Paperback Reader » Japanese Literature

Publishing Experience

Paperback Reader — Sun, 03 Oct 2010 16:00:18 +0000

In my last post I may have unintentionally misled some of you in regards to the identity of the publisher playing host to me at the moment. Although Virago and Persephone Books are an imprint and publisher, respectively, that I would love to work for and where most of you thought my placement is, I am actually at Random House HQ in Pimlico. Vintage Books and Vintage Classics are imprints mentioned frequently on Paperback Reader because -as with Virago and Persephone- my preference when it comes to literature is backlist as opposed to frontlist titles especially classics or neglected classics. I am working in the CCV division, which encompasses the literary imprints of Jonathan Cape, The Bodley Head, Yellow Jersey, Square Peg, Harvill Secker, Chatto & Windus, Vintage, Vintage Classics and Pimlico. Working on nine imprints of prize-winning books and authors (and the potential Booker prize-winning C by Tom McCarthy) during one of the busiest times of year -with the upcoming Cheltenham Literary Festival and the publication of the high-profile titles for sale in the lead up to Christmas in full swing- is exciting and enriching.

My first week has flown by in a buzz of activity with every task and day varied, highly-pressured and insightful. A wealth of experience is being had and also fun. I love to be busy and thrive on it and there is so much to see, learn and do in CCV with never a dull moment. Yes, there are tasks that could be considered mundane and administrative in nature -photocopying and mailing out- but I am truly loving all of the different aspects of the publicity department; I have also designed fliers, made up showcards for book events, sent author mail, sought and compiled reviews, drafted party invite lists, planned other parties and events, data entry and I also putting my book blogging and digital experience to good use.

Of course I love being surrounded by the books and some of my favourite authors’ work -Rushdie, García Márquez, Morrison, Coetzee, Murakami are all published there- but publishing is a business and although a passion for the product is tantamount an understanding of how publishing works is an essential requirement for working in the industry. My brief time so far in Random House is providing me with that crucial insight.

I will, however, share some of the bookish joys here on my site. On Thursday I had a lunch consisting of several recipes from Nigella Lawson’s new cookbook, Kitchen; the RH canteen cooked up a storm to celebrate the premiere of Nigella Kitchen premiering that night on BBC2. I can testify that the Pappardelle with Butternut Squash and Blue Cheese and the Panzanella (bread salad) are both completely and utterly delectable.

Lunch on Friday was spent with my mentor, Lisa, who kindly offered me anything on her Vintage Classics shelves after we discussed our shared love for classics; a spare five minutes later that afternoon and some exercise of restraint on my part resulted in the conservative pile above.

I’ve been wanting to read Yukio Mishima for some time but Simon of Savidge Reads convinced me to start with The Sailor Who Fell From Grace with the Sea, which I thought back to when perusing some Mishima books on the shelves.

I mentioned a couple of months ago that it was the fiftieth anniversary of the publication of The L-Shaped Room by Lynne Reid Banks this year, which meant that I had to read it; Lisa gave me the fiftieth-anniversary edition (click on the title link to see the cover) and I plan on reading it next.

The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood was my first Atwood novel and remains a favourite. Vintage Classics are reissuing it with a striking new red and white cover for its twenty-fifth anniversary (click on the title link to see the cover), The Handmaid’s Tale is as pertinent in its dystopian vision of the subjugation of women as it was when first published. My copy of the book is one I loaned and never received back so I could not resist owning it again especially with its new jacket design, which I love.

Cancer Ward by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn is the favourite book of one of my closest friends, consequently one that has been on my wishlist for some time. I couldn’t resist taking a copy of this when I saw it especially as I was meeting the same friend for dinner that night (she is currently based in the US so it was great to see her); we discussed the Soviet novel a little over dinner and she then told me that it took her a month to read, which she had neglected to mention before.

Speaking of Russian literature, Lisa gave me an amazingly beautiful hardback edition of Doctor Zhivago by Boris Pasternak, a new translation -the first since the 1958 original- to celebrate Harvill Secker’s Centennial (the bookbag I brought the books home in also commemorates the imprint’s landmark). I read Doctor Zhivago years ago for a Slavonic literature course at university and would love to reread it one day especially in this lovely snowflake copy and its new translation.

