When discussing the concept of omagatoki, it is important to point out that while other words used to refer to the symbolic concept of twilight in Japanese like kawatare彼は誰 (彼=he/person 誰= who) and tasogare黄昏( 黄=yellow 昏=evening/dusk/dark) my hold the same denotative meaning, they do not necessarily hold the same connotative meaning. Both kawatare and tasogare can be translated into twilight, however they derive from a greeting one would say when passing an indiscriminate figure during twilight. They were often asked at twilight, when it would have been harder to see someone’s face, which is how they became associated with twilight[3]. I would like to focus on the key difference between these two terms and omagatoki when describing twilight, and how I believe they have come to represent the fundamental change undergone in how Japan (as well as the rest of the world) has come to view the setting of twilight in narratives. Kawatare/tasogare have no inherent negative or scary connotations to them in the same way omagatoki (a word that can literally mean the “time of great calamity”) does. Instead, they forth a feeling of the unknown and uncertainty, which is a far more neutral emotion and leaves in the option for hope and joy. That blurry face in the distance may be a yokai, but it may also be a friend or neighbor or even your future love. Twilight is still a symbol of change and a period of transition, but that change no longer needs to be one that holds the fear of the monsters that lurk at night.

The introduction of electrical lighting into urban settings and the mass migration to city centers that was seen all across the world starting in the mid-1800’s caused a change in human’s relationship to twilight and darkness. One of the predominant changes was that twilight was no longer a time of transition for light to complete darkness. Now we have street lights, phones with flashlights and stores open 24-hours with glowing signage; light is everywhere and constant and intense. In major cities like Tokyo, one would be hard pressed to find a truly dark space at any point at night. This is all to say, the fear of night no longer exists purely in what could be hiding in the darkness, because the is no true darkness to be found. In the modern age of electronics, the fear of the darkness comes from isolation. Especially in densely populated areas like Japan, there is a feeling in the 20^st/21^st century there is no where we can go that does not hold human life, where we are truly alone. There is something disquieting to the idea of being alone in a space where you know there are other people, whether that be physically alone or socially/emotionally isolated from other.

This can be seen in more modern (post-industrial) mythology coming out of Japan. These mythologies and ghost stories shares many characteristics to the English “urban-fantasy” genre; both are generally stories that re-imaging older mythologies from their culture in a modern and urban landscape. Tales of the Metropolis 都会の幽気 by Toyoshima Yoshio 豊島与志雄 from Kaiki: Uncanny Tales from Japan Vol. 3 is an example of these modern ghost stories. While pre-Meji era mythology may have had scenes that took place in “urban” environments, there weren’t many where the urban environment is explored in great detail in the way it is in Tales of the Metropolis. The first paragraphs of the story are dedicated to exploring the relationship between the ghost and the city they inhabit. This attention to detail and exploration of the details of the city helps give the urban landscape our protagonist walks through a firm grounding in time and space. The city itself is anthropomorphized within the narrative, with the author describing parts of it as “silent, slumbering streets” (98) and an “eerie, confused town” (102)[4]. It creates the sense that the town—and the ghosts that are tied to it—are a human-like presence in the story and characters in their own right, without being human.

This goes back to the idea of isolation being a greater fear than the monsters that might hide in the dark in our modern era. There is no monster that attacks the protagonist or attempt to trick him. It is just him—his feelings of isolation, aimlessness, and fear of losing control—and the ghosts of the city, who are as the story describes them “countless traces, countless human shapes—human shapes that have formed out of their ardent desires, human shapes left everywhere from each and every moment” (111). These ghosts are not tangible presences that can hurt the narrator, but they help create a feeling of both being overwhelmed by the presents of people and being alone mentally. It plays off the anxiety of always being observable that one can experience in a densely populated; that there is always someone looking at you, even if you feel like you are alone . These are far more familiar fear to people living in urban areas than simply the fear of what hides in the dark. When humans have become the dominant species, what else is more terrifying to us than other humans.

