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A True Novel
A remaking of Emily Brontë’s Wuthering Heights set in postwar Japan.
A True Novel begins in New York in the 1960s, where we meet Taro, a relentlessly ambitious Japanese immigrant trying to make his fortune. Flashbacks and multilayered stories reveal his life: an impoverished upbringing as an orphan, his eventual rise to wealth and success—despite racial and class prejudice—and an obsession with a girl from an affluent family that has haunted him all his life. A True Novel then widens into an examination of Japan’s westernization and the emergence of a middle class.
The winner of Japan’s prestigious Yomiuri Literature Prize, Mizumura has written a beautiful novel, with love at its core, that reveals, above all, the power of storytelling.
A True Novel begins in New York in the 1960s, where we meet Taro, a relentlessly ambitious Japanese immigrant trying to make his fortune. Flashbacks and multilayered stories reveal his life: an impoverished upbringing as an orphan, his eventual rise to wealth and success—despite racial and class prejudice—and an obsession with a girl from an affluent family that has haunted him all his life. A True Novel then widens into an examination of Japan’s westernization and the emergence of a middle class.
The winner of Japan’s prestigious Yomiuri Literature Prize, Mizumura has written a beautiful novel, with love at its core, that reveals, above all, the power of storytelling.
859 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2002
186 people are currently reading
7768 people want to read
About the author
Minae Mizumura
14 books148 followersMinae Mizumura (水村 美苗 Mizumura Minae, born 1951) is a novelist currently writing in the Japanese language.
Educated in the US, she wrote her first published work in the English language, a scholarly essay on the literary criticism of Paul de Man. She is often portrayed as a Japanese novelist who questions the conventional boundaries of national literature. Her novels include Light and Darkness Continued, An I-Novel, and A True Novel, which has been selected for the Japanese Literature Publishing Project, a national program to promote translations of Japanese literature. She also writes essays and literary criticism in major newspapers and journals. Many of Minae Mizumura's works have been described as highly readable and often entertaining, while, at the same time, resonating with historical significance. They are also known for their formalistic innovations, such as making use of unusual printing formats and inserting English texts and photographic illustrations. Because she returned to Japan as an adult and chose to write in the Japanese language despite her coming of age in the United States and her education in the English language, critics have often noted her particular love for Japanese language and her commitment to Japanese literature. Her analysis and observations on the demise of the Japanese language, detailed in her book of criticism called The Fall of the Japanese Language in the Age of English, gained much attention from the mainstream media as well as the Internet. In the same book, she wrote of the significance of preserving the great literary tradition established during the time of building modern Japan.
Minae Mizumura has taught at Princeton University, the University of Michigan and Stanford University. She was a resident novelist in the International Writing Program at the University of Iowa in 2003. She has won the 1991 Agency for Cultural Affairs New Artist Award, the 1996 Noma New Artist Award, and the 2003 Yomiuri Prize for Literature. Minae Mizumura now resides in Tokyo, Japan.
Source: wikipedia
Educated in the US, she wrote her first published work in the English language, a scholarly essay on the literary criticism of Paul de Man. She is often portrayed as a Japanese novelist who questions the conventional boundaries of national literature. Her novels include Light and Darkness Continued, An I-Novel, and A True Novel, which has been selected for the Japanese Literature Publishing Project, a national program to promote translations of Japanese literature. She also writes essays and literary criticism in major newspapers and journals. Many of Minae Mizumura's works have been described as highly readable and often entertaining, while, at the same time, resonating with historical significance. They are also known for their formalistic innovations, such as making use of unusual printing formats and inserting English texts and photographic illustrations. Because she returned to Japan as an adult and chose to write in the Japanese language despite her coming of age in the United States and her education in the English language, critics have often noted her particular love for Japanese language and her commitment to Japanese literature. Her analysis and observations on the demise of the Japanese language, detailed in her book of criticism called The Fall of the Japanese Language in the Age of English, gained much attention from the mainstream media as well as the Internet. In the same book, she wrote of the significance of preserving the great literary tradition established during the time of building modern Japan.
Minae Mizumura has taught at Princeton University, the University of Michigan and Stanford University. She was a resident novelist in the International Writing Program at the University of Iowa in 2003. She has won the 1991 Agency for Cultural Affairs New Artist Award, the 1996 Noma New Artist Award, and the 2003 Yomiuri Prize for Literature. Minae Mizumura now resides in Tokyo, Japan.
Source: wikipedia
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 292 reviews
June 20, 2024
Wspaniała…
November 1, 2022
Minae Mizumura’s marvellous epic is a deftly-told, merging of Japanese i-novel and true-novel conventions, although it’s not necessary to be aware of that to enjoy it. It opens in the late 1950s, in America, where a young, uprooted Japanese girl Minae first hears about Taro who, like her father, has left home in Japan for a new start. As Minae grows up their paths repeatedly cross. Minae becomes an academic and writer, while the enigmatic, solitary Taro goes on to become a phenomenally-wealthy, Gatsby-like figure. Many years after their final encounter, Minae learns the details of Taro’s turbulent life. At the heart of the narrative’s a loose retelling of Wuthering Heights, a book that has an iconic status in Japan. Mizumura takes just enough from Emily Brontë’s work to make its influence clear but draws as much, if not more, on Japanese literature - in particular Tanizaki’s fiction, incorporating elements that reminded me of The Makioka Sisters and its companion The Maids. This fertile intermingling of literary traditions informs the novel, as Mizumura slowly constructs a vivid history of a specific section of Japanese society. One which stretches back to the late 1930s and the first stirrings of war; through the occupation and the shifting relationships between Japanese and Western culture; finally reaching the mid-1990s.
I was so impressed by this, it's artfully-structured, intelligent, intriguing and deeply absorbing. Like Wuthering Heights it features a doomed relationship that began in childhood, here between orphan Taro, ostracised because of his poverty and mixed heritage, and Yoko, who’s part of a wealthy but fading family dynasty. Just like Brontë’s Heathcliff and Catherine their growing bond’s tainted by class prejudice, social inequality and racism, but the way their lives play out departs from Brontë’s script, becoming very much Mizumura’s own creation, as she uses her characters to explore and expose various fault lines in postwar Japanese society. But as much as this might seem an explicit indictment of elements of Japanese history, there’s a curiously elegiac air to this too, an underlying lament of sorts for a lost Japan: that sense of mourning the passing of time and its imprint on Japan’s landscapes is intensified by the inclusion of a series of eerie photographs that surface throughout the book: depictions of haunted spaces emptied out of people, as if they all just suddenly vanished. Despite the early emphasis on Taro, key to Mizumura’s piece is Fumiko, one-time family maid, whose links to Yoko’s family and, later, to Taro, go back as far as her teenage years. Initially Fumiko’s role seems akin to Nelly Dean’s, as she takes on the task of reconstructing Taro and Yoko’s story. But Fumiko’s connection to them is far more intricate than it appears. Her psychologically-complex tale’s riddled with strange gaps, and unexpected twists and turns, which gradually cast doubt over her reliability as a storyteller, or perhaps on the reliability of storytelling altogether. Translated here by Mizumura's long-time collaborator Juliet Winters Carpenter.
Rating: 4.5
I was so impressed by this, it's artfully-structured, intelligent, intriguing and deeply absorbing. Like Wuthering Heights it features a doomed relationship that began in childhood, here between orphan Taro, ostracised because of his poverty and mixed heritage, and Yoko, who’s part of a wealthy but fading family dynasty. Just like Brontë’s Heathcliff and Catherine their growing bond’s tainted by class prejudice, social inequality and racism, but the way their lives play out departs from Brontë’s script, becoming very much Mizumura’s own creation, as she uses her characters to explore and expose various fault lines in postwar Japanese society. But as much as this might seem an explicit indictment of elements of Japanese history, there’s a curiously elegiac air to this too, an underlying lament of sorts for a lost Japan: that sense of mourning the passing of time and its imprint on Japan’s landscapes is intensified by the inclusion of a series of eerie photographs that surface throughout the book: depictions of haunted spaces emptied out of people, as if they all just suddenly vanished. Despite the early emphasis on Taro, key to Mizumura’s piece is Fumiko, one-time family maid, whose links to Yoko’s family and, later, to Taro, go back as far as her teenage years. Initially Fumiko’s role seems akin to Nelly Dean’s, as she takes on the task of reconstructing Taro and Yoko’s story. But Fumiko’s connection to them is far more intricate than it appears. Her psychologically-complex tale’s riddled with strange gaps, and unexpected twists and turns, which gradually cast doubt over her reliability as a storyteller, or perhaps on the reliability of storytelling altogether. Translated here by Mizumura's long-time collaborator Juliet Winters Carpenter.
Rating: 4.5
dnf
June 11, 2024DNF 28%
O mamo, dawno nie byłam tak oburzona nagłą zmianą bohaterów i kierunku historii.
Już się przywiązałam przez te 150 stron, zaczęłam rozumieć ku czemu idziemy, a tu zwrot wstecz.
O mamo, dawno nie byłam tak oburzona nagłą zmianą bohaterów i kierunku historii.
Już się przywiązałam przez te 150 stron, zaczęłam rozumieć ku czemu idziemy, a tu zwrot wstecz.
December 8, 2022
Tal como lo dice su título, va desgranando distintos aspectos de su vida como japonesa en Estados Unidos. Hay elementos con los que me identifico un montón, el desarraigo, la indecisión de la lengua, (es japonesa que crece en el idioma inglés, también estudia francés, y después decide escribir en su lengua materna, el japonés). La soledad, la añoranza, el desarraigo. La relación con su hermana. Con su madre, con su familia japonesa. Es muy hermoso, no solo me identifico por el hecho de estar lejos de mi país, también las preguntas que se hace sobre la violencia, la identidad, la lengua. Muy recomendado.
