悪女について

by Sawako Ariyoshi, 有吉佐和子 (著者)

ISBN: 4-10-113219-4
This is an alternate cover edition of a different edition that uses the same ISBN.

《自殺か、他殺か、虚飾の女王、謎の死》――醜聞（スキャンダル）にまみれて謎の死を遂げた美貌の女実業家富小路公子。彼女に関わった二十七人の男女へのインタビューで浮び上がってきたのは、騙された男たちにもそれと気付かれぬ、恐ろしくも奇想天外な女の悪の愉しみ方だった。男社会を逆手にとり、しかも女の魅力を完璧に発揮して男たちを翻弄しながら、豪奢に悪を愉しんだ女の一生を綴る長編小説。

477 pages, Paperback Bunko

First published January 1, 1978

About the author

Born in Wakayama City and a graduate of Tokyo Women's Christian College, Sawako Ariyoshi spent part of her childhood in Java. A prolific novelist, she dramatises significant issues in her fiction such as the suffering of the elderly, the effects of pollution on the environment, and the effects of social and political change on Japanese domestic life and values, especially on the lives of women. Her novel The Twilight Years depicts the life of a working woman who is caring for her elderly, dying father-in-law. Among Ariyoshi's other novels is The River Ki, an insightful portrait of the lives of three rural women: a mother, daughter, and granddaughter. Her novel The Doctor's Wife, a historical novel dramatising the roles of nineteenth-century Japanese women as it chronicles the experience of a pioneer doctor with breast cancer surgery, has identified her as one of the finest postwar Japanese women writers. The Doctor's Wife (1966) is considered as her best novel. Starting in 1949, Ariyoshi studied literature and theatre at the Tokyo Women's Christian College until she graduated in 1952. In 1959 she spent a year at the Sarah Lawrence College in New York. She then worked with a publishing company and also wrote for journals, joined a dance troupe, and wrote short stories and scripts for various media. She travelled extensively, getting material for her serialized novels of domestic life, mostly dealing with social issues. Recipient of a Rockefeller Foundation Fellowship in 1959, Ariyoshi had received some Japanese literary awards and was at the height of her career when she died quietly in her sleep.

See Wikipedia

Reviews

[Ryo · Rating 4 out of 5]

The writer was amazing. The story was based on interviews with 27 people, all of whom talked about one specific woman. Interestingly, depending on who was being interviewed, the woman’s character appeared different. The title of the book suggests she is a bad woman, so readers might assume that from the beginning. However, she is a very good liar. Many people believed she was kind, gentle, and pure. They couldn’t imagine her doing anything bad.

Still, each person recalled one thing she did or said that didn’t quite make sense to them. Just one small thing—but they overlooked it because they believed she was a good person. To them, those moments may have seemed like small, unimportant details.

But for the readers, those small things reveal the truth. Readers start to realize: this woman really was bad. She did something wrong. She lied to them.

That was brilliant. It made readers feel that the writer is truly talented.