What do you think?
Rate this book
Rain in the Wind: Four Stories
A middle-aged businessman reliving a murderous punch-up that happened in his youth; a chatterbox bar girl cheerfully describing her involvement in a customer's fantasy life; a novelist puzzling over an obsession with tree shadows; and a scholar dabbling irresponsibly in the biography of a famous modern poet. This is the rich and varied world into which you are invited, a world of only half-solved puzzles for its the scholar, for example, discovers a tragedy in his own past in place of the impersonal facts he sought; the novelist, in his search for the origins of his strange preoccupation, encounters a woman who improbably claims to be his mother. It is a world of brilliant satirical, at times to the point of parody; incisive, at times to the point of cruelty. A world also of sudden depths, the mind at last confronting truths it prefers not to acknowledge. These two short stories and two novellas ("Tree Shadows" was awarded the 1988 Kawabata Prize) make up the second volume of Maruya's fiction to appear in English. His novel Singular Rebellion was acclaimed internationally as "a superb piece of urban fiction." This new collection should serve both to confirm his reputation and to give readers a better idea of the scope of his writing. Here is a writer who not only sees the profoundly comic side of human life, but subtly reveals--without resorting to that aggressive sentimentalism which makes some Japanese literature so hard for Western readers to take--its the fact that we are all emigrants from a past we remember only too little of. It haunts us, and we try to reconstruct it, but most of what is important in it escapes us. When Singular Rebellion appeared, Anthony Burgess generously hailed Maruya as a major comic novelist. With this second volume, the limitation of the word "comic" may, we believe, be dispensed with. Maruya's later A Mature Woman has gone one step further to confirm his reputation.
240 pages, Paperback
First published April 1, 1990
2 people are currently reading
96 people want to read
About the author
Saiichi Maruya
104 books6 followersSaiichi MARUYA (丸谷 才一), a Japanese author and critic was born in 1925 in Yamagata Prefecture, grew up in Niigata, and graduated with a degree in English literature from the Tokyo Imperial University. After completing his Master's degree, he taught at Kokugakuin University and then at the University of Tokyo, while publishing a series of translations of English literary works.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
March 18, 2018
Saiichi Maruya is a great writer and a favorite of mine. In this book there are three short stories and a novella. Since I don’t particularly enjoy reading short stories, I did not find the ones in this book any different. The first was about a student’s altercation with a group of hooligans. The second was about the impact of a lie on a woman’s relationship with her benefactor. The third was about a guy’s obsession with shadows (which I did not finish). Altogether, I would have given them two or three stars.
The real gem is the novella “Rain in the Wind”. This remarkable work is about the narrator’s quest to find the identity of a wandering priest who his father has met at a spa decades earlier, around 1940. The narrator presents to the reader how he attempted over a span of three decades (the novella was written in the 70’s) to prove (or disprove) that the priest was the poet Taneda Santoka. To do so he embarked on a scholastic investigation into Santoka’s life and work by talking to people and reading and analyzing every conceivable literature about the poet, which involved academic discussion of Santoka's poetry.
I could not tell if this was a work of fiction or non-fiction. Santoka is a real person and a known Japanese poet. This work could have very well been a memoir, a fiction based on true events, or a genuine scholastic work. I did not look into this, but either way, this was a truly enjoyable read. I enjoy Mr. Maruya’s work for its straight, to the point, no frills writing. Maruya writes in a biography style, which you could readily sense in his longer works, “A Mature Woman” and “Singular Rebellion”.
Unlike contemporary novelists, such as Murakami, Higashino, and Yoshimoto who write pop fiction for the masses, Mr. Maruya’s work has a Japanese feel to it, as if it was written for a select group of Japanese intellectuals. You get the impression that translating his works violates the privacy that he has created with his elect group of readers. Those interested in Japanese culture would probably appreciate this aspect of his writing. I also enjoyed this work for its detective vibe, although from a scholastic approach. It is also worthy to note that a significant portion of this work is dedicated to the discussion of Haiku and Japanese poetry, and its historical figures. Therefore, those who like to read Haiku or are interested in Japanese poetry will find this novella an absolute joy.
The real gem is the novella “Rain in the Wind”. This remarkable work is about the narrator’s quest to find the identity of a wandering priest who his father has met at a spa decades earlier, around 1940. The narrator presents to the reader how he attempted over a span of three decades (the novella was written in the 70’s) to prove (or disprove) that the priest was the poet Taneda Santoka. To do so he embarked on a scholastic investigation into Santoka’s life and work by talking to people and reading and analyzing every conceivable literature about the poet, which involved academic discussion of Santoka's poetry.
I could not tell if this was a work of fiction or non-fiction. Santoka is a real person and a known Japanese poet. This work could have very well been a memoir, a fiction based on true events, or a genuine scholastic work. I did not look into this, but either way, this was a truly enjoyable read. I enjoy Mr. Maruya’s work for its straight, to the point, no frills writing. Maruya writes in a biography style, which you could readily sense in his longer works, “A Mature Woman” and “Singular Rebellion”.