Coincidentally I am at present reading a Vintage Classics book -as you can see on the right-hand side of the post- for the Riverside Readers. The lovely Polly of Novel Insights chose On the Beach by Nevil Shute as this month’s book; I am particularly thankful to her as I was supposed to read this for a Writing the Disaster module at uni several years ago and didn’t.

I hope to be able to share more books with you next week. In the meantime feel free to ask me any questions you may have about my placement or Random House in general.

Hotel Iris by Yoko Ogawa

Paperback Reader — Thu, 08 Jul 2010 17:43:51 +0000

When I asked in my recent acquisitions post which book you suspected I had already read, nobody guessed Hotel Iris by Yoko Ogawa. One of the shortest books on the stack and also by the same writer of one of my favourite reads of the year so far, it was a natural choice for me; I was struck by subtle beauty of The Housekeeper and the Professor and was eager to read more by the author and her translator, Stephen Snyder. Interestingly, Hotel Iris was published in Japan in 1996, seven years before The Housekeeper and the Professor; it is tellingly the earlier novel. Hotel Iris lacks the emotional resonance of its successor (in Japanese) but it is a hauntingly evocative study of a unconventional relationship.

As in The Housekeeper and the Professor, all of the characters are nameless excluding the seventeen-year-old narrator, Mari; Mari’s mother, the translator, his nephew and the maid at Hotel Iris make up the remainder of the small cast of characters and are identified by their professions and relationships. Mari is quiet and impressionable; she works the front desk of the family hotel and is at the whim of her mother’s dominant personality. On the opening page, a prostitute and a middle-aged man are ejected from the Hotel Iris following a heated and public altercation (mostly on the side of the prostitute who is shocked at her customer’s sexual proclivities). Mari is instantly attracted to the commanding voice of the man, before she sees him, and so begins her obsession with him; she then meets the much-older man in the coastal Japanese resort, he introduces himself as a translator, and they enter into a disturbing relationship. The translator is rumoured to have murdered his wife and has a reputation of depravity; Mari and he quickly adopt adopt role play of dominant and submissive. Mari enjoys the pain and ecstasy of her subjugation and her illicit meetings with the translator are often violent and intense.

It was the first order he gave me, and I trembled at the thought that his voice was now speaking only to me. I shook my head, not to refuse but to hide the trembling. “Take everything off,” he said. Desire and impatience stirred under his calm expression. He had been as timid as usual all day – until we reached the island, where his rule over me began.

Ogawa’s writing is spare but she successfully sets up a tense narrative that looks ahead with foreboding. The translator’s mute nephew comes to visit his uncle and he and Mari share a sensual attraction towards each other and the novella heightens in intensity to its abrupt climax.

The subject matter is dark and makes uneasy reading but Ogawa takes the disturbing and writes it into something subtle and yet also tragic. Hotel Iris is an interesting and eerily compelling examination of a BDSM relationship that also looks at the power dynamics in everyday relationships; Mari’s mother bullies her and Mari in turn holds power over the maid whilst the nephew holds the power of guilt over his uncle; all possess different levels of moral ambiguity.

Japanese Literature Challenge

Paperback Reader — Thu, 17 Jun 2010 10:45:58 +0000

I’m not a great one for completing reading challenges; I love the excitement to begin with and going through my books (and books I want to read but don’t yet have) and compiling a list for the challenge but for me that’s the most exciting part. Soon I become bogged down by not having met the challenge criteria and reading to a deadline and I hate that; reading should be fun, whimsical and not prescribed so I avoid falling into that quagmire wherever possible. However, Dolce Bellezza’s annual Japanese literature challenge is so easy that even I can participate without feeling pressured. I love reading literature from Japan and would love to indulge in it more often, let alone only one book in the six months that the challenge runs for. One book is a requisite that even I can meet and is the easiest of stipulations, one that I have adopted in challenges I have hosted – challenges that are so easy that they don’t challenge me all so much (the best kind, if you ask me!)