October 27, 2023
Literacko jest to jedna z najlepszych powieści, jakie czytałam - wielowątkowa, kunsztownie napisana. Jednak pod względem emocjonalnym była dla mnie aż przytłaczająco neutralna.
July 28, 2023
Is there something better than a big long slow epic book?
I don’t like Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte even a little bit. This is a loose retelling of it set in post war Japan. I loved every second of this book.
In her retelling Minae Mizumura extracted important plot points, characters and their dominant characteristics and a lot of subtext and made it text. She took the structure of the original - a story within a story - and added her own outer layer to it, the I-novel in the margins of this True novel - merging two big Japanese literary genres together but made it coherent with the theme of the outsider and ever changing Japan. Fictional Minae is an outsider, who is in between her American and Japanese identity. Taro (this story’s version of Heathcliff) is in-between his part Chinese and Japanese identity making him an outsider for the Japanese xenophobic older generation and being a poor boy, making him beneath them in class.
And then there’s the real main character of the novel, Fumiko (this story’s Nelly Dean), the outsider because of class, the person in-between all the other characters, the person who maybe doesn’t tell the reader all there is.
And ever changing Japan is another main character in the story, the speed of the changes, the old world of the characters feels like a dream in the last pages. Minae is a person of the western tradition (she was obsessed with English classics while growing up) and Japanese (I haven’t read The Makioka sisters but the three older sisters who were caught up in between the changing times must’ve surely been inspired by Tanizaki?). Another merging but this time of the literary traditions, not only genres.
And because she made this story her own, she added so much complexity and humanity to the characters, they are human first and foremost, and there are no humans in Wuthering heights, just forces of nature.
Beautifully and carefully crafted, big sprawling achievement of storytelling. My favorite new read of this year.
I don’t like Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte even a little bit. This is a loose retelling of it set in post war Japan. I loved every second of this book.
In her retelling Minae Mizumura extracted important plot points, characters and their dominant characteristics and a lot of subtext and made it text. She took the structure of the original - a story within a story - and added her own outer layer to it, the I-novel in the margins of this True novel - merging two big Japanese literary genres together but made it coherent with the theme of the outsider and ever changing Japan. Fictional Minae is an outsider, who is in between her American and Japanese identity. Taro (this story’s version of Heathcliff) is in-between his part Chinese and Japanese identity making him an outsider for the Japanese xenophobic older generation and being a poor boy, making him beneath them in class.
And then there’s the real main character of the novel, Fumiko (this story’s Nelly Dean), the outsider because of class, the person in-between all the other characters, the person who maybe doesn’t tell the reader all there is.
And ever changing Japan is another main character in the story, the speed of the changes, the old world of the characters feels like a dream in the last pages. Minae is a person of the western tradition (she was obsessed with English classics while growing up) and Japanese (I haven’t read The Makioka sisters but the three older sisters who were caught up in between the changing times must’ve surely been inspired by Tanizaki?). Another merging but this time of the literary traditions, not only genres.
And because she made this story her own, she added so much complexity and humanity to the characters, they are human first and foremost, and there are no humans in Wuthering heights, just forces of nature.
Beautifully and carefully crafted, big sprawling achievement of storytelling. My favorite new read of this year.
February 1, 2023
At 880 pages, “A True Novel”is a story within a story —
[translated by Juliet Winters Carpenter] —
inspired by the author’s life experiences—coming of age—postwar Japan—rages-to-riches-character driven-‘memories/backstories’ of the characters-cultural & historical 20th century Japanese-Americans immigrant issues, class distinctions, and a fascinating exploration of writing itself…
There are all types of love-endless love, obsessive love, love triangles, special sister love, familial love, nature, ‘stream-of-consciousness’ styling…..
epic in the most ambitious of ways.
Mizumura’s writing is intimate, and captivating….packed filled with stories…and multifaceted characters…..
It’s full of light, even at the darkest moments. The hours I spent with these complexed characters were relentless. It’s filled with passion, historical interests, and spiritual questing.
A remarkable accomplishment, a type of profound meditation on the changes wronght to Western world….exploring questions of faith, beliefs, time, and place.
Photos are included—
….Mount Asama….
….The oldest church in Karuizawa: a gorgeous resort town…. especially known for a summer retreat getaway.
….and other photos in Japan.
Sample excerpts….
“It’s not that I feel as if I’ve lived all that long. It’s just that I can’t recognize myself in the child I was. Somewhere along the way, when I was still young, my life took a different turn, but I kept on going without realizing it. Then, one day, when I finally looked back, I saw that the path I started on before the turn had somehow disappeared”.
“These are my memories, but they don’t seem like mine. The sensations remain vivid, as if engraved on me, but . . . how shall I put it? I feel my mind has changed so much that they’re no longer part of who I am now. I can see no link between the world of my childhood and my adult life. I suppose every adult feels he’s different from when he was a child. But for someone like me, who moved into an entirely different world, when still quite young, it’s as if a deep gap divides my past in my present”.
“After getting so involved in other people’s lives, and being harrowed by it, body and soul, I felt drained when I was alone again. I’d never had something worth calling ‘a-life-of-my-own’, but now my life seemed more thoroughly and bitterly empty than ever”.
“After World War II, Japan rapidly recovered, and even became rich—and also thoroughly middle-class. More and more ordinary corporate employees started to build summer houses in Karuizawa. It lost its aura as a place for the elite, but thanks to its history, the name still evoked that early period, and the spot began to flourish as a tourist destination for masses of vacationers from all over Japan”.
“The term ‘true novel’ once played a crucial role in the development of modern Japanese literature. The period when Japan opened its doors to the West, beginning in 1868, coincided with what might be called the golden era of the Western novel”.
Minae Mizumura is an international renowned novelist—
She offers a terrific contribution to Japanese literature—(having taught Japanese literature at Princeton, University of Michigan, Stanford, University of Iowa)….
The ease in which she writes —such a natural flow — makes it feel as if we are in the same room with the characters…..(saying goodbye to Minae, Nanae, Taro, Yoko, Fumiko, Uncle Genji, Grandpa, Father, mother, Yusuke, etc.)….
And isn’t that one of the greatest joys of reading?
Yes — it’s long -but it’s a treasure. 🇯🇵 🇺🇸 🌈💕
🍃🍂….thank you to Amy! Her review inspired me to read this.
[translated by Juliet Winters Carpenter] —
inspired by the author’s life experiences—coming of age—postwar Japan—rages-to-riches-character driven-‘memories/backstories’ of the characters-cultural & historical 20th century Japanese-Americans immigrant issues, class distinctions, and a fascinating exploration of writing itself…
There are all types of love-endless love, obsessive love, love triangles, special sister love, familial love, nature, ‘stream-of-consciousness’ styling…..
epic in the most ambitious of ways.
Mizumura’s writing is intimate, and captivating….packed filled with stories…and multifaceted characters…..
It’s full of light, even at the darkest moments. The hours I spent with these complexed characters were relentless. It’s filled with passion, historical interests, and spiritual questing.
A remarkable accomplishment, a type of profound meditation on the changes wronght to Western world….exploring questions of faith, beliefs, time, and place.
Photos are included—
….Mount Asama….
….The oldest church in Karuizawa: a gorgeous resort town…. especially known for a summer retreat getaway.
….and other photos in Japan.
Sample excerpts….
“It’s not that I feel as if I’ve lived all that long. It’s just that I can’t recognize myself in the child I was. Somewhere along the way, when I was still young, my life took a different turn, but I kept on going without realizing it. Then, one day, when I finally looked back, I saw that the path I started on before the turn had somehow disappeared”.
“These are my memories, but they don’t seem like mine. The sensations remain vivid, as if engraved on me, but . . . how shall I put it? I feel my mind has changed so much that they’re no longer part of who I am now. I can see no link between the world of my childhood and my adult life. I suppose every adult feels he’s different from when he was a child. But for someone like me, who moved into an entirely different world, when still quite young, it’s as if a deep gap divides my past in my present”.
“After getting so involved in other people’s lives, and being harrowed by it, body and soul, I felt drained when I was alone again. I’d never had something worth calling ‘a-life-of-my-own’, but now my life seemed more thoroughly and bitterly empty than ever”.
“After World War II, Japan rapidly recovered, and even became rich—and also thoroughly middle-class. More and more ordinary corporate employees started to build summer houses in Karuizawa. It lost its aura as a place for the elite, but thanks to its history, the name still evoked that early period, and the spot began to flourish as a tourist destination for masses of vacationers from all over Japan”.
“The term ‘true novel’ once played a crucial role in the development of modern Japanese literature. The period when Japan opened its doors to the West, beginning in 1868, coincided with what might be called the golden era of the Western novel”.
Minae Mizumura is an international renowned novelist—
She offers a terrific contribution to Japanese literature—(having taught Japanese literature at Princeton, University of Michigan, Stanford, University of Iowa)….
The ease in which she writes —such a natural flow — makes it feel as if we are in the same room with the characters…..(saying goodbye to Minae, Nanae, Taro, Yoko, Fumiko, Uncle Genji, Grandpa, Father, mother, Yusuke, etc.)….
And isn’t that one of the greatest joys of reading?
Yes — it’s long -but it’s a treasure. 🇯🇵 🇺🇸 🌈💕
🍃🍂….thank you to Amy! Her review inspired me to read this.
February 27, 2024
Borze zielony, to było tak wspaniałe! Czułam się podczas lektury tak głęboko usatysfakcjonowana jak rzadko kiedy. Fabułą, każdym zdaniem (wielkie ukłony dla autorki przekładu 👏🏻), kolejnymi etapami tej powieści i tym, że autorka napisała ją tak, że teraz nie wiadomo (to znaczy ja nie wiem) czy to fikcja, czy prawdziwa historia.
