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Title: Thousand Cranes by Yasunari Kawabata ISBN: 0-679-76265-5 Publisher: Vintage Pub. Date: 26 November, 1996 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $11.00 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.4 (15 reviews)
Rating: 5
Summary: A true work of art
Comment: Yasunari Kawabata was truly an artist with great taste. He was a great painter in disguise of a writer. Reading his work is like wandering alone in Japanese art gallery in a chilly day, looking at painting after painting while pondering over your own thoughts, savoring the beauty of color and at the same time being transported by the delicacy or even the tiniest details of his literary brushstrokes. Every word or gesture in this story has meanings in itself even if it was inexpicitly expressed. The suppressed passion, guilt, revenge and jealousy intertwined beautifully among the backdrop of tea ceremony, thousand cranes kerchief, iris vase in the alcove, the lipstick stain on the rim of the teacup, the double star, the fireflies etc. This is certainly not the book for everyone. For those who are looking for a book that full of plots, or a book that inundated with overdone passion or actions, this is definitely not for you. But for those who want to explore complex and artistic Japanese minds, Zen philosophy which is the backbone of the famous cliche "less is more", the beautiful combination of domestic life and nature, this book is a gem. Kawabata is by all account worthy of Nobel prize for literature. This is the book I cherish and feel wonderful every time I read and re-read it.
Strongly recommend.
Rating: 5
Summary: Sex, Lies, Suicide, and Tea
Comment: Sex, lies, suicide, and tea. This slim novel by Nobel Prize winner Kawabata Yasuni deals with Kikuji Mitani and his encounters with a wide variety of women: the poisonous Chikako, the haunted Mrs. Ota, and Fumiko, caught between her shame and her desire. The books moves at a leisurely pace, touching upon numerous subject: propriety, shame, and revenge. Kawabata shows his mastery here, crafting each character carefully, with precise nuance. I would recommend this book if only for the character of Chikako: both monstrous and tragic, she is one of the most interesting characters you will encounter in literature. Some Western readers will be off put by it's slow pace and decentralized plot, but the details and characterization will win you over in the end. One word of warning: although extensive knowledge of the tea ceremony is not need, and a brief introduction will fill you in on basically everything you need to know, readers may miss some of Kawabata's lush symbolism when it comes to the tea ceremony and the tea utensils. But even without that layer, it remains a masterpiece.
Rating: 2
Summary: Too sentimental
Comment: The sentimental and sexual education of a young man, who gets entangled in a spider web concocted by one of his father's mistresses.
The story is shrouded in an emotionally restrained and melancholic (remembrances of the passed away) atmosphere, which is always brutally broken by the interventions of the devilish intriguer.
The novel is full of symbols, but should more appeal to the Japanese than to foreign readers. The tea ceremony is an important part of it, e.g. the author relates the deep impressions made by tea sets on the participants (because they have hundreds of years of age and their ancestors drank already out of them).
Some reactions of the main characters seemed to me exaggerated and they cried nearly on every occasion.
Only for the aficionados of the Japanese novel.
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Title: Snow Country by Edward G. Seidensticker, Yasunari Kawabata ISBN: 0679761047 Publisher: Vintage Pub. Date: 30 January, 1996 List Price(USD): $12.00 |
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Title: First Snow on Fuji by Yasunari Kawabata, Michael Emmerich ISBN: 1582431051 Publisher: Counterpoint Press Pub. Date: 10 November, 2000 List Price(USD): $14.00 |
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Title: The Master of Go by Yasunari Kawabata ISBN: 0679761063 Publisher: Vintage Pub. Date: 28 May, 1996 List Price(USD): $12.00 |
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Title: Beauty and Sadness by Yasunari Kawabata ISBN: 0679761055 Publisher: Vintage Pub. Date: 30 January, 1996 List Price(USD): $12.00 |
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Title: Palm-of-the-Hand Stories by Yasunari Kawabata, Lane Dunlop, J. Martin Holman ISBN: 0865474125 Publisher: North Point Press Pub. Date: 16 May, 1990 List Price(USD): $14.00 |
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