Speaking of making lists, here is mine for this year’s Japanese literature challenge, which bears an uncanny resemblance to the one I made last year… On it are books I have been meaning to read from favourite writers whose work I want to read more of, (Haruki Murakami), newly-discovered writers who I would like to read a second book by (Yoko Ogawa) and new-to-me writers whose work I wish to sample (the remainder!) Many of these are books that have been read and enjoy by participants in previous challenges, that have been popularly suggested and recommended and others are Japanese classics that Tanabata of In Spring it is the Dawn is and will be hosting read-alongs for and which will allow me to catch up with and participate in.

Silence by Endo Shusaku

Battle Royale by Koushun Takami

In the Miso Soup by Ryu Murakami

Kafka on the Shore by Haruki Murakami

The Pillow Book by Sei Shonagon

Out by Natsuo Kirino

Strangers by Taichi Yamada

Hotel Iris by Yoko Ogawa

The Makioka Sisters by Jun’ichiro Tanizaki

Claire’s Corner

Paperback Reader — Thu, 10 Jun 2010 20:04:08 +0000

The latest installments of The Bloomsbury Group series -complete with vibrantly coloured covers- arrived at Paperback Reader abode today (published in the UK July 5th). The one I am most excited about reading is the double-header photographed above: Mrs Harris Goes to Paris & Mrs Harris Goes to New York (or, And Other Adventures, as it appears on the book cover) by Paul Gallico. My review of the first in the double-header, Mrs Harris Goes to Paris, can be read here (under the title, Flowers for Mrs Harris); I am looking forward to reading about the further touching escapades of the salt-of-the-earth charwoman.

At the weekend I found this article in The Guardian fascinating; this year sees the fiftieth anniversary of the birth control pill. Whatever your thoughts may be on this form of contraception, it was revolutionary in the Women’s Liberation movement; Rachel Cooke explores its influence upon literature of the time including The Group by Mary McCarthy, which was my favourite read of last year. Attention is also paid to The L-Shaped Room by Lynne Reid Banks, a book also celebrating its fiftieth birthday this year, and one that concerns the pregnancy of a young, unmarried woman. I’ve been meaning to read the book for some time -especially as it appears on Simon of Stuck in a Book’s list of books that I (and everyone else) must read- and this is added incentive to finally read it this year; I think it is one to suggest to my book group (the one that mainly reads feminist literature) and would perhaps make a great companion read with Married Love by Marie Stopes.

Lastly, I don’t know where the time has gone but did you realise that Dolce Bellezza’s fourth annual Japanese Literature Challenge has already begun? JLC IV is a challenge that I will most definitely be participating in and will be sharing a list of potential reads with you shortly (I love making lists and even if I don’t manage to read many of them, they are so enjoyable to compile); before I do run away to my bookshelves with my notebook and pen, do you have any Japanese literature to recommend?

Fireworks by Angela Carter

Paperback Reader — Mon, 05 Apr 2010 08:00:53 +0000

Lorna Sage (author, literary critic, and great friend of Angela Carter) described Carter’s writing as “pyrotechnic – fuelled with ideas, packed with images and spangling the night with her starry language”; the complimentary accolade connotes an image of fireworks. The short fiction collection of the same name, her first collection of short stories, came relatively early in her writing career (her publications were more prolific in the Sixties and Seventies and this was her seventh book, published in 1974) and was subtitled Nine Profane Pieces. Carter was married twice and divorced her first husband (retaining his surname) in 1972; she used the proceeds of her Somerset Maugham Award win (in 1969 for her second novel, Several Perceptions) to leave her husband and relocate from England to Japan. Fireworks is influenced and inspired by Carter’s Japanese experiences and are very much, as in the title of the first story, a souvenir of Japan.

Carter wrote that “In Japan I learnt what it was to be a woman and become radicalised” and that self-awareness of her gender and her new-found feminism can be best seen in my favourite story from the volume, “The Loves of Lady Purple”. The story is one that Carter herself chose to collect in Wayward Girls and Wicked Women, a Virago anthology of short stories written by women that she edited; “The Loves of Lady Purple” is a story about a marionette who comes alive and wreaks revenge on her puppet-master (reminiscent of The Magic Toyshop).