Kocham. W comiesięcznym zalewie nowościami wydawniczymi coraz trudniej znaleźć takie powieści, które przeszywają na wskroś i coś robią człowiekowi na duszy. Ta taka jest.
Będzie w topce tego roku.
Kocham. W comiesięcznym zalewie nowościami wydawniczymi coraz trudniej znaleźć takie powieści, które przeszywają na wskroś i coś robią człowiekowi na duszy. Ta taka jest.
Będzie w topce tego roku.
July 2, 2021
I came across this book because a GR friend said she had read another book by Mizumura (An I-Novel) and liked it so much she wanted to read other books written by her. High praise indeed so I went to my local library catalog and saw they did not have ‘An I-Novel’ but they did have ‘A True Novel’. So, I started reading it on Tuesday afternoon and read and read and read and discovered when I was halfway through with it that this was Volume I of a two-volume work. I was no engrossed in the book I knew I had to get that second volume pronto because I wanted to see how the story ended. So, I spent an hour driving to and from the branch of the library in my area that had the second volume yesterday and read and read, and today I read and read, and I am finished. 🙂 🙃
I am surprised at myself. I gripe a lot about books that are too long oftentimes. And I should gripe about this book…fer chrissake it was 854 pages long! Still and all, I liked the book and would recommend it to others. 😊
This is the Goodreads synopsis of what the book is about…and I would add that if you like Wuthering Heights then you very well might like this novel too as it is reminiscent of Bronte’s masterpiece.
• A True Novel begins in New York in the 1960s, where we meet Taro, a relentlessly ambitious Japanese immigrant trying to make his fortune. Flashbacks and multilayered stories reveal his life: an impoverished upbringing as an orphan, his eventual rise to wealth and success—despite racial and class prejudice—and an obsession with a girl from an affluent family that has haunted him all his life. A True Novel then widens into an examination of Japan’s westernization and the emergence of a middle class.
The winner of Japan’s prestigious Yomiuri Literature Prize, Mizumura has written a beautiful novel, with love at its core, that reveals, above all, the power of storytelling.
There were a number of things that were unusual about the book.
• There were photographs in the book…
• It was narrated by different people including the author. It started out like a memoir with the author narrating her life growing up and it included becoming acquainted with a person by the name of Taro Azuma. And then it morphed into somebody, Yosuke, visiting her out of the blue at Stanford University because he met Taro Azuma and knew that she was a writer, and that she knew Taro Azuma, too, and had the strangest story to tell her about Taro Azuma, which was told to him by another character in the story, Fumiko. Mizumura had been struggling with coming up with an idea for her next novel and he essentially dropped a gift in her lap - his story (and the story of Fumiko’s) became her next novel.
• But the whole damn thing was a novel. Got that? 🤨
• The book was divided into a prologue and the actual story…you know you have a long slog in front of you when the prologue is 166 pages! 😮
• Mizumura in the novel calls her novel an ‘I-novel’. Wikipedia has a page on the I-Novel, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I-novel.
• “There are several general rules for the creation of an I-novel: The first and most important one is that the I-novel is often written from the first-person perspective (which is where the "I" of I-novel comes from). The I-novel is categorized as "reality". "Reality" in the I-novel is defined by 3 aspects. The first is a one-to-one relationship between the author's experience and the story in the novel, though slight differences are acceptable. The second is "inner reality". Rather than reflecting accurate facts, the I-novel emphasizes more on the actual spiritual condition of the author. The third is from the reader's perspective. An I-novel should appear natural and unplanned to its readers.”
To me, the writing was indeed natural and unplanned. Mizumura through the different first-person characters (herself, Fumiko Tsuchiya, and Yosuke Kato) talks about many minutiae which normally would be terribly boring to me but because of the third aspect of reality mentioned above, i.e., an I-novel should appear natural and unplanned to its readers, for the most part it wasn’t boring to me.
Reviews:
• https://www.nytimes.com/2013/12/15/bo... (Susan Chira, December 13, 2013)
• excellent review with a link to interviews with the author… https://therumpus.net/2014/02/a-true-...
• damn, what a good review… https://www.musicandliterature.org/re...
• https://vishytheknight.wordpress.com/...
I am surprised at myself. I gripe a lot about books that are too long oftentimes. And I should gripe about this book…fer chrissake it was 854 pages long! Still and all, I liked the book and would recommend it to others. 😊
This is the Goodreads synopsis of what the book is about…and I would add that if you like Wuthering Heights then you very well might like this novel too as it is reminiscent of Bronte’s masterpiece.
• A True Novel begins in New York in the 1960s, where we meet Taro, a relentlessly ambitious Japanese immigrant trying to make his fortune. Flashbacks and multilayered stories reveal his life: an impoverished upbringing as an orphan, his eventual rise to wealth and success—despite racial and class prejudice—and an obsession with a girl from an affluent family that has haunted him all his life. A True Novel then widens into an examination of Japan’s westernization and the emergence of a middle class.
The winner of Japan’s prestigious Yomiuri Literature Prize, Mizumura has written a beautiful novel, with love at its core, that reveals, above all, the power of storytelling.
There were a number of things that were unusual about the book.
• There were photographs in the book…
• It was narrated by different people including the author. It started out like a memoir with the author narrating her life growing up and it included becoming acquainted with a person by the name of Taro Azuma. And then it morphed into somebody, Yosuke, visiting her out of the blue at Stanford University because he met Taro Azuma and knew that she was a writer, and that she knew Taro Azuma, too, and had the strangest story to tell her about Taro Azuma, which was told to him by another character in the story, Fumiko. Mizumura had been struggling with coming up with an idea for her next novel and he essentially dropped a gift in her lap - his story (and the story of Fumiko’s) became her next novel.
• But the whole damn thing was a novel. Got that? 🤨
• The book was divided into a prologue and the actual story…you know you have a long slog in front of you when the prologue is 166 pages! 😮
• Mizumura in the novel calls her novel an ‘I-novel’. Wikipedia has a page on the I-Novel, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I-novel.
• “There are several general rules for the creation of an I-novel: The first and most important one is that the I-novel is often written from the first-person perspective (which is where the "I" of I-novel comes from). The I-novel is categorized as "reality". "Reality" in the I-novel is defined by 3 aspects. The first is a one-to-one relationship between the author's experience and the story in the novel, though slight differences are acceptable. The second is "inner reality". Rather than reflecting accurate facts, the I-novel emphasizes more on the actual spiritual condition of the author. The third is from the reader's perspective. An I-novel should appear natural and unplanned to its readers.”
To me, the writing was indeed natural and unplanned. Mizumura through the different first-person characters (herself, Fumiko Tsuchiya, and Yosuke Kato) talks about many minutiae which normally would be terribly boring to me but because of the third aspect of reality mentioned above, i.e., an I-novel should appear natural and unplanned to its readers, for the most part it wasn’t boring to me.
Reviews:
• https://www.nytimes.com/2013/12/15/bo... (Susan Chira, December 13, 2013)
• excellent review with a link to interviews with the author… https://therumpus.net/2014/02/a-true-...
• damn, what a good review… https://www.musicandliterature.org/re...
• https://vishytheknight.wordpress.com/...
November 12, 2013
A Japanese retelling of my favorite classic Wuthering Heights? Where do I sign up?
Minae Mizumura writes beautifully about the life of Taro Azuma. Taro’s a man who intrigues her family with his enigmatic and sometimes dark personality. Mizumura meets this man as a private chauffer for her father’s boss. As time goes on, the only chattering heard about Taro is that he’s slowly making a name for his self and acquiring massive amounts of wealth. The information of Taro’s history is unknown until Mizumura runs into a past student who tells her the story he’s heard of the cryptic Taro Azuma. This handsome man who hails from Japan and is talked about as if a legend, is Mizumura’s starring character in an attempt to write a “true novel”.
Mizumura explains in the prologue (perhaps the longest one I’ve ever read) that “Inovels” are very popular in Japanese literature and are primarily stories that are true to life and neither have a beginning or end since that is of course how true to life they are. Mizumura found that the classic novel Wuthering Heights was a story that is so true to life and told thousands of times. This is where she got the idea of how to structure Taro’s life into a “true novel”. “True” in the sense that it is based off of an actual true story or a man’s wonderful rise in a new world that would not let him remain unconscious to that fact that he was an outsider.
Yusuke happens upon a cottage in a remote part of Karuizawa. His bike is in disrepair after a torrential rain leaves him stranded, keyless, and at the mercy of two strangers. These strangers turn out to be Fumiko, a woman assumed to be the maid, and the legendary Taro Azuma. Yusuke is offered lodging at this home and is baffled by the presence of a woman and man. He was certain there was no one else at this small home. He inquires to Fumiko about the presence of these other people. She explains they are the ghosts of Taro’s one true love and her husband. It’s here she takes over the novel and narrates the past life of the infamous, mysterious Taro Azuma and how these ghosts came to be.
From page one A True Novel is enthralling and hard to step away from. Although I’ve read Wuthering Heights many times, I was more interested in the lives of these characters than comparing what Mizumura kept from the original Bronte novel or decided to abandon. Similar to the original 19th century novel, there is so much more to this novel than the surface of a love story.
Essentially, there are many true loves in this novel. Mizumura mentions the talk of a Japan that she longed for dearly as a child growing up in New York. She tried to hold on to the memories of that Japan for as long as possible only to find the Japan she once knew was no more. This place of her childhood was now a westernized-concrete jungle. She’d lost her true love to time and change. Similarly to Taro Azuma who lost his one love to the same circumstances.