This is relevant to the discussion of omagatoki because the idea of omagatoki has a core foundation that the change from twilight is a negative change; the two translations of its name are literally “the meeting time of demons” and “the time of great calamity”. But when humans are no longer afraid of the monsters that lurk at night—be that imaged ones or the literal tigers that could attack someone while you are walking alone through the woods—than twilight no longer feels like a calamity; why would it, when there are street lights guiding your route home, and the trains run until the early hours of the morning, and all the bars are still open until 1 am? Instead, we see in this story that the time for transition into the world of the supernatural is not as firmly established as it has been in earlier mythology, but rather is connected to the feelings of isolation experienced in the narrator. One of the reoccurring times that ghosts start appearing in the story when the narrator begins to sense the supernatural at around 1 am as he walks home alone. This is much closer to the Western idea of when supernatural events begin to happen known as “the witching hour” (around 2 am – 4 am) than to the time of omagatoki. This can explain why the transition period for the supernatural became later, as 1 am is a far more isolated and silent time in a city than twilight, when nightlife is just beginning.

In the past few centuries, the nebulous space created by twilight has even become a space of safety for marginalized groups because of its association with an ambiguity, hidden identity and change. In her essay The "hour of pink twilight": Lesbian Poetics and Queer Encounters on the Fin-de-siècle Street Kat Flint makes the argument that twilight and dusk where used as tropes in turn of the century literature, especially those written by women for women, as a space where they could explore their taboo affections precisely because of the unsure liminal space it created. In her essay she describes it as “the magic quality of dusk, the moment at which the city seems denaturalized, fantastical” [5] . And while I can’t speak for the use of twilight as a trope in LGBTQIA+ literature within Japan specifically, this use of twilight to explore the excitement, magical and even taboo nature of romance can be seen in modern Japanese media.

As an example, in the movie Kimi No Na Wa, the sunset and twilight seem to be on the surface used as liminal and transitional spaces in the same way that they are used in the more traditional mythologies and fables. It seems that it is used in the movie as a framing device to transition from the common and every day to the mysterious and scary, as both the meteor strike witness by one of the main characters, Mitsuha, in the movie and the discovery of the destruction caused by the strike to Mitsuha’s town by the other main characters, Taki, happen during twilight. But within the movie, these are framed as moments of beauty and discovery rather than horror. There is unquestionable some tension as the audience sees the meteor break off as Mitsuha watches it, but the colorful animation and sweeping soundtrack accompanying it paint the moment as one of excitement rather than fear. And rather than a tragedy, this scene also ends up being a catalyst for Mitsuha and Taki to meet and eventually form a relationship[6].

There is an example of liminal space being used in the movie to convey a more traditional unease, when Taki walks through the remains of Mitsuha’s old village and enters a cave where he experiences a surreal vision of Mitsuha’s past. In this scene, the music switches to a low, plaintive melody and the visuals move from the vibrant color palate used in the rest of the movie to mute greys and final inverted, hyper saturated hues. In the language of film, this is the tone of fear, not bright colors and soft melodies. In contrast to that, the moment Mitsuha and Taki are reunited at twilight goes back to sweet melodies and bright colors. This is a weird, supernatural meeting, but one of joy and love and hope for the future. In fact, many of the discussions centered around the uncertainty of the future in this movie take place at twilight. One of the reoccurring songs in the movie is called Kawatare Doki. While the future can be terrifying, it can also be truly wonderful. The unknown of the future, like twilight, is a space for hope and joy as well as fear.

This is why twilight is so prevalent in modern media as moment of love confessions or climaxes . As our culture changes to one where the fear of the things hidden in the dark becomes less prevalent, the feeling of change and uncertainty that twilight brings changes to reflect the excitement and surprise that we can find in change. This is why omagatoki is far less relevant when discussing modern Japanese supernatural stories, and why terms like kawatare and tasogare work so much better at discussing the symbolic use of twilight in media.