The Key by Junichiro Tanizaki, Translated by Howard Hibbett

The Key is a story told in a diary format. Alternating between the husband's and the wife's entries. It is a he said she said take on what was going on in their life, mostly, their sexual life.

The husband and wife lack communication and instead they conceive ideas about what each of them might be feeling or thinking. All of these they put forth in writing in their diaries which they chose to write in secret but secretly, both wanted each other to read what they have written.

I did not find any of the characters likeable. At first I thought the daughter, Toshiko, is quiet, well-mannered girl. But later on, she came out rude to her parents. I also find her somewhat perverted. Setting up her mother with a younger guy which may be caused by jealousy as Ikuko, the mother, realizes in her last diary entries.

Rated this 2 stars in Goodreads. I still have Makioka Sisters to read and I'm hoping that in that novel, I will see why Junichiro Tanizaki is considered a giant in the Japanese literature.

Tokyo Story 1953

 A story about an elderly couple who visited their children in Tokyo. 

Kokoro by Natsume Soseki, translated by Edwin McClellan

Published by Charles E Tuttle Company 
Copyright 1957

KOKORO is a quiet story about the state of the human heart. What lies within its walls. The unfortunate things of the past that hover over us. The rusts that build within the heart that slowly eat out whatever life has left.

Sensei, the protagonist of the story, unfolds his past through a letter to the unnamed narrator. The past which determined his current state of being.

The story reminded me how people behave differently in different circumstances. 

"Under normal conditions, everybody is more or less good, or at least ordinary. But tempt them and they may suddenly change."

And though some actions are made in vain, 

"who are we to judge the needs of another man's heart."

The beauty of the story is evasive like that of sensei’s character.  I think this is so because more than beauty, the book offers moral principles. 

Kokoro is a quiet story that requires a quiet mind.

Ms Ice Sandwich by Mieko Kawakami, Translated by Louise Heal Kawai

Ms Ice Sandwhich and Mieko Kawakami

I HAD previous wrote a review on this book but as I re-read it, I was not happy with my composition. So I deleted it and instead, I'm just putting here some of my favorite lines from the book.

Goodbye. There’s the sound of someone breathing, that’s what I’m listening to, Goodbye. The stars are setting, and in their last breath somebody tells me goodbye. Someone is saying goodbye, and now I can’t move at all, and all I can do is hold my breath, and silently listen to the final sound, nothing to do but listen silently to the very last echo of that sound.

You haven’t gone to see her, not for ages. And if it goes on like that forever, then you’ll never see her again… If you want to see somebody, you have to make plans to meet, or even make plans to make plans… If you don’t see somebody, you end up never seeing them again. And then there’s going to be nothing left of them at all…. The worst thing is, you never know when somebody’s going to just disappear.

I stopped doing that kind of thing a long time ago. You know—putting off stuff and not doing anything, and not going and seeing somebody when I really wanted to. I stopped that. It’s too risky... You just go and see someone when you can.

Pachinko by Min Jin Lee

History failed us but no matter.

THAT is the opening line of the book Pachinko by Min Jin Lee. I could not agree nor disagree that in history books, we seldom read about the poor people, the ordinary citizens who suffer the wages of war. The reason is that I have not read that many history books. The ones that I have read, I could not recall anymore.

Pachinko is about a family saga of Korean generations who left their homeland in search for a better life. Before reading this book, I have no knowledge of Japanese-Korean relationship during the world war II and it was a surprise that Koreans were treated harshly by the Japanese. Which is one thing I want to understand better as I only read from a Korean point of view. It makes me wonder how this book was received by the Japanese readers.

It started with Hoonie and Yangjin, a husband and wife who owned a boarding house in the village of Yeongdo in Korea. They had a child named Sunja who was later impregnated by Koh Han Su, a Korean man who was adopted by a Japanese family when he was a child.