Taro’s enduring love for Yoko pushed him to the limit and embodies the true agony of not being loved wholly in return. He was raised in a home where he suffered abuse, was undereducated, poor, and essentially cast off as a non-person because of his questionable heritage. His only salvation from this hell was in the old woman Mrs. Utagawa, the wealthy grandmother of Yoko. A he matures into an adult, it is in this world Taro realizes he doesn't belong. After an abhorrent fight with Yoko, Taro journey's to the land of opportunity in the hopes of someday returning a man worthy of her stature. Upon his arrival, he finds that she is married with no plans of ever leaving her husband.
I could go on and on about the characters, the plot, the themes, and how much I love A True Novel by Minae Mizumura but… that would be a disservice to future readers. Ultimately, this novel explores the circle of love and how time is unwilling to allow anything to remain the way we hope they would.
Copy provided by Netgalley
Minae Mizumura writes beautifully about the life of Taro Azuma. Taro’s a man who intrigues her family with his enigmatic and sometimes dark personality. Mizumura meets this man as a private chauffer for her father’s boss. As time goes on, the only chattering heard about Taro is that he’s slowly making a name for his self and acquiring massive amounts of wealth. The information of Taro’s history is unknown until Mizumura runs into a past student who tells her the story he’s heard of the cryptic Taro Azuma. This handsome man who hails from Japan and is talked about as if a legend, is Mizumura’s starring character in an attempt to write a “true novel”.
Mizumura explains in the prologue (perhaps the longest one I’ve ever read) that “Inovels” are very popular in Japanese literature and are primarily stories that are true to life and neither have a beginning or end since that is of course how true to life they are. Mizumura found that the classic novel Wuthering Heights was a story that is so true to life and told thousands of times. This is where she got the idea of how to structure Taro’s life into a “true novel”. “True” in the sense that it is based off of an actual true story or a man’s wonderful rise in a new world that would not let him remain unconscious to that fact that he was an outsider.
Yusuke happens upon a cottage in a remote part of Karuizawa. His bike is in disrepair after a torrential rain leaves him stranded, keyless, and at the mercy of two strangers. These strangers turn out to be Fumiko, a woman assumed to be the maid, and the legendary Taro Azuma. Yusuke is offered lodging at this home and is baffled by the presence of a woman and man. He was certain there was no one else at this small home. He inquires to Fumiko about the presence of these other people. She explains they are the ghosts of Taro’s one true love and her husband. It’s here she takes over the novel and narrates the past life of the infamous, mysterious Taro Azuma and how these ghosts came to be.
From page one A True Novel is enthralling and hard to step away from. Although I’ve read Wuthering Heights many times, I was more interested in the lives of these characters than comparing what Mizumura kept from the original Bronte novel or decided to abandon. Similar to the original 19th century novel, there is so much more to this novel than the surface of a love story.
Essentially, there are many true loves in this novel. Mizumura mentions the talk of a Japan that she longed for dearly as a child growing up in New York. She tried to hold on to the memories of that Japan for as long as possible only to find the Japan she once knew was no more. This place of her childhood was now a westernized-concrete jungle. She’d lost her true love to time and change. Similarly to Taro Azuma who lost his one love to the same circumstances.
Taro’s enduring love for Yoko pushed him to the limit and embodies the true agony of not being loved wholly in return. He was raised in a home where he suffered abuse, was undereducated, poor, and essentially cast off as a non-person because of his questionable heritage. His only salvation from this hell was in the old woman Mrs. Utagawa, the wealthy grandmother of Yoko. A he matures into an adult, it is in this world Taro realizes he doesn't belong. After an abhorrent fight with Yoko, Taro journey's to the land of opportunity in the hopes of someday returning a man worthy of her stature. Upon his arrival, he finds that she is married with no plans of ever leaving her husband.
I could go on and on about the characters, the plot, the themes, and how much I love A True Novel by Minae Mizumura but… that would be a disservice to future readers. Ultimately, this novel explores the circle of love and how time is unwilling to allow anything to remain the way we hope they would.
Copy provided by Netgalley
March 7, 2024
Wspaniała powieść opowieści opowiadanych jedna w drugą, przez drugą, na drugą, za drugą... O i do nieskończoności twórczej - Prawdziwego Czasu. Fenomenalnie złożona wewnętrznie, ukrwiona w każdym słowie, ryzykancka i niepowstrzymanie tkwiąca, zaczepna. Mizumura przygląda się miłości od każdej strony (1-744), europejskością "my" zatacza krąg nad japońskim "ja" i czyni je elementem środka, a prawdziwym, niewypowiedzianym przekazicielem swojej historii mianuje czytelnika. I robi to, organizując wszystko celnie wymierzonym przypadkiem.
August 24, 2023
Bez wątpienia jedna z moich trzech ukochanych książek ever. Powiedzieć, że ją kocham, to nic nie powiedzieć.
November 25, 2025
kiedy tak boisz się cegieł, że z lekturą książki czekasz dwa lata, a potem kończysz ją w kilka dni
z jednej strony świetny retelling moich ukochanych pato „wichrowych wzgórz”, z drugiej historia powojennej japonii, klasowych napięć, uprzedzeń i turbokapitalizmu; nic chyba tak dobrze nie zarysowało w mojej głowie tego kraju
to prawdziwa wielka powieść, choć bardzo świadoma literacko, plus mimo wszystko uważam, że mogłaby być krótsza, ale to ja i moja fobia
z jednej strony świetny retelling moich ukochanych pato „wichrowych wzgórz”, z drugiej historia powojennej japonii, klasowych napięć, uprzedzeń i turbokapitalizmu; nic chyba tak dobrze nie zarysowało w mojej głowie tego kraju
to prawdziwa wielka powieść, choć bardzo świadoma literacko, plus mimo wszystko uważam, że mogłaby być krótsza, ale to ja i moja fobia
January 22, 2024
Minae Mizumura’s epic novel is generally described as a retelling of “ Wuthering Heights “ while combining the literary forms of the Japanese I novel and true novel.This description does not do full justice to the scope of this work.Ms. Mizumura has constructed a complex work that has stories buried within the main plot.These inner layers are like nested dolls and entice the reader as increasing levels of complexity develop.
The novel is constructed in two parts that combine the semi autobiographical I novel with the all encompassing narrative of a true novel.The novel opens in the waning years of the 1950s on Long Island.We meet two young people who have been uprooted. The first is Minae, the daughter of a Japanese corporate family.She is struggling to reconcile her American experience with her Japanese identity. She becomes acquainted with Taro, a slightly older youth who is a low level worker in the corporation that employs Minae’s father.He has left Japan to escape his impoverished origins and to outdistance the prejudice attached to his biracial Sino-Japanese heritage.Their paths diverge in adulthood. Minae has become a writer and Taro has become obscenely wealthy. Long after the two have lost contact, Minae learns Taro’s backstory, motivating her to write a “ true novel.”
The true novel segment employs the literary exoskeleton of Bronte’s classic. Taro is the impoverished youth who has a turbulent romance with the emotionally high strung Yoko, the daughter of a prominent family whose wealth and status are gradually eroding. Their story is narrated by Fumiko, the faithful housekeeper who has been connected to them since childhood. Their stories underscore the class strife and economic shifts occurring in Japan from the late 1930s through the mid 1990s.
The author has skillfully constructed a portrait of an evolving country seeking to define its role in a rapidly changing geopolitical world. The characters encounter family rivalries, racism and economic displacements.Their saga is at times a wistful dirge bemoaning the loss of traditional values.At other times, the focus shifts to the struggle to balance Western incursion with maintaining a distinctly Japanese identity.
There is clearly a great deal of depth in these storylines. While much of the focus seems to be on Taro, the arc of Fumiko’s life adds the ultimate layer of complexity nested in the plot. She is intimately connected to both Taro and Yoko. Her story subtly and obliquely flows beneath the current of the two lovers. Her narration is sometimes unreliable which adds to the mystique of her history . Hers is a tale of gender struggles and achievements as she gradually transitions from rural impoverishment to empowered business person. Her journey encapsulates the struggles and achievements of her society and stands an example of the complex delights contained in this outstanding epic.
The novel is constructed in two parts that combine the semi autobiographical I novel with the all encompassing narrative of a true novel.The novel opens in the waning years of the 1950s on Long Island.We meet two young people who have been uprooted. The first is Minae, the daughter of a Japanese corporate family.She is struggling to reconcile her American experience with her Japanese identity. She becomes acquainted with Taro, a slightly older youth who is a low level worker in the corporation that employs Minae’s father.He has left Japan to escape his impoverished origins and to outdistance the prejudice attached to his biracial Sino-Japanese heritage.Their paths diverge in adulthood. Minae has become a writer and Taro has become obscenely wealthy. Long after the two have lost contact, Minae learns Taro’s backstory, motivating her to write a “ true novel.”
The true novel segment employs the literary exoskeleton of Bronte’s classic. Taro is the impoverished youth who has a turbulent romance with the emotionally high strung Yoko, the daughter of a prominent family whose wealth and status are gradually eroding. Their story is narrated by Fumiko, the faithful housekeeper who has been connected to them since childhood. Their stories underscore the class strife and economic shifts occurring in Japan from the late 1930s through the mid 1990s.
The author has skillfully constructed a portrait of an evolving country seeking to define its role in a rapidly changing geopolitical world. The characters encounter family rivalries, racism and economic displacements.Their saga is at times a wistful dirge bemoaning the loss of traditional values.At other times, the focus shifts to the struggle to balance Western incursion with maintaining a distinctly Japanese identity.
