Book Description
This collection features a brilliant new translation of the Japanese master's stories, from the source for the movie Rashomon to his later, more autobiographical writings.
Customer Reviews:
This is an excellent edition.......2007-07-20
With 17 other stories, and alot of extras. The preface is well written, in how the translation has changed some over the years, and explaining the era, pronounceation of certain words, etc. I really don't need to go into this book as enough good reviews have said alot. The book stands the test of time as brilliant.
Wonderfully written and highly entertaining.......2007-07-16
I was expecting a lot when I first opened Rashomon and 17 other stories, and I was not let down. Ryunosuke Akutagawa has an amazing style, and also led an interesting and difficult life. I recommend that anyone considering this product get it, whether it be from a used book store or a new copy. You won't be let down.
JAY RUBIN'S TRANSLATION: BE NOT DECEIVED BY EXCELLENT COVER!.......2006-11-21
Please, this refers to the Jay Rubin translation with the Barefoot Gen style graphic cover. Do not be deceived: This is not a "graphic novel" representation of the seventeen Akutagawa short stories in the style of the excellent and important historical Barefoot Gen series. You cannot tell from the Search Inside feature generously provided, which refers to another edition and another translator. This I refer to to is the Jay Rubin translation published by Penguin in 2006, and already available very economically. It is not a graphic novelization like Gen; it is the straight presentation of an excellent translation highly recommended to the thoughtful reader of advanced short stories.
Other reviewers have mentioned Kafka. I would add the early symbolist stories of James Joyce presented in cold realist style. But please do not categorize nor pigeon hole these profound presentations of reality from a meditative, Asian perspective. Enter this world without fear and ready to learn. Come with your cup emptied, ready to fill and to fill it up again.
Other reviewers have adequately explicated this excellent and generous collection which arrives to my grateful hands today. Finally perhaps something will release Mr. Joyce long enough from my hands to consider another author, having studied so long and frequently the film of Rashomon. Criterion's excellent restoration and commentary are well worth acquisition and stand up under repeated viewing of their DVD (as they choose among HDTV formats). Please notice here the orignal stories (also included in the Criterion package with different translator- a crucial point of departure) and the transfer of titles.
A great book for a quiet day. A great book for mass transport if you can focus in silence. I cannot destroy the tales by a clumsy attempt at summary. REpeated reading is rewarded by more profound understanding, just as walking through a village every day for a year will finally grant some slight perception of its realities and rhythms. I wish these were available on audio book as my over-worn eyes fade in to the gloom.
Rashomon and Other Stories.......2006-11-16
Early 20th century prose that feels more like poems.
A collection of stories, one of which is a base for Kurosawa's "Rashomon", which has much more nuances and ideas.
Yet the neat style of this author leaves a feeling of calmness in the heart.
Rashōmon.......2006-05-18
I bought the new Penguin Classic, Rashōmon and Seventeen Other Stories by Japanese author, Ryūnosuke Akutagawa (1892-1927), with the intention of furthering my knowledge of Japanese fiction and its writers beyond Mishima and the spaghetti obsessed Murakami. What I found in this collection is an interesting mix of stories providing an adequate introduction to Akutagawa, but not enough, perhaps, to interest me further.
Preceded by a foreward by the aforementioned Haruki Murakami, the collection is split into four parts by translator Jay Rubin. This division is to differentiate the works between different parts of the author's short life much like Picasso's output can be pigeonholed into such periods as blue and rose. So, we have his early retelling of Japanese legends and anecdotes through to conflicts between native religion and Christianity missionaries, on to modern works highlighting both tragic and comic circumstances, before reaching his biographical work in which he showcased his own madness.
For me, the earlier stories of Akutagawa proved more interesting. Rashōmon, which provided the title for Akira Kurosawa's 1950 film, is followed by In A Bamboo Grove, the story upon which the film was based. The Nose, a comic tale of vanity, is followed by the great Dragon: A Potter's Tale, which in turn is followed by the wonderful, albeit predictable, Hell Screen, a story about an artist who requires to see his subject matter so that he may capture it on canvas; thus, when commissioned to paint Hell, he sets about having his vision of Hell recreated before him so that he may recreate it with measured strokes.
