’ would be ruined. * He wears American clothes that strike Toshiko as ‘‘garish’’ and chooses to live in a western style house. * Toshiko reflects: ‘‘she dreaded going back to their house, unhomely with its Western- style furniture and with the bloodstains still showing on the floor.’’