There is clearly a great deal of depth in these storylines. While much of the focus seems to be on Taro, the arc of Fumiko’s life adds the ultimate layer of complexity nested in the plot. She is intimately connected to both Taro and Yoko. Her story subtly and obliquely flows beneath the current of the two lovers. Her narration is sometimes unreliable which adds to the mystique of her history . Hers is a tale of gender struggles and achievements as she gradually transitions from rural impoverishment to empowered business person. Her journey encapsulates the struggles and achievements of her society and stands an example of the complex delights contained in this outstanding epic.
November 10, 2023
Nie mam wiele do powiedzenia, po prostu mnie zachwyciła i pokochałam ją całym sercem. Niesamowita. Jestem pod olbrzymim wrażeniem zakończenia, pozostawiającego po sobie szok i mnóstwo pytań bez odpowiedzi. Literacko - majstersztyk. Pięknie napisana, elegancko i nienachalnie. Z wad - jest trochę za długa i przez to nierówna. Dzieciństwo mnie nieźle wymęczyło.
September 14, 2013
Five stars for the first half of this novel. I am eagerly (and impatiently) waiting for the publisher to send me the second half.
Don't be scared off by the page count. When I requested this book, I wasn't sure if I was up for almost 900 pages. But I flew threw the first half in 3 1/2 days, without rushing. I suspect when I get to the end I will want it to go on even longer. I will want to know more about Taro and Fumiko and Yusuke and the author, who inserts herself very cleverly into the novel.
The translation from Japanese is excellent. There's no awkwardness or lost meaning. Everything flows beautifully.
Don't be scared off by the page count. When I requested this book, I wasn't sure if I was up for almost 900 pages. But I flew threw the first half in 3 1/2 days, without rushing. I suspect when I get to the end I will want it to go on even longer. I will want to know more about Taro and Fumiko and Yusuke and the author, who inserts herself very cleverly into the novel.
The translation from Japanese is excellent. There's no awkwardness or lost meaning. Everything flows beautifully.
January 31, 2025
Obawiam się, że nie przeczytam już w swoim życiu lepiej skonstruowanej powieści i teraz muszę się z tym pogodzić.
August 24, 2023
Ilość razy kiedy musiałam wstawać, żeby rozchodzić po pokoju te dramy rodzinne i zawirowania fabularne jest tylko ciut mniejsza niż liczba stron, a na końcu i tak padłam na kolana
August 9, 2014
Perhaps the best tribute I can pay this novel is that after 854 pages I was still enthralled and disappointed that it ended.
At face value this is a Japanese re-imagining of Wuthering Heights, complete with a Heathcliff (Taro), Cathy (Yoko) and Edgar (Masayuki), the maid Nelly who tells much of the story (Fumiko) and the Lockwood listener to the tale (Yusuke).
You don't need to have read Wuthering Heights to appreciate A True Novel, indeed it may be better not to have done so and avoid the risk of over-analysing the similarities and differences in the story and characters. Indeed Mizumura herself has warned against that, saying in an interview "I basically was not trying to replicate Wuthering Heights. I even consciously avoided reading Wuthering Heights while I was writing A True Novel so that I wouldn’t get caught up in the game of trying to figure out how to replicate the novel". Nevertheless it is difficult not to make certain comparisons.
The Fumiko character is notably and deliberately much more developed than Nelly in Wuthering Heights, indeed A True Novel would best be described as Fumiko's story, in which Taro and Yoko play a key part, rather than the reverse. A True Novel manages to skilfully capture the changes in Japan from the pre-war period, through occupation, to the economic miracle and the more recent lost decades. And this is best expressed in the novel by the changes to the class structure and the role of maids, as encapsulated by Fumiko.
A True Novel also goes beyond a simple re-telling of Wuthering Heights, and explores the nature of novel writing itself. Mizumura has added an additional layer of narrative separation, inserting (a semi-fictional version of) herself into the novel as the author telling the story that she has heard from Yusuke ("Lockwood"), which he in turn heard from Fumiko ("Nelly"). The author character was also acquainted with Taro ("Heathcliff") in a part of his life unknown, other than by rumour, to the other characters and hence is able to add to the story.
The preface telling the story of how the author came to hear the tale is 165 pages long, and indeed would actually constitute a fine novel in it's own right. Mizumura uses this preface to explore the debate in Japanese literature between two forms - the "true novel" and the "I novel" - one normative and the other descriptive, former based on the 19th Century Western novel, "where the author sought to create an independent fictional world outside his own life" and the latter, closer to the soul of Japanese literature, "writing truthfully about themselves, being true to oneself, and, ultimately, to life".
The preface to the book essentially serves as the "I novel" and the tale of Fumiko, Yoko and Taro as a "true novel" (hence the title), albeit the author/narrator's claim to have finally reached the holy grail of Japanese literature, the ultimate A True Novel, is meant to be taken somewhat tongue in cheek, as Mizumura has said in an interview "I was trying to be a bit naughty vis-à-vis the Japanese novelists of the past".
As a fascinating aside, one reason she advances for prevalence of the I-Novel form in Japanese is that "personal pronouns are elusive, constantly shifting, often absent" - I'm not sufficiently familiar with Japanese to comment, but what she says is certainly true of the Korean language.
The author narrator also contrasts herself to Bronte, saying "We had different temperaments, EB and I: she was a gifted poet, I am incurably prosaic" - although she does herself a massive disservice if one takes this as the more common (e.g. "lacking imaginativeness or originality") rather than literal meaning of prosaic.
The book is also physically beautiful - two separate volumes in a slip case, printed on glossy paper and with interspersed black and white photos. The photos serve an interesting purpose as they are neither referred to in the text, nor directly of the objects and places in the book - e.g. photos are of "A cemetery" rather than the specific cemetery where a character is buried. The photos are also notable for their absence of people - which gives the whole book a rather Sebaldian feel.
The translation by Juliet Winters Carpenter is excellent, and the book was a worthy runner-up in the 2014 Best Translated Book Award, indeed had it not have been up against Krasznahorkai/Mulzet with Seiobo it could have won in a normal year.
At face value this is a Japanese re-imagining of Wuthering Heights, complete with a Heathcliff (Taro), Cathy (Yoko) and Edgar (Masayuki), the maid Nelly who tells much of the story (Fumiko) and the Lockwood listener to the tale (Yusuke).
You don't need to have read Wuthering Heights to appreciate A True Novel, indeed it may be better not to have done so and avoid the risk of over-analysing the similarities and differences in the story and characters. Indeed Mizumura herself has warned against that, saying in an interview "I basically was not trying to replicate Wuthering Heights. I even consciously avoided reading Wuthering Heights while I was writing A True Novel so that I wouldn’t get caught up in the game of trying to figure out how to replicate the novel". Nevertheless it is difficult not to make certain comparisons.
The Fumiko character is notably and deliberately much more developed than Nelly in Wuthering Heights, indeed A True Novel would best be described as Fumiko's story, in which Taro and Yoko play a key part, rather than the reverse. A True Novel manages to skilfully capture the changes in Japan from the pre-war period, through occupation, to the economic miracle and the more recent lost decades. And this is best expressed in the novel by the changes to the class structure and the role of maids, as encapsulated by Fumiko.
A True Novel also goes beyond a simple re-telling of Wuthering Heights, and explores the nature of novel writing itself. Mizumura has added an additional layer of narrative separation, inserting (a semi-fictional version of) herself into the novel as the author telling the story that she has heard from Yusuke ("Lockwood"), which he in turn heard from Fumiko ("Nelly"). The author character was also acquainted with Taro ("Heathcliff") in a part of his life unknown, other than by rumour, to the other characters and hence is able to add to the story.
The preface telling the story of how the author came to hear the tale is 165 pages long, and indeed would actually constitute a fine novel in it's own right. Mizumura uses this preface to explore the debate in Japanese literature between two forms - the "true novel" and the "I novel" - one normative and the other descriptive, former based on the 19th Century Western novel, "where the author sought to create an independent fictional world outside his own life" and the latter, closer to the soul of Japanese literature, "writing truthfully about themselves, being true to oneself, and, ultimately, to life".
The preface to the book essentially serves as the "I novel" and the tale of Fumiko, Yoko and Taro as a "true novel" (hence the title), albeit the author/narrator's claim to have finally reached the holy grail of Japanese literature, the ultimate A True Novel, is meant to be taken somewhat tongue in cheek, as Mizumura has said in an interview "I was trying to be a bit naughty vis-à-vis the Japanese novelists of the past".
As a fascinating aside, one reason she advances for prevalence of the I-Novel form in Japanese is that "personal pronouns are elusive, constantly shifting, often absent" - I'm not sufficiently familiar with Japanese to comment, but what she says is certainly true of the Korean language.
The author narrator also contrasts herself to Bronte, saying "We had different temperaments, EB and I: she was a gifted poet, I am incurably prosaic" - although she does herself a massive disservice if one takes this as the more common (e.g. "lacking imaginativeness or originality") rather than literal meaning of prosaic.
The book is also physically beautiful - two separate volumes in a slip case, printed on glossy paper and with interspersed black and white photos. The photos serve an interesting purpose as they are neither referred to in the text, nor directly of the objects and places in the book - e.g. photos are of "A cemetery" rather than the specific cemetery where a character is buried. The photos are also notable for their absence of people - which gives the whole book a rather Sebaldian feel.
The translation by Juliet Winters Carpenter is excellent, and the book was a worthy runner-up in the 2014 Best Translated Book Award, indeed had it not have been up against Krasznahorkai/Mulzet with Seiobo it could have won in a normal year.