Of the later stories there are few standouts, although that may just be my preference for stories set in a highly romanticised medieval Japan than in a period (the 1920s) in which I know little of the nation. The stereotypical legends of samurai, peasants, and overlords sit far more comfortably with me than a beautiful history deeply influenced by western imports. One of the better stories is Horse Legs, a Kafkaesque tale in which a Japanese Gregor Samsa wakes to find that he has equine legs, complete with hooves, and there follows comic situations as he attempts to hide his secret from everyone, notably the wife whom he shares his bed. The Writer's Craft was another story that sat well with me, a tale about how the appreciation of an author's work is not determined by the time put in but by how others interpret it within their own lives.
The collection gathers together a blend of Akutagawa's well known short pieces in addition to a bunch of stories translated to English for the first time. While some of these freshly translated stories appealed, I couldn't help feel it was a cynical attempt to force a few new tales on those already initiated with the author's work: one story, for example, is just a fragment of a longer unfinished piece.
Akutagawa's writing, at least in translation, is certainly vibrant and his stories come at you from all manner of narrators, the most common seeming to be told from the point of view of someone who witnessed the events but was not integral to the plot. Later stories, such as The Life Of A Stupid Man, show interesting attempts at style but the narrative (a series of numbered paragraphs with individual titles) is so personal that it would seem to be only of interest to friends and family of the author, in addition to Akutagawa scholars.
All in, this book serves to give me an introduction to the author and, with the extensive footnotes, a further understanding of different periods in Japan's history. But, given my indifference to many of the stories, especially Akutagawa's more personal pieces, I doubt I'll go in search of his previously translated works, although the occasional retelling of previous Japanese tales may be enough to pique my interest in much the same way a cookie may keep me satisfied until teatime.
Book Description
Here are two novels by Japan's Nobel Prize-winning author. In Seventeen, a lost young man, raised in a country which falsifies its own history, is in the throes of becoming a right-wing activist and assassin. In J, an increasingly isolated and psychotic youth takes up chikan, a game that involves sexually assaulting women on the crowded Tokyo trains.
Customer Reviews:
Friction between the Public and Private Self.......2006-05-26
Seventeen and the two halves of J are three variations on a similar theme. In these stories, the protagonists are confronted with the realization that their private and public selves are irreconcilably different, and it is this schism that leads to the characters' self-destruction.
In Seventeen (4.5 stars), Oe masterfully portrays the story's anti-hero, a seventeen year old boy who awakens to many fears--death, status as outsider/outcast by family and peers, his own insecurity--as well as the antidote to these fears: masturbation (Oe's use of a Japanese euphemism that means "self-defilement" is telling of the protagonist's sadistic streak). In fact, the protagonist longingly states that it would be nice if life was just one long orgasm. By a few twists of fate, it is right-wing extremism that he chooses as his "suit of armor" to cover his vulnerable ego, and it is the emperor he chooses as the object of his quest for the lifelong orgasm.
Oe's choice of a seventeen year old protagonist is not coincidental. This story is patterned after the murder of a left-wing politician by a seventeen year old youth. Not surprisingly, Oe's interpretation of events enflamed a passionate response from Japan's ultranationalist right who were outraged by Oe's connection between right-wing activism and the masturbation of a lonely, frightened boy.
Again in J (4 stars), Oe uses sex as the vehicle for his message about the strain between acting on one's true impulses and desires and conforming to social norms and expectations. The contrast is illustrated immediately as the Tokyo-ites observe the silent, condemning crowd outside of the house of an adulterer. The scene is repeated later at J's cottage after the "free love" goings on of the young socialites is witnessed by a young boy from the village. The villagers retreat, but the damage is done. The socialites are overcome with a feeling of defilement and emptiness, crushed as a result of not meeting the expectations of a disapproving society.
