Pillar of Fire

by Naoe Kinoshita

English, Japanese (translation)

200 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1904

Reviews

[David · Rating 4 out of 5]

"Socialism, in a word, is God's will, as Christ revealed it."

Decadent Western atheist Japanophiles like me are unlikely to fall in love with Japanese Christian Socialism, are they? But this was fun and not too preachy.

The aristocrats were great (aren't they always? Where would literature be without fabulous aristocrats?). There's a fun scene on a train, with Masters of the Meiji Universe bitching at each other whilst fondling geisha.

Then there's a thrilling scene at an elegant villa on the Sumida river, and the Meiji aristocracy get all Quentin Tarantino on one another's asses.

From the introduction I learnt that:
"it was not uncommon for a samurai to build a high fence very close to the south side of his home, so as to harden his offspring by shutting out the warmth of the sun."

And that there was a quarrel for years in Nagano Prefecture about re-locating the government back to Matsumoto.

[Stephen Rowland · Rating 1 out of 5]

I've never read any Japanese proletarian literature that didn't fucking suck, and this is no exception.