January 15, 2018
This book is often billed as a Japanese retelling of Wuthering Heights, which is fair enough given that in the lengthy prologue Minae Mizumura explicitly acknowledges that this is her goal. And while this novel certainly owes its central, tempestuous relationship and main character archetypes to Emily Brontë, the ways in which A True Novel builds upon and departs from Wuthering Heights is what makes it a worthwhile read. Where Wuthering Heights is rooted in the desolate moodiness of the 19th-century Yorkshire moors, A True Novel unfolds in Japan after World War II and traces the country's astonishing rise in productivity and wealth to become the "economic miracle" of the postwar years. And while Wuthering Heights examines the intensity of individual heartbreak, vengeance, and self-destruction, A True Novel looks outward and explores the ways in which characters don't doom themselves but are instead caught up in the tide of history and of how things like class, gender, nationality, and economic booms and busts can determine one's destiny.
The story also benefits from focusing largely on the "first generation" characters—that is, Mizumura's versions of Heathcliff, Cathy, and Nelly, all of whom are more sympathetic (and dare I say complicated) than their source material. Consummate maid Fumiko, in particular, gets humanized in a way that Nelly Dean never does, and the relationship between Fumiko and Taro Azuma (Mizumura’s Heathcliff) is especially fascinating.
Covering almost 50 years of several characters' lives is no easy feat, however, and there are times when the narration relies a bit too heavily on "telling"—specifically, on one character relaying or summarizing long stretches of another character's life. In these moments, the exposition can get to be a bit too much, although Mizumura makes in-the-moment scenes come alive with sharp dialogue, believable gestures, and often meaningful looks. Perhaps A True Novel doesn't have the lyricism of Wuthering Heights, but it is epic in scope, and my heart aches for Taro and Fumiko in a way it never did for Heathcliff, Cathy, or Nelly.
The story also benefits from focusing largely on the "first generation" characters—that is, Mizumura's versions of Heathcliff, Cathy, and Nelly, all of whom are more sympathetic (and dare I say complicated) than their source material. Consummate maid Fumiko, in particular, gets humanized in a way that Nelly Dean never does, and the relationship between Fumiko and Taro Azuma (Mizumura’s Heathcliff) is especially fascinating.
Covering almost 50 years of several characters' lives is no easy feat, however, and there are times when the narration relies a bit too heavily on "telling"—specifically, on one character relaying or summarizing long stretches of another character's life. In these moments, the exposition can get to be a bit too much, although Mizumura makes in-the-moment scenes come alive with sharp dialogue, believable gestures, and often meaningful looks. Perhaps A True Novel doesn't have the lyricism of Wuthering Heights, but it is epic in scope, and my heart aches for Taro and Fumiko in a way it never did for Heathcliff, Cathy, or Nelly.
March 20, 2016
The title of this book “A True Novel” apparently specifically references a type of literature popular in Japan a while back. From the Prologue:
Of course, what she is writing here is based on true event, so it is in fact a “true novel” but I was intrigued that the title wasn’t just a mildly clever juxtaposition, but was rooted in literary history.
I’ve already referenced the frame of the prologue, but there is one further frame to the core story – in the prologue a young man, Yusuke, visits her and tells her the story of Taro Azuma, a man Mizumura knew in her youth (and a primary focus of the prologue). The first true chapter focuses on Yusuke, and the book does so for another 150 pages before Fumiko takes up the story. Of course, she provides a great deal of backstory, so it’s not until page 430 that Taro (very young) makes his appearance. So, really, it’s a frame-frame-tale. These opening ~430 pages are quick reads, and they never ceased to be interesting or to hold my attention. They also both begin to suss out some of the major themes of the novel, which are more fully developed in the main story (family, legacy, economic status / economic divide). But, still, I have to pretty strenuously point out that the actual story doesn’t even begin to take focus for 430 pages, as that might be off-putting for you. In fact, the entire first volume (450 pages – over half of the 854 page total) is basically backstory and setup for the “true novel” itself in Vol II. That’s not in any way to say you can skip it – it’s mostly all necessary – but there is a lot of build up here.
Oh, you’re probably aware of this – it was mentioned in absolutely every single write up of this novel, and is heavily alluded to at one point in the prologue (though for some reason not truly explicitly stated) – but this is a true story that happens to closely parallel Wuthering Heights. Obviously it’s not a 1 to 1 match, but the outline is there.
I will note that I’m taking the whole “true” aspect of this at face value – I feel like I read an article at the time this came out that verified that the events had actually occurred – but I can’t locate that now. It’s possible it’s all fiction – kudos to the author if it is – but I believe the “true” aspect to this is not in fact exaggerated. With that said, there are striking parallels and connections between the event of the prologue and the events of the novel proper, which seems to strain credulity a bit – I like these moment though, as I’m a big fan of structure and novelist framework, especially when the manufactured edges of the construct peek through, or appear to.
If you know the story of Wuthering Heights you likely know much of what to expect here; the basic story is much the same, as is the tone of the novel. It’s been probably 20 years since I read Wuthering Heights, but I loved it when I read it, and found this book to be distinctly enjoyable. It’s parallels – even if they are in fact true – are much too great to elevate this book to too high of a stature, but the whole is excellent, and definitely recommended if you are a fan of the original.
[Also, much as with the multivolume paperback of 2666, I loved the two volume slipcase here – the pages are dense and heavy – this is a high quality print job, and the pictures in the book likely required the nicer, glossier paper – and so having the 850 page book split into two nice volumes was welcome. I really wish more publishers would do this with large books.]
The term “true novel” once played a crucial role in the development of modern Japanese literature. The period when Japan opened its doors to the West, beginning in 1868, coincided with what might be called the golden era of the Western novel. It also coincided with a period when an evolutionary theory of civilization--one which included the idea that art evolves toward higher forms—prevailed with passionate conviction in the West and spread to the rest of the world. It was inevitable that Japanese novelists would also be moved by a desire to reproduce what they perceived to be the most highly evolved form of literature. For them, and perhaps for other non-Western Writers, the type of novels written in nineteenth-century Europe, ones where the author sought to create an independent fictional world outside his own life, came to represent the ideal.The prologue goes on to contrast the True Novel with what eventually replaced it in popularity in Japan: the “I-Novel”. Mizumura spends a few pages contrasting the two and providing some backing information relating to the two literary forms within the confines of the Japanese language. What’s interesting to me is that Mizumura was working on a different third novel – at the time titled “An I-Novel from Top to Bottom”; so it’s interesting to see (through the introduction and the prologue) how she came about writing this book instead, but it’s also interesting to see how the title of the new book replaced and contrasted the title of the book she was working on. (also, I suppose the ~150 page autobiographical prologue is in itself a form of the “I-Novel” so it’s possible that portions of the original third novel she was working on were re-purposed here. I was probably 100 page into the book before I remembered I was still in the prologue; it is quick compelling reading, but even in that it is merely a frame for the “true novel” itself)
Of course, what she is writing here is based on true event, so it is in fact a “true novel” but I was intrigued that the title wasn’t just a mildly clever juxtaposition, but was rooted in literary history.
I’ve already referenced the frame of the prologue, but there is one further frame to the core story – in the prologue a young man, Yusuke, visits her and tells her the story of Taro Azuma, a man Mizumura knew in her youth (and a primary focus of the prologue). The first true chapter focuses on Yusuke, and the book does so for another 150 pages before Fumiko takes up the story. Of course, she provides a great deal of backstory, so it’s not until page 430 that Taro (very young) makes his appearance. So, really, it’s a frame-frame-tale. These opening ~430 pages are quick reads, and they never ceased to be interesting or to hold my attention. They also both begin to suss out some of the major themes of the novel, which are more fully developed in the main story (family, legacy, economic status / economic divide). But, still, I have to pretty strenuously point out that the actual story doesn’t even begin to take focus for 430 pages, as that might be off-putting for you. In fact, the entire first volume (450 pages – over half of the 854 page total) is basically backstory and setup for the “true novel” itself in Vol II. That’s not in any way to say you can skip it – it’s mostly all necessary – but there is a lot of build up here.
Oh, you’re probably aware of this – it was mentioned in absolutely every single write up of this novel, and is heavily alluded to at one point in the prologue (though for some reason not truly explicitly stated) – but this is a true story that happens to closely parallel Wuthering Heights. Obviously it’s not a 1 to 1 match, but the outline is there.
I will note that I’m taking the whole “true” aspect of this at face value – I feel like I read an article at the time this came out that verified that the events had actually occurred – but I can’t locate that now. It’s possible it’s all fiction – kudos to the author if it is – but I believe the “true” aspect to this is not in fact exaggerated. With that said, there are striking parallels and connections between the event of the prologue and the events of the novel proper, which seems to strain credulity a bit – I like these moment though, as I’m a big fan of structure and novelist framework, especially when the manufactured edges of the construct peek through, or appear to.
If you know the story of Wuthering Heights you likely know much of what to expect here; the basic story is much the same, as is the tone of the novel. It’s been probably 20 years since I read Wuthering Heights, but I loved it when I read it, and found this book to be distinctly enjoyable. It’s parallels – even if they are in fact true – are much too great to elevate this book to too high of a stature, but the whole is excellent, and definitely recommended if you are a fan of the original.
[Also, much as with the multivolume paperback of 2666, I loved the two volume slipcase here – the pages are dense and heavy – this is a high quality print job, and the pictures in the book likely required the nicer, glossier paper – and so having the 850 page book split into two nice volumes was welcome. I really wish more publishers would do this with large books.]
October 7, 2013
A True Novel
First of all, the highest praise to Juliet Winters Carpenter and Ann Sherif, whose translation of “A True Novel” sets the bar higher for literature in translation. So often books translated from Japanese have a stiff, quaint feel, but their work on “A True Novel” is gorgeous; fluid, emotionally true. The characters spring off the page, completely realistic and believable whether they wear kimono or jeans.