The second half focuses on the struggle between expression and conformity in the odd "pervert's club" of J, an old man, and a youth. At different stages, they realize that there is no compromise--they must either give in to their true nature or commit entirely to conforming to society. In the end, they all reject society and meet inglorious ends.
In Seventeen and J, Oe uses rather extreme situations to highlight the difficulty or even impossibility of reconciling personal expression and social expectations. Both the vehicle and the content of Oe's message are oddly gripping and memorable. These stories will not be enjoyed by all readers, but I think they will reward those who keep an open mind and search for the meaning that Oe instills in his works.
Politics and Sex.......2004-08-01
_Seventeen & J_ was one of the many books resting and collecting dust that I bought on a whim and reall had little intention of reading soon. I have read two other Oe novels before these two short novels, _Nip the Buds, Shoot the Kids_ and _A Personal Matter_ and his reknowned short story "The Catch," but while I did enjoy these works I was caught up in the recent literature of two of my favorite writers: Murakami Haruki and Yoshimoto Banana, and withing their numerous pages concerning sheepmen and girls who love to sleep in the kitchen, I was kind of bored when I entered Oe's more mundane world.
However, after a couple of years and haing read many of the works of Natsume Soseki, Tanizaki Junichiro, Mishima Yukio, and Kawabata Yasunari, I decided to try another Oe novel. After all the man did win the Nobel Prize for literature, and that must mean something, hehe.
I am glad that I did read these short novels, because they give the reader a view of the tumultuous early 60s in Japan.
_Seventeen_ stars a a young high school student who has just turned seventeen years old. While he is in the bathroom, he feels on top of the world and that with a little effort he will be able to accomplish anything. However, after he leaves the restroom, his high hopes fall back to earth and he gets into a poltical argument with his sister. He supporting the left, communists, and she supporting the right, basically nationalists. The sister wins the argument and succeeds in reducing her brother to tears. However, he pays her back with a swift kick to the eye. One can almost tell that "Seventeen" wants someone to say something to him, but the onl thing that happens is that his father says his sister won't help pay his college tuition.
The next day is even worse. The boy fails several important tests, but worse of all he wets himself while running 800 meters. Later a friend takes Seventeen to a rightest political rally, which the young high schooler becomes entranced by. He soon joins the rightest group, and even though he spouts all of the correct rightest slogans, one can tell he is only doing so because he feels that he finally belongs to a group of people.
The hero of _J_ is quite different than Seventeen. He is the 29 year old son of the president of a steel company and has money coming out of the yin yang. He also has a group of artists, a poet, an actor, a jazz singer, a camera man, a sculpter, his younger sister, a poet, and a film maker, his wife, at his beck and call. The novel starts out with J and his friend getting drunk in his jaguar as they head to his father's country houe to film a movie directed by his wife. They enjoy their time there, well mot of them at least, drinking, having sex, and telling dirty stories. However, things go wrong when they catch a little boy inside the cabin who escapes by crashing through a window. Everything works out fine in the end, but not before some very harsh words are spoken among the friends. Their close personal web of friendship, thought to be quite strong, was, in fact, quite weak.
The second part of the _J_ novel, finds J teamed up with a 60 year old man. They are both chikans, men who find sexual arousal through rubbing themselves on young girls on crowded trains, buses, subways, etc. However, they are quite cautious when they do it, that is why they are quite moved by a young man who performs chikan almost completely out in the open to gain experience so he can write a grand poem about sexual perversity.
Both novels are quite good. _Seventeen_ seems a bit stunted, but that is because the second half was not translated. The second part has never even been reprinted in Japanese because its original publication brought Oe much criticism from the left and the right. So, in all honesty, to protect his life, the story was never reprinted or translated.
A great book that gives to reader a raw view of the extremist in Japan during the early years of the sixties.
The Solemn Tightrope Walkers.......2000-01-20
This is quintessential Oe.
If we fail to see ourselves reflected in society often we become outcasts or are labeled as deviant. The images of Seventeen and J are not reflexive. Therefore, by acts of violence and sexual molestation, they superimpose their images on a world which refuses to see.