Personally I don’t find much cohesion in the grouping of the stories and think that the later The Bloody Chamber is a far stronger collection; however, I do recognise Carter’s common themes of mirrors/reflections; incest; rape; alienation; absent mothers; puppets; doubling and duplicity; subversive reworkings of fairy tales and use of fairy tale motifs. Carter deals with dark subject matter but her stories are surreal and she is a great proponent of magical realism. As for the profanity alluded to in the title, the sexual content is at times graphic; at other times it is implied through intense suggestion and lustful imagery as in the Eve-myth inspired “Penetrating to the Heart of the Forest”:

The dark pool reflected her darkly, like an antique mirror. She raised her hand to part the leaves in search of a ripe fruit but the greenish skin seemed to warm and glow under her fingers so the first one she touched came as easily off the stem as if it had been brought to perfection by her touch. It seemed to be some kind of apple or pear. It was so juicy the juice ran down her chin and she extended a long, crimson, newly sensual tongue to lick her lips, laughing.

Although not my favourite Angela Carter book, the writing is of course stunning as in all of Carter’s prose; it is always rich and allusive, “starry” in Sage’s words above, and breathtaking to read. I have four copies of Fireworks to give-away to anybody that is interested. To enter please tell me which Angela Carter work you are most looking forward to reading about during Angela Carter month. The draw is open worldwide and will close on Friday 9th April at 12pm BST.

For further thoughts on Fireworks, to whet your appetite, read this review by another cookie crumbles.

Claire's Corner

Paperback Reader — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 14:32:31 +0000

Thank you all for celebrating my first blog birthday with me; I appreciated your warm and thoughtful comments. I was also interested in seeing which books I have highlighted over the past year were selected should you win my give-away; I was delighted to see so many of you coveting my favourite Persephone book, Lady Rose and Mrs Memmary. Alas, nobody will be receiving a copy of that title from me this time as the lucky winner is Tony who opted for I Am a Cat by Sōseki Natsume. Congratulations, Tony! Please email me your address and I’ll send you a copy via The Book Depository (can’t beat the worldwide free shipping).

As for my own progress with the read-along of I Am a Cat, hosted by Tanabata of In Spring it is the Dawn, I am a month behind in the reading of the third and final volume. I have been in a little bit of book slump recently and have a number of unfinished books around me, that being one of them, but I hope to present my concluded thoughts soon. The saving grace is that the delay will allow me the opportunity for something Sōseki Natsume related, which I will post about at the same time.

You may have read my negative review of An Elegy for Easterly last week so imagine my humiliation when the author, Petina Gappah, also read it. What is more, she linked to it on her own blog. Gappah’s grace and dignity shamed me because I was entirely negative; I do try and balance any negative reviews that I write but, for the most part (I did mention that I liked the emotionally-charged title story and The Cracked, Pink Lips of Rosie’s Bridegroom”), I was harsh. I have no issues with voicing my opinions but I do forget that on the internet nothing is private and in the age of Google Alerts and social networking sites, some things come back to bite you. As it was, Petina Gappah was exceedingly gracious and we shared a few messages back and forth; I am thrilled that she was so complimentary about my blog and her humble attitude and constructive use of criticism more than persuaded me to read her first novel, The Book of Memory, when it is published early next year. The author’s pleasant attitude reminded me that there is such a thing as tact and that I could exercise it more often; I’ll always be honest (as I am in all of my reviews, not just the negative ones) but I will try to be less brutal about it, a lesson that applies to life just as much as it does to writing. I now have something of a literary crush on Petina Gappah as she is incredibly cool! I mean that, really, not just because she didn’t respond to my post nastily: have a look at her biography.

Today in The Guardian there is a gallery selection of the best (and naughtiest) heroes from children’s literature. Anne Shirley (of Green Gables fame) is my favourite character from children’s fiction and one of the best heroines in literature as a whole, so I am delighted that she made the cut; pray tell why, though, in the photograph she looks as if she is a brunette as opposed to flaming red-head?! Gilbert would be less than taken, I feel.