“A True Novel” is being touted as a retelling of “Wuthering Heights,” which is only part of the story. Don’t get too into this or you’ll go nuts trying to figure out who is Mr. Lockwood or Nelly Dean or Mr. Earnshaw. Can this really be Cathy? The story flits back and forth in time, making harder to settle on a single candidate for the role. Is it the author, who cleverly places herself in the narrative? When you see who it will be (neatly revealed at the end of the first volume) you’ll be compelled to wonder how that’s going to work as you crack volume two.
Set in Japan and New York at the end of World War II, the story is beautifully reeled out to include characters from various classes and levels of education, from different regions and with varying degrees of Westernization. The two volumes give it that Victorian novel vibe.
But this book is not like anything else I’ve read. I felt as though I had entered a new world, where the emotions were universal but the setting was rare. I highly recommend “A True Novel” to anyone who loves fiction filled with nuance and truth. Minae Mizumura has written several other novels, and I hope translations are in the works.
First of all, the highest praise to Juliet Winters Carpenter and Ann Sherif, whose translation of “A True Novel” sets the bar higher for literature in translation. So often books translated from Japanese have a stiff, quaint feel, but their work on “A True Novel” is gorgeous; fluid, emotionally true. The characters spring off the page, completely realistic and believable whether they wear kimono or jeans.
“A True Novel” is being touted as a retelling of “Wuthering Heights,” which is only part of the story. Don’t get too into this or you’ll go nuts trying to figure out who is Mr. Lockwood or Nelly Dean or Mr. Earnshaw. Can this really be Cathy? The story flits back and forth in time, making harder to settle on a single candidate for the role. Is it the author, who cleverly places herself in the narrative? When you see who it will be (neatly revealed at the end of the first volume) you’ll be compelled to wonder how that’s going to work as you crack volume two.
Set in Japan and New York at the end of World War II, the story is beautifully reeled out to include characters from various classes and levels of education, from different regions and with varying degrees of Westernization. The two volumes give it that Victorian novel vibe.
But this book is not like anything else I’ve read. I felt as though I had entered a new world, where the emotions were universal but the setting was rare. I highly recommend “A True Novel” to anyone who loves fiction filled with nuance and truth. Minae Mizumura has written several other novels, and I hope translations are in the works.
July 30, 2022
Map
Preface
--A True Novel
The Families
Preface
--A True Novel
The Families
September 18, 2024
drobiazgowa, spójna, wspaniała
April 4, 2017
A little perplexed by its genre-like title, in early last January I first came across this book with its sombre brownish covers denoting a sort of Japanese design. I wondered then if I had time and motive to keep going till the end; however, I was attracted by the two lines in capital letters above and below its 7-line synopsis proclaiming "SPECIALLY SELECTED FOR THE JAPANESE LITERATURE PUBLISHING PROJECT (JLPP)" and "THE WINNER OF JAPAN'S PRESTIGIOUS YOMURI LITERATURE PRIZE" (back cover). Therefore, I decided to have a go with this handsome paperback with its highly reader-friendly 12.75 pt Perpetua fonts (p. iv) with a map of Karuizawa, a page of two family trees of the Saegusas and the Shigemitsus as well as its 28 black-and-white sentimentally related photos and my preference of Prof. Juliet Winters Carpenter whose translated short stories I've enjoyed reading since a few years ago.
Since it was my first encounter with Ms Minae Mizumura so I thought reading its plot, key characters, summary, etc. was essential. After visiting this web page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_True_..., I found its information essential and helpful regarding her brilliant writing style which might impede my understanding and enjoyment. While reading on and on, I couldn't help but notice how her readers have gradually learned and understood something called 'Japaneseness' in terms of those key characters' manners, mindsets, ways of life, etc. in which we find most of them unique as reflected in their behavior, attitudes, fortitude, etc. Therefore, these characteristics have long enticed innumerable tourists to visit Japan to know Japanese people and enjoy going sightseeing that include famous temples, shrines, castles as well as food, sherry blossoms, Mt Fuji, Koyasan, shinkansen, and so on.
Indeed, I found reading this middleweight novel appreciatively enjoyable (there is a minor incident I don't agree; I'd like to ask the author if it's true or a gossip) and, eventually, I think its readers would decisively call it a new Japanese heartbreakingly touching story as soon as they reach various fantastic scenes. For instance, it is thrillingly wonderful to read such a 5-page narration depicting the sentimental meeting between Yoko and Taro after their bitter 15-year absence as we can see from the following dialog and narrative excerpts:
''Taro!'' Yoko's voice rang out sharply. The night air swayed, and her hair, which lately she'd worn nicely smoothed down, seemed to fly out in all directions. "You got married, didn't you?"
He came to his senses and answered quietly: "No."
"You didn't?"
"No, I didn't."
"Not ever?"
"Never."
"Liar!"
"I'm not lying."
... (pp. 695-696)
"I waited and waited for you." Slowly she was giving way to tears. "Even afterward. I waited, and waited, and waited ..." Her face scrunched up, making her look even more like the little girl she had once been. "For years I waited for you."
With a wail, she turned and ran barefoot out onto the porch and down the steps. Taro quickly started after her, but the low table was on his way, and by the time he reached the porch she must have already gone out through the gate. I had been standing transfixed, watching the two of them, but after a minute I too slipped on my sandals and went out.
Looking up the road from beside the gate, I saw them together in the moonlight.
... (p. 697)
To continue ...
Since it was my first encounter with Ms Minae Mizumura so I thought reading its plot, key characters, summary, etc. was essential. After visiting this web page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_True_..., I found its information essential and helpful regarding her brilliant writing style which might impede my understanding and enjoyment. While reading on and on, I couldn't help but notice how her readers have gradually learned and understood something called 'Japaneseness' in terms of those key characters' manners, mindsets, ways of life, etc. in which we find most of them unique as reflected in their behavior, attitudes, fortitude, etc. Therefore, these characteristics have long enticed innumerable tourists to visit Japan to know Japanese people and enjoy going sightseeing that include famous temples, shrines, castles as well as food, sherry blossoms, Mt Fuji, Koyasan, shinkansen, and so on.
Indeed, I found reading this middleweight novel appreciatively enjoyable (there is a minor incident I don't agree; I'd like to ask the author if it's true or a gossip) and, eventually, I think its readers would decisively call it a new Japanese heartbreakingly touching story as soon as they reach various fantastic scenes. For instance, it is thrillingly wonderful to read such a 5-page narration depicting the sentimental meeting between Yoko and Taro after their bitter 15-year absence as we can see from the following dialog and narrative excerpts:
''Taro!'' Yoko's voice rang out sharply. The night air swayed, and her hair, which lately she'd worn nicely smoothed down, seemed to fly out in all directions. "You got married, didn't you?"
He came to his senses and answered quietly: "No."
"You didn't?"
"No, I didn't."
"Not ever?"
"Never."
"Liar!"
"I'm not lying."
... (pp. 695-696)
"I waited and waited for you." Slowly she was giving way to tears. "Even afterward. I waited, and waited, and waited ..." Her face scrunched up, making her look even more like the little girl she had once been. "For years I waited for you."
With a wail, she turned and ran barefoot out onto the porch and down the steps. Taro quickly started after her, but the low table was on his way, and by the time he reached the porch she must have already gone out through the gate. I had been standing transfixed, watching the two of them, but after a minute I too slipped on my sandals and went out.
Looking up the road from beside the gate, I saw them together in the moonlight.
... (p. 697)
To continue ...
September 1, 2021
Brilliant: Mizumura provides a panorama of the Japanese experience of the fifty years 1945 through 1995, with a look back to the Taisho era and an epilogue set in 1998, a few months after the Nagano Winter Olympics. Although she is at her best, I think, describing the unthinking privilege enjoyed by the three Saegusa sisters, the Heathcliff figure, Taro Azuma, enables her to encompass the story of those who arrived "home" after the collapse of the Japanese empire with only the clothes on their backs.
Perhaps what impresses most is the specificity of the detail, especially the fine attention paid to markers of social class: addresses in Tokyo, education of both men and women, career, dress, interior, manners, speech, and taste--of all these, Mizumura is an acute observer. There are no loose ends, either--revelation follows revelation, and if occasionally one feels that the different narrators are moved to vantage points a little too handily, well, A True Novel is inspired by a nineteenth-century novel, after all.
Other readers seem to have enjoyed the first half best, but I found the second half if anything even more compulsively readable. The translation by Juliet Winters Carpenter is awe-inspiring, not a false note throughout.
Perhaps what impresses most is the specificity of the detail, especially the fine attention paid to markers of social class: addresses in Tokyo, education of both men and women, career, dress, interior, manners, speech, and taste--of all these, Mizumura is an acute observer. There are no loose ends, either--revelation follows revelation, and if occasionally one feels that the different narrators are moved to vantage points a little too handily, well, A True Novel is inspired by a nineteenth-century novel, after all.
Other readers seem to have enjoyed the first half best, but I found the second half if anything even more compulsively readable. The translation by Juliet Winters Carpenter is awe-inspiring, not a false note throughout.
February 2, 2021
Estuve tres días completamente absorbida por este libro y por todos esos mundos que contiene, ahora que lo terminé quedé como flotando, tratando de decir algo.
Más allá de la historia en sí, o mejor dicho, de todas esas historias que son como mamushkas que se nos van mostrando, lo interesante que me trajo el libro fue poder conocer un poco una forma de vivir tan ajena a lo que conocemos en occidente: la forma en la que se forman parejas, familias, la forma en la que se piensa en la vejez y en preparar un horizonte de cuidados.
El único consejo que puedo dar a quien quiera arrancarla es: hagan un genograma, un árbol, lo que sea, yo no lo hice y en un momento fue todo confusión.