With Seventeen and J, Oe depicts the transmution of post-war Japan. This is cleverly evidenced by J's truncated name and the attitude of Seventeen's father. While the political aspect of Japan is more apparent in Seventeen, the politics in J are presented in a more abstract level.
They have each architected an inner world populated with the shadows of despair, doubt, and disgust. Oe lets us become voyeurs of the private and sometimes painful world of these two young men who are self-described "others".
Seventeen and J are both "Solemn Tightrope Walkers". Yet, what they are trying to balance is their existence in a world which they despise with a raison detre. This is demonstrated by Seventeen's fanatical involvement with a right-wing political group and J's flirtation with being a "chaikan".
These two novels should be read by anyone who gives a damn or have stopped.
Two Novels: J and Seventeen........1999-05-28
Oe Kenzaburop is a genius. I gave a copy of this book to two people-once three or four years ago to my high school English teacher, and once again this year to a fellow college student at Binghamton University.
The first person liked Seventeen better. He thought the masturbation scene in Seventeen was masterful. I thought so too. The scene is supposedly the first masturbation scene in a Japanese novel, and it was enthrallingly detailed. Seventeen was a good depiction of a boy coming of age, and his confused entry into the world of Japanese politics. The second person to whom I gave the book, loved the part in which the protogonist of Seventeen kicks his sister in the face, breaking her glasses.
As the first person to whom I gave the book liked Seventeen better than J, the second person to whom I gave the book liked J better than Seventeen. I too liked J better. J was a more vivid depiction of Japan and its contemporary personage's. J is written in two parts. The first part of the book takes place in the country, it presents J as a person confused about sex and his own sexuality, and at some point he even comes across as homosexual. The second part shows him in the city. He no longer contents himself with the answers life grants him, he decides to go out into the world and chance finding the sexual answers he desires by taking action. He becomes a "chikan," a sexual predator, who rides trains looking for his next victim (he exposes his naked parts to innocent train passengers, usually young school girls heading to school or returning home). Riding the trains he meets two persons with whom he will develop a great bond. This novel introduces some of the most memorable characters in fiction. In the world of Japanese literature Oe Kenzaburo ranks with Saikaku Ihara, Yasunari Kawabata, and Mishima Yukio.
J is about sex, it is about the pain of being a sadist-the suffering a sadist has to go through because he is miss understood. Reading this book, and seeing the unfairness in it, is enough to make a person question the way we view people, and society for that matter.
This book is essential for anyone who's interested in sex, or is just a straight out pervert. The first person to whom I gave the book was an erudite, whom I felt needed to read the book to be further learnt in literature. The second person was one who wanted me to suggest some books for him to read, for he wanted to be well-read. I felt this book was essential for such a goal.
Customer Reviews:
an okay anthology about a great topic.......2001-10-17
This is an anthology about black gay men. Unfortunately, the tales inside are not as fierce or defiant as the title would suggest. In many of the pieces, issues of race and sexuality take the back seat to "l'art pour l'art", typical literature. The pieces near the back are better than the introductory ones. The piece by James Earl Hardy (who almost never writes short stories) is great. Jaime Manrique has a piece here and I've never seen him write about black issues (he writes almost exclusively of latino ones). I am glad I have a copy of this book, but I liked "Brother to Brother" and other books on the topic much better.
Customer Reviews:
A valuable document of the Japanese American experience.......2003-04-25
Hisaye Yamamoto was not a prolific writer, but her output of fine short stories spans decades. Central themes include assimilation and the loss of traditional cultural values, troubled marraiges, and, of course, the shameful internment of Japanese Americans during WWII. As a writer who was raised in the culture and who originally published many of these stories in Japanese American publications for a largely Japanese American audience, she produces uniquely authentic accounts of a lifestyle that has largely disappeared. Here are the farms, the oil fields, the New Year's celebrations, the dusty internment camps, the tragic generation gaps, the hopes, dreams, and loneliness of a people who are inclined to remain quiet about personal matters--these stories present a fully developed portrait of the Japanese experience in American and its consequences. Highly recommended.