On the Bedside Table

Paperback Reader — Sun, 31 Jan 2010 10:00:00 +0000

Do you have several books on the go at once? I’m usually what you would consider a monogamous reader: a girl who is loyal to one book at a time; occasionally though I read a few books at once, especially longer classics and books that I am reading over an extended period of time. Books that I am slowly reading are kept on my bedside table (nightstand) as well as books that I plan to read next; my immediate to-be-read pile also lies in two stacks: one beside the bedside table and another in the living room, for ease of access wherever I happen to finish a book, depending on what I’m in the mood for reading.

Currently on my night-stand are two Japanese classics: I Am a Cat by Soseki Natsume and The Pillow Book by Sei Shonagon, both of which are In Spring it is the Dawn read-alongs, one of which is coming to an end and the other about to commence. The other titles, To Bed With Grand Music by Marghanita Laski and Foe by J. M. Coetzee, are two that I am looking forward to reading and have placed within easy reach to pick up and read when the time is right.

Do you keep books by your bedside? If so, what do you have there at the moment?

The Housekeeper & the Professor

Paperback Reader — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 13:40:00 +0000

The Housekeeper and the Professor by Yoko Ogawa is a tender exploration of the relationship between a housekeeper, her client the maths Professor and her son, Root, who is so-called by the Professor because his flat head reminds him of a square root sign. The Professor suffered brain-damage in a car accident seventeen years previously and lives with only eighty minutes of short-term memory, which is both a problematic and poignant factor in their day-to-day lives together.

Translated from Japanese by Stephen Snyder, The Housekeeper and the Professor is a lyrically touching novel. Very gently told, Ogawa uses maths to create heartfelt connections between the Housekeeper, her son and the Professor. I enjoyed the simplistic style to the story and how it broke down maths to connect these disparate people together; the Housekeeper becomes interested in maths, on working out problems and noticing patterns whilst the Professor sees the world through numbers. Using complex equations metaphorically throughout the novel was effective for me; I didn’t think that it was simply a vehicle but was an interesting means of connection between an employer and employee in a subservient role who may have otherwise been unable to communicate. It has been a long time since I studied maths and I liked the refresher course and enjoyed seeing how Ogawa, through her characters, drew links between maths and life.

The Housekeeper and the Professor is a gentle novel, simply rendered with only four nameless characters and an unseen baseball player. It is beautiful meditation on the nature and limitations of memory and also on what can make familial relationships and what they can teach us; it is subtly written and the sadness of the Professor’s short-term memory is never overwhelmingly tragic or trite but resonates in its understated form. Culturally, the novel taught me the Japanese fascination with baseball; educationally it made me appreciate maths once more; emotionally it touched me.

Some favourite and/or key passages:

I happened to glance at some of the notes to his suit: ” … the failure of the analytic method…,” “… the function of the elliptical curve….” Shuffled in among the fragments of obscure numbers and symbols and words was one scrap that even I could understand. From the stains and bent corners of the paper and the rusted edges of the binder clip, I could tell that this one had been attached to the Professor for a long time: “My memory lasts only eighty minutes,” it read.

I don’t know what the evening star meant to him, perhaps finding it in the sky soothed his nerves, or maybe it was simply a habit. And I don’t know how he could see it so long before anyone else-he barely noticed the food I set right in front of him. For whatever reason, he would point his withered finger at a single spot in the vast sky-always the right place, as I eventually discovered-and that spot had significance for him and no one else.

Euler’s formula shone like a shooting star in the night sky, or like a line of poetry carved on the wall of a dark cave. I slipped the Professor’s note into my wallet, strangely moved by the beauty of those few symbols. As I headed down the library stairs, I turned back to look. The mathematics stacks were as silent and empty as ever-apparently no one suspected the riches hidden there.

