姉妺 -

姉妺 by Fumi Kuroyanagi (畔柳 二美)

After reading "A Room's of One Own/Three Guineas", "姉妹" appears to be the perfect companion: it tells the story of a couple of sisters in Japan, an older, Keiko, reserved, Christian, with a very conservative view of things; and a younger one, Toshiko, the real hero, independent, always asking questions, and not very happy that, because she is a woman, she has not the same options as her younger brothers (she can only study 10 years instead of 17, she cannot be a career woman; etc.).

The story is set in Japan, close to the end of the Taishô era, and it is set in Hokkaido and a little town around a power plant. The heroes are Keiko and Toshiko, the two older sisters of a family of five siblings (the other younger boys). It is a very realistic novel, based on the author's life, and it is pretty easy to see so, as there are many little details that ring true. In that respect Kuroyanagi does a great job, because everything feels real and close to the reader. She develops the novel by telling little stories, where the two sisters life and character gets developed by little things and situations. All the stories last around four pages, and in them, Kuroyanagi introduces a topic (as the uncle that likes to party too much or the girls running from school to watch movies) and tells a little situation in a very easy writing style. If at the very beginning everything may sound very alien and distant, pretty soon the life of Keiko and Toshiko becomes very real. It shows clearly the limitations that money, social position or gender had in the Japan of the era (even if, ironically, in some respects, people seemed freer than nowadays; probably that is the image because things haven't changed so much as maybe they should have). Toshiko, but also Keiko, have to suffer because of being women, and Kuroyanagi does a great job on not hitting us in the head but of showing us how and how come this comes to happen. It is a very interesting novel, short, easy to read, and that will bring the reader to another era.

The best: the realist tone; the clash between worlds and views; both sisters are quite interesting; the plot doesn't get over-convoluted.

The worst: you have seen all of it a hundred times before, like the young rebel against the old-style older sisters; the Japanese can sometimes be difficult to understand because of some dialect.

Further Reading: well, you can get into reading more about women in Japan (very different, and set in modern Japan, but for example "グロテスク" (it has an English version, "Grotesque", that, sadly, is censored) by Natsuo Kirino or "モンスター" by Naoki Hyakuta) or women in general (like "A Room's of One Own/Three Guineas" by Virginia Woolf (non-fiction) or "A Doll's House" by Henrik Ibsen (fiction)). You can also read a Japanese novel set in the past, as the historical fiction tofu story, "あかね空" by Ichiriki Yamamoto). And, of course, "Infinite Jest" (no, really, it's really good; it just doesn't have anything to do with this book; or maybe everything has to do with "Infinite Jest".

7/10

(Japanese Original Version)

(with a short afterword by Ineko Sata)