Stories of Asian-American life.......2001-10-15
"Seventeen Syllables and Other Stories," by Hisaye Yamamoto, was first published in 1988. The revised and expanded edition adds 4 more stories, for a total of 19. Yamamoto was born in 1921 in California to parents who were immigrants from Japan, and hers is one of the most remarkable voices in 20th century United States literature. These stories originally were written or published between 1942 and 1995, and thus represent many decades of Yamamoto's literary career.
Her style is a blend of delicacy and determined passion. The book as a whole strikes a balance between tragedy and tenderness, and her best stories are quite moving. Yamamoto's stories mainly have Japanese-American female protagonists, and offer glimpses into many decades of Japanese-American life. Some topics include troubled marriages, crippling addictions, racism, and relations among the many ethnic groups of the U.S.
Some stories deal with the experience of Japanese-Americans who were incarcerated in concentration camps by their own government during World War II. Other important themes include the human toll of World War II on those Japanese Americans who lost family members in the war, and the cultural shift between generations in Japanese-American families.
The four new stories in the expanded edition are "Death Rides the Rails in Poston," a murder mystery; "Eucalyptus," about a woman's experience in a mental facility; "A Fire in Fontana," about a Japanese-American woman's connection to the African-American community; and "Florentine Gardens," which centers around a visit to a military cemetery in Italy.
Hisaye Yamamoto's work is highly regarded by many, and many of her stories have been anthologized (which is how I first read her work). It is wonderful to have her stories brought together in one volume; I feel richer for having read "Seventeen Syllables and Other Stories." One final note: as a fitting complement to the title story of this collection, I recommend Richard Wright's book "Haiku: This Other World."
A Rewarding Read.......2001-04-24
I read 17 Syllables for an English class, and it will be one of the books that I won't sell back. My favorite stories were Las Vegas Charlie, Legend of Miss Sasagawara, and 17 Syllables. Many of the stories describe Asian characters trying to find their niche in America. Themes include generational and cultural conflicts, addiction struggles, and financial insecurities. Yamamoto seems to take a minimalist approach to her writing, which encourages one to reread her stories in order to extract more information.
Gem-like stories.......2000-04-27
These stories are beautiful, sensitive, thoughtful, and occasionally painful in their depiction of the condition, not only of Japanese- Americans, but of anyone who lives slightly off the beaten track. She writes with kindness, humor, and insight. I especially liked "The Legend of Miss Sassasagawara" and "Wilshire Bus," as well as the interview with her. Her stories remind me of Faulkner's and Flannery O'Connor's. If she had written more, I am certain she would have been better known.
Very good reading.......1999-07-30
So much more intricate than at first glance. If you grow weary of the usual themes of the Asian-American experience, you will find this collection remarkable in its originality, especially considering the first story was written in 1948. A wonderful book to read.
Average customer rating:
- Zen and the Art of Being a Spy
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Seventeen Moments of Spring
Julian Semyonov
Manufacturer: Calder Publications
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
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ASIN: 0714541400 |
Customer Reviews:
Zen and the Art of Being a Spy.......2004-05-26
Semyonov by depicting "Stirlitz", the hero of the story, tries to show how one can be a zen guru in the world of spies. So read the book as the story of a Zen Guru. I specially love the last 3 paragraphs of the book .The feeling of salvation portraied in the lonliness of Stirlitz in a jungle born to spring , a well finished impossible mission , an unknown future and the "Seventeen Moments of Spring" song being sang in the background.
Average customer rating:
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The Celibacy of Felix Greenspan: A Novel in Seventeen Stories
Lionel Abrahams
Manufacturer: Academy Chicago Publishers
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ASIN: 0897333969 |
Book Description
In Two Volumes. This scarce antiquarian book is included in our special Legacy Reprint Series. In the interest of creating a more extensive selection of rare historical book reprints, we have chosen to reproduce this title even though it may possibly have occasional imperfections such as missing and blurred pages, missing text, poor pictures, markings, dark backgrounds and other reproduction issues beyond our control. Because this work is culturally important, we have made it available as a part of our commitment to protecting, preserving and promoting the world's literature.
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