I Am a Cat Vol. II

Paperback Reader — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 22:00:00 +0000

I have enjoyed Volume II of I Am a Cat as much as I have Volume I, probably more so as I have become immersed in the novel and attuned to its narrator and satirical humour. I Am a Cat is highly amusing with wry perceptions through the eyes of a cat. Volume II has been more episodic -with the setting and premise established in Volume I- with the cat (or Neko, as I refer to him when posting) venturing out to a Japanese bathhouse, spying on neighbours and being the only witness to a burglary in his master’s home (of course burglars are also known as cat burglars). The scene were Neko attempts to prove his worth by catching rats -before a visitor to the Sneazes’ home takes him to eat- is a moment of high comedy. Neko’s commentary is insightful as well as scathing at times but it is always witty; when he is not participating in his own escapades then he is observing the domestic dramas of his owners, their friends and acquaintances. I also enjoyed a cheeky reference to Sōseki and his poetry by Sneaze and his friends, Coldmoon and Waverhouse.

I am finding I Am a Cat immensely readable and enjoyable and have definitely found my stride with Volume II; the characters are more fully-fledged and less annoying than in Volume I (not that they irritated me that much but Mr Sneaze is rather pompous) and the cat, himself, is more humanised, which is a development interesting to follow. The cat is by far one of the most intriguing and compelling narrators I have ever had the joy of reading. The concept of an omniscient narrator that is a character and a cat is awe-worthy and it still impresses me two volumes on; I am very excited -but also disappointed- to read the third and final volume for January 15th.

How are you finding I Am a Cat? I know that some of you have borrowed it from the library on my recommendation and I hope that you are enjoying it as much as I am.

Some quotes from Volume II:

So who the hell is this that has so blithely appropriated the cushion which was destined, sooner or later, to have eased Suzuki buttocks? Had the interloper been a human being, he might well have given way. But to be pre-empted by a mere cat, that is intolerable. It is also a little unpleasant.

But cats, I can assure you, just like anyone else, feel the heat and feel the cold. There are times when I consider that I really wouldn’t mind, just that once, soaking myself in a bath, but if I got hot water all over my fur, it would take ages to get dry again and that is why I grin and bear the stink of my own sweat and have never in all my life yet passed through the entrance of a public bathhouse. Every now and again I think about using a fan but, since I cannot hold one in my paws, the thought’s not worth pursuing.

I Am a Cat Vol.1

Paperback Reader — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 20:46:00 +0000

I am a Cat. As yet I have no name.

I Am a Cat by Sōseki Natsume began as a short story, which makes up chapter one of Volume one, but due to its success was extended into a three-volume book that is now a Japanese classic. Highly readable, I Am a Cat is narrated by a nameless stray who observes human nature. Amusing and delightfully originally, the satire and allegory are presently beyond me after only reading Volume one but I am looking forward to delving in deeper and learning more about the history, culture and society of the Meiji era (the installments of I Am a Cat first appeared between 1905 and 1906).

I Am a Cat is a scathing, observed piece that is very much a comedy of manners and intellect. The narrator -let’s call him Neko- ingratiates himself into the household of an English teacher and his family with many scholarly friends of the schoolteacher visiting regularly and telling tall tales that the cat recounts. The device of cat as narrator is used cleverly as he is omniscient in his pride of listening place in a lap, privy to household conversations, and also, as a cat, can sneak undetected into other houses to eavesdrop on his light paw-steps.

Of course I am a cat-lover and I love to read about cats. Truth be told, I am a little cat obsessed and I highly enjoy the cat’s meanderings and antics. I thought that this book would be the perfect companion read to I Am a Cat and I am coveting it accordingly.

I am enjoying the accessible, gentle and witty style of I Am a Cat and look forward to the subsequent volumes. Discussion of the first volume can be read at the dedicated read-along page at In Spring it is the Dawn.

A particularly favourite quote from this volume:

“He has no secret vices, but he is totally abandoned in the way he buys book after book, never to read a single one. I wouldn’t mind if he used his head and bought in moderation, but no. Whenever the mood takes him, he ambles off to the biggest bookshop in the city and brings back home as many books as chance to catch his fancy. Then, at the end of the month, he adopts an attitude of complete detachment. At the end of last year, for instance, I had a terrible time coping with the bill that had been accumulating month after month.”