Lo recomiendo MUCHO.
Más allá de la historia en sí, o mejor dicho, de todas esas historias que son como mamushkas que se nos van mostrando, lo interesante que me trajo el libro fue poder conocer un poco una forma de vivir tan ajena a lo que conocemos en occidente: la forma en la que se forman parejas, familias, la forma en la que se piensa en la vejez y en preparar un horizonte de cuidados.
El único consejo que puedo dar a quien quiera arrancarla es: hagan un genograma, un árbol, lo que sea, yo no lo hice y en un momento fue todo confusión.
Lo recomiendo MUCHO.
January 13, 2024
Doskonale komparatystyczna rzecz łącząca różne estetyki i kultury. Poruszając się w przestrzeni literatury, zabawia się ze strukturami meta - nie będąc (i będąc) zarazem opowieścią, powieścią, spowiedzią, opowieścią o pisaniu, przytaczaniem słowa, fantazją, relacjonowaniem drogi. Emocjonalna i przewrotna, jednocześnie prawdziwa i nieprawdziwa powieść - zależnie od której strony patrzeć - która w śmiały sposób flirtuje sobie z czytelnikiem, pojęciem prawdy i zmyślenia i figurą opowieści/narracji jako takiej.
January 26, 2023
Update 12/31:
When I finished A True Novel, I felt a little emotional - it was the first book on my goodreads “to read” list, having been there since November 2013, and I am so happy to have finally read it!
A True Novel is a beautiful and multi-layered retelling of Wuthering Heights. Set in postwar Japan, it centers around three generations of two families - focusing mainly on the three sisters of the Saegusa family, Harue, Natsue and Fuyue, along with Fumiko, a maid that works for Natsue, and Yoko, Natsue’s youngest daughter.
It is split into two books and begins, in Long Island, with the author, Minae, as the narrator. We are introduced to Taro Azuma, who has immigrated from Japan and works as a chauffeur for an associate of Minae’s father. She continues to hear about Taro over the years and his eventual success as a businessman.
The story then shifts back to Japan with Fumiko telling a story to a visitor who has shown up at her house after having a bicycle accident. She tells him the story of Taro and his relationship with Yoko in much the same way that Nelly Dean recounts Cathy and Heathcliff’s story.
This book was so rich in it’s storytelling and though sad, it was such a comfort to me at the time that I was reading it. I looked forward to my time reading it every night. I love books set it Japan and Mizumura does a beautiful job of describing the landscape and the changes that took place in Japan through the years. I also loved the pictures interspersed throughout.
So for all these reasons, this was my favorite book of 2022. For me, it was one of those reading experiences that happens so rarely and it’s one that I won’t soon forget.
When I finished A True Novel, I felt a little emotional - it was the first book on my goodreads “to read” list, having been there since November 2013, and I am so happy to have finally read it!
A True Novel is a beautiful and multi-layered retelling of Wuthering Heights. Set in postwar Japan, it centers around three generations of two families - focusing mainly on the three sisters of the Saegusa family, Harue, Natsue and Fuyue, along with Fumiko, a maid that works for Natsue, and Yoko, Natsue’s youngest daughter.
It is split into two books and begins, in Long Island, with the author, Minae, as the narrator. We are introduced to Taro Azuma, who has immigrated from Japan and works as a chauffeur for an associate of Minae’s father. She continues to hear about Taro over the years and his eventual success as a businessman.
The story then shifts back to Japan with Fumiko telling a story to a visitor who has shown up at her house after having a bicycle accident. She tells him the story of Taro and his relationship with Yoko in much the same way that Nelly Dean recounts Cathy and Heathcliff’s story.
This book was so rich in it’s storytelling and though sad, it was such a comfort to me at the time that I was reading it. I looked forward to my time reading it every night. I love books set it Japan and Mizumura does a beautiful job of describing the landscape and the changes that took place in Japan through the years. I also loved the pictures interspersed throughout.
So for all these reasons, this was my favorite book of 2022. For me, it was one of those reading experiences that happens so rarely and it’s one that I won’t soon forget.
September 13, 2024
Jaka to niezwykła, epicka powieść! 741 stron, które dosłownie pochłonęłam w ciągu zaledwie kilku dni. Minae Mizumura stworzyła cudowną, luźną wersję „Wichrowych Wzgórz” Emily Brontë, ale w odróżnieniu od angielskiej powieści, którą czytałam jako nastolatka i która drażniła mnie swoją pretensjonalnością i egzaltowanym melodramatyzmem, „Prawdziwa powieść” (w znakomitym przekładzie Anny Zielińskiej-Elliott) urzekła mnie bez reszty. Pod koniec nawet uroniłam parę łez, co podczas lektury zdarza mi się niezmiernie rzadko, najwyżej raz w roku.
„Prawdziwa” historia zaczyna się tak naprawdę po ok. 150 stronach. Z początku mamy Nowy Jork w latach 1960., ale cofamy się później w czasie do ostatnich lat wojennych (II wojna światowa, dla doprecyzowania) w Japonii i z tego okresu posuwamy się aż do późnych lat 1990. Ta historia to opowieść o trójkącie miłosnym między Yōko, panienką z dobrego domu, Tarō Azuma, ubogim chłopcem który potem zostaje milionerem w Stanach Zjednoczonych, a Masayukim, poślubiającym Yōko po emigracji Tarō do Nowego Jorku. Opowiadana przez przeróżnych bohaterów powieść nosi znamiona powieści szkatułkowej, a jej misterna konstrukcja jest bardzo dobrze przemyślana. Główną narratorką jest lojalna służąca Fumiko. Poza opowieścią o miłości, jest to też powieść o systemie klasowym, konsekwentnie podtrzymywanym przez trzy dość zamożne siostry, z których jedna jest matką Yōko. Niczym greckie Mojry odpowiadają one na porządek świata, lecz w pewnym momencie ten wymyka się spod ich kontroli. Można również potraktować tę powieść jako słodko-gorzką refleksję na japońską bańkę gospodarczą, która pękła na początku lat 1990. oraz na skomplikowane stosunki Japończyków ze Stanami Zjednoczonymi. Muszę uczciwie przyznać, że postacią, która skradła moje serce była Fumiko i w trakcie lektury cały czas trzymałam kciuki, by los okazał się dla niej łaskawy.
Jestem pod ogromnym wrażeniem, jak umiejętnie Mizumura przedstawiła cały wachlarz emocji i kompleksowość zmieniających się z czasem losów bohaterów. Cała powieść obejmuje mniej więcej pół wieku, ale miałam niekiedy wrażenie, że obserwuję, niczym w kalejdoskopie, wciąż coraz to nowe konfiguracje zależności międzyludzkich. Żadna fałszywa nuta nie przyćmiła w moim odczuciu harmonii tej historii. „Prawdziwa powieść” wykreowała w moim sercu mit Karuizawy, której niestety nie dane mi było nigdy odwiedzić. Jednocześnie jest to opowieść tak filmowa, tak pięknie złożona, iż potrafiłam każdą scenę wyobrazić sobie z detalami. Chylę czoła nisko przed Mizumurą za tak rewelacyjną powieść, która pod każdym względem przyćmiła tę autorstwa Brontë.
„Prawdziwa” historia zaczyna się tak naprawdę po ok. 150 stronach. Z początku mamy Nowy Jork w latach 1960., ale cofamy się później w czasie do ostatnich lat wojennych (II wojna światowa, dla doprecyzowania) w Japonii i z tego okresu posuwamy się aż do późnych lat 1990. Ta historia to opowieść o trójkącie miłosnym między Yōko, panienką z dobrego domu, Tarō Azuma, ubogim chłopcem który potem zostaje milionerem w Stanach Zjednoczonych, a Masayukim, poślubiającym Yōko po emigracji Tarō do Nowego Jorku. Opowiadana przez przeróżnych bohaterów powieść nosi znamiona powieści szkatułkowej, a jej misterna konstrukcja jest bardzo dobrze przemyślana. Główną narratorką jest lojalna służąca Fumiko. Poza opowieścią o miłości, jest to też powieść o systemie klasowym, konsekwentnie podtrzymywanym przez trzy dość zamożne siostry, z których jedna jest matką Yōko. Niczym greckie Mojry odpowiadają one na porządek świata, lecz w pewnym momencie ten wymyka się spod ich kontroli. Można również potraktować tę powieść jako słodko-gorzką refleksję na japońską bańkę gospodarczą, która pękła na początku lat 1990. oraz na skomplikowane stosunki Japończyków ze Stanami Zjednoczonymi. Muszę uczciwie przyznać, że postacią, która skradła moje serce była Fumiko i w trakcie lektury cały czas trzymałam kciuki, by los okazał się dla niej łaskawy.
Jestem pod ogromnym wrażeniem, jak umiejętnie Mizumura przedstawiła cały wachlarz emocji i kompleksowość zmieniających się z czasem losów bohaterów. Cała powieść obejmuje mniej więcej pół wieku, ale miałam niekiedy wrażenie, że obserwuję, niczym w kalejdoskopie, wciąż coraz to nowe konfiguracje zależności międzyludzkich. Żadna fałszywa nuta nie przyćmiła w moim odczuciu harmonii tej historii. „Prawdziwa powieść” wykreowała w moim sercu mit Karuizawy, której niestety nie dane mi było nigdy odwiedzić. Jednocześnie jest to opowieść tak filmowa, tak pięknie złożona, iż potrafiłam każdą scenę wyobrazić sobie z detalami. Chylę czoła nisko przed Mizumurą za tak rewelacyjną powieść, która pod każdym względem przyćmiła tę autorstwa Brontë.
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