The Makioka sisters - book.itmens

544 pages

English language

Published 1957

ISBN:: 978-0-679-76164-8

(1 review)

Junichirō Tanizaki’s magisterial evocation of a proud Osaka family in decline during the years immediately before World War II is arguably the greatest Japanese novel of the twentieth century and a classic of international literature.

Tsuruko, the eldest sister of the once-wealthy Makioka family, clings obstinately to the prestige of her family name even as her husband prepares to move their household to Tokyo, where that name means nothing. Sachiko compromises valiantly to secure the future of her younger sisters. The shy, unmarried Yukiko is a hostage to her family’s exacting standards, while the spirited Taeko rebels by flinging herself into scandalous romantic alliances and dreaming of studying fashion design in France. Filled with vignettes of a vanishing way of life, The Makioka Sisters is a poignant yet unsparing portrait of a family—and an entire society—sliding into the abyss of modernity. It possesses in abundance the keen social insight and …

Junichirō Tanizaki’s magisterial evocation of a proud Osaka family in decline during the years immediately before World War II is arguably the greatest Japanese novel of the twentieth century and a classic of international literature.

Tsuruko, the eldest sister of the once-wealthy Makioka family, clings obstinately to the prestige of her family name even as her husband prepares to move their household to Tokyo, where that name means nothing. Sachiko compromises valiantly to secure the future of her younger sisters. The shy, unmarried Yukiko is a hostage to her family’s exacting standards, while the spirited Taeko rebels by flinging herself into scandalous romantic alliances and dreaming of studying fashion design in France. Filled with vignettes of a vanishing way of life, The Makioka Sisters is a poignant yet unsparing portrait of a family—and an entire society—sliding into the abyss of modernity. It possesses in abundance the keen social insight and unabashed sensuality that distinguish Tanizaki as a master novelist.

1 edition

gesang reviewed The Makioka sisters by Jun'ichirō Tanizaki

Destiny and the Frailty of Life

5 stars

It may seem bizarre to compare the novel with Greek tragedies, but there's still a vestige of analogy, though in its core Buddhist. There's no melancholy, but still a strong feeling of loss. Life goes on, and on, and on, as river flows, in its course stirring eddies and waves, finally into the sea to perish. Some fade away in the course, prematurely; eddies stir and vanish without leaving a trace. Like leaves on trees the race of man is found, now green in youth, now withering on the ground; so generations in their course decay; so flourish these, when those are pass'd away. Sunset is lingering, taints every corner of the Kansai region, dyed in an elegiac golden redness, but over this red sunset, still, a sky of watery blue and the fresh scent of spring, the shivering of cherry blossoms. Every ritual and every miniscule details are that …

It may seem bizarre to compare the novel with Greek tragedies, but there's still a vestige of analogy, though in its core Buddhist. There's no melancholy, but still a strong feeling of loss. Life goes on, and on, and on, as river flows, in its course stirring eddies and waves, finally into the sea to perish. Some fade away in the course, prematurely; eddies stir and vanish without leaving a trace. Like leaves on trees the race of man is found, now green in youth, now withering on the ground; so generations in their course decay; so flourish these, when those are pass'd away. Sunset is lingering, taints every corner of the Kansai region, dyed in an elegiac golden redness, but over this red sunset, still, a sky of watery blue and the fresh scent of spring, the shivering of cherry blossoms. Every ritual and every miniscule details are that of death but yet also that of life, so frail, so precious, so destined to death and decay, but eternal for what it leaves: the memories of time.

This almost Mozartian intensity is hard to detect, but once it's felt, it lives on. What is to come is the great war and grave hardship, and the total annihilation of this old way of living, this aristocratic elegance, and the patience, the frail but beautiful rituals of life that is permeated by a premonition of death. But still, how splendid, and how graceful is the sunset, in its stubborn April fragrance, and the perseverance of frail human life.

Subjects

Japanese Literature