Unlike contemporary novelists, such as Murakami, Higashino, and Yoshimoto who write pop fiction for the masses, Mr. Maruya’s work has a Japanese feel to it, as if it was written for a select group of Japanese intellectuals. You get the impression that translating his works violates the privacy that he has created with his elect group of readers. Those interested in Japanese culture would probably appreciate this aspect of his writing. I also enjoyed this work for its detective vibe, although from a scholastic approach. It is also worthy to note that a significant portion of this work is dedicated to the discussion of Haiku and Japanese poetry, and its historical figures. Therefore, those who like to read Haiku or are interested in Japanese poetry will find this novella an absolute joy.
July 23, 2025
In Saiichi Maruya’s Rain In the Wind: Four Stories. The first two stories are much shorter than the second two. They won me over to Maruya’s style. The third story Tree Shadows was my favourite. A man obsessed with the shadows of trees when they fall on a vertical wall. He investigates this obsession in nature and in himself. In the shadows he sees “a work of nature which is yet unnatural and a work of art only partially contrived.” He describes ruins as “an intermediary between the worlds of nature and of art.” There are two explanations to the source of his obsession – both believable. The wonder of the fourth and longest story, Rain In the Wind, is that Maruya can construct a story – of over one hundred pages – on an ordinary, single event: the priest, who the storyteller’s father and friend had a weekend carousal with; was he a famous haiku poet or not? A couple of times, and only briefly – did my interest wain. The conclusion, is in line with Maruya’s belief that “life itself constantly presents us with problems of a kind that permit no conclusive interpretation.” Obviously I found plenty of good quotes in these stories. Maruya writes “there is nothing like a knowledge of the past for deepening one’s awareness of the present” and his description of a haiku poem is worth noting: “a celebration of the common place, the everyday, in a poetic language, with traditional, elegant overtones.”
November 3, 2012
Four stories going into the maze-like minds of four different people trying to get answers to some mystery in themselves. Reminded me of a Japanese Borges.
May 24, 2021
This has been on my book shelf for decades. I think I started reading it then, but now I have attempted again. I finally put it down after almost finishing the last of the four stories, Rain in the Wind. Terribly boring, it and Tree Shadows, terribly boring. Not being Japanese, I am sure that the author's stellar reputation is deserved and that I am missing something important.
January 10, 2024
Collection of 4 short stories of varied lengths, but each is on the continuum from 'Very Good' to 'Excellent'. 1st story: A teenage fight; 2nd: A model/Mistress; 3rd: Shadow of a tree! 4th: (Longest) Literary investigation with father involved. (Excellent 50 page story, but 120 pages long)
October 6, 2019
At the second reading, 6 October 2019:
Upon revisiting this collection for the second time, I am reminded how masterful a commander of narrative is Maruya. The substances of these tales glide, slip, offer brief suggestions that remain, for the story’s duration, buried, and then with the mechanism of some brief, brilliant allusion, are, as the tale itself begins to fold toward its resolution, recalled. The casual writing of these tales belies the mastery of Maruya’s art.
———
From the first reading, 13 Jan 2013:
Rain in the Wind is the best set of contemporary short stories that I have read and enjoyed. Each of the four stories contained in this volume is personable but stimulating; serious, but witty and funny; and winding, involved and complex, without losing any of the light freshness that makes each tale distinct and enjoyable.
I've never been inclined to talk plot or summary when reviewing literature, and this instance is no different one. What you should know, though, is what makes this set of stories glow, and that's Maruya's ability as a stylist to tell a story in a sophisticated manner, without losing a shred of his audience's attention to sophistication. What Maruya does that is so effective and so engaging is to create a narrator that is our roommate from our college days, our co-worker, the bohemian waitress at our favorite cafe, the deviant we stopped hanging out with, our younger brother. We know these people, and these familiar voices become the storytellers in Maruya's stories to tell us tales that we know inside, somehow, but that still surprise and remain fresh and, most significantly, and in spite of their questionable reliability, never speak lies to us but always tell us the truth.
Upon revisiting this collection for the second time, I am reminded how masterful a commander of narrative is Maruya. The substances of these tales glide, slip, offer brief suggestions that remain, for the story’s duration, buried, and then with the mechanism of some brief, brilliant allusion, are, as the tale itself begins to fold toward its resolution, recalled. The casual writing of these tales belies the mastery of Maruya’s art.
———
From the first reading, 13 Jan 2013:
Rain in the Wind is the best set of contemporary short stories that I have read and enjoyed. Each of the four stories contained in this volume is personable but stimulating; serious, but witty and funny; and winding, involved and complex, without losing any of the light freshness that makes each tale distinct and enjoyable.
I've never been inclined to talk plot or summary when reviewing literature, and this instance is no different one. What you should know, though, is what makes this set of stories glow, and that's Maruya's ability as a stylist to tell a story in a sophisticated manner, without losing a shred of his audience's attention to sophistication. What Maruya does that is so effective and so engaging is to create a narrator that is our roommate from our college days, our co-worker, the bohemian waitress at our favorite cafe, the deviant we stopped hanging out with, our younger brother. We know these people, and these familiar voices become the storytellers in Maruya's stories to tell us tales that we know inside, somehow, but that still surprise and remain fresh and, most significantly, and in spite of their questionable reliability, never speak lies to us but always tell us the truth.
November 22, 2016
'Rain in the Wind' is the most boring work of Japanese literature I have ever read, and I read that book about the dude who collects rocks.
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews