“The white in the morning glories was like the white in the thousand cranes.” Chapter 1: The Tea Ceremony The novel opens with Kikuji Mitani attending a tea […]
Japanese literature
Snow Country
“The train came out of the long tunnel into the snow country.” Chapter 1 Shimamura, a wealthy Tokyo dilettante, travels by train to a remote hot-spring town in […]
Japanese literature
The Sea of Fertility
“Man is a being in search of meaning.” Spring Snow (1969) The first novel in the tetralogy, Spring Snow, is set in 1912 during Japan’s Taishō era. It […]
Japanese literature
Spring Snow
“The snow fell endlessly, as if the heavens themselves were weeping.” Chapter 1: The Encounter The novel opens in early 20th-century Tokyo, introducing Kiyoaki Matsugae, the sensitive and […]
Japanese literature
Runaway Horses
“The moment the blade tore open his flesh, the bright disk of the sun soared up and exploded behind his eyelids.” Book One: The Sea of Fertility The […]
Japanese literature
Confessions of a Mask
“I was born with a spirit that sought to hide itself.” Chapter 1: Childhood and Early Awareness The protagonist, Kochan, recounts his early childhood in wartime Japan. From […]
Japanese literature
The Temple of the Golden Pavilion
“Human life is as fragile as the morning dew, yet the Golden Pavilion stands eternal.” Chapter 1: Introduction to Mizoguchi The novel opens with Mizoguchi, a young stutterer, […]
Japanese literature
The Sailor Who Fell from Grace with the Sea
“A man’s happiness lies in conformity with the purpose of the universe.” Chapter 1: The Sailor’s Return Noboru, a 13-year-old boy, watches from his bedroom window as his […]
Japanese literature
Killing Commendatore
“A portrait is not a likeness. The moment an emotion or fact is transformed into a photograph it is no longer a fact but an opinion.” Volume 1: […]
Japanese literature
After the Quake
“The earth shook for precisely seventeen seconds. Exactly seventeen seconds—no more, no less.” UFO in Kushiro Komura’s wife leaves him after the Kobe earthquake, claiming he is “empty.” […]