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| Territory of Light /Yuko Tsushima; trans. from the Japanese by Geraldine Harcourt NY: Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 2019, c1979. 192 p. |
This slim book is my first pick for reading in line with the Japanese Literature Challenge, hosted by Dolce Bellezza for 14 years now. It's a translation that has only just appeared, but the book was first published in Japan in the late 70s. It started out as a serial novel, one chapter published per month for a year, to represent the first year of a woman's life separated from her husband, in quasi-real-time.
The book is sparely written, with a lot of imagery around light and darkness, as the unnamed main character finds herself deserted by her unreliable husband, left to raise their 3 yr old daughter alone. The story feels steeped in the issues facing a single mother in Japan at that time -- she is depressed, but has to manage everything herself; her position as a mother seeking a divorce is denigrated by many people around her, including other women, and she is struggling with who she is now that everything has changed.
It's hard to read in parts -- her daughter is supposed to be around 3, but feels older; I kept imagining her around 5 due to her interactions. However, still very young, and the mother's treatment of her is shocking at times: abusive, neglectful, angry. But at other times she delights in her daughter and imagines seeing things with the innocence of her young daughter's perceptions, as when there is a water leak in their building and they look at the roof in the sunshine as a glittering ocean.
The year that they spend in their new apartment, after the marriage breaks up, is full of light: they are living on the fourth floor of an office building, in a place that isn't really much of a residential space, rather it is full of windows and always bright and flooded with light, searingly so at times. The metaphor is clear.
When, in the 12th installment, the reality of her new life sinks in, the main character starts looking for a new place to live and encounters normal residential apartments, smaller, darker, and more reflective of everyday life. I'm not sure I see a brighter future for her once she leaves her sun-soaked apartment, but I certainly hope that things improved for this small and lonely family of two.
The story was briefly told, although slightly repetitive in parts, and examined the internal life and struggles of this woman to accept that her feckless husband wasn't going to assist her or return her to a life she'd expected. It was sad, harrowing at times, and revealed the difficulty of this situation in Japanese culture at that time -- little understanding or support was given to this woman, although she also refused the bit of help that was offered (mainly from her mother). It was thought provoking and raised a lot of issues about women and mothering and the sense of self.
For some reason, I keep seeing the theme of the exhausted single mother across Japanese Literature. And not just in the written word, also across anime, manga and Japanese shows/ movies. Seems to be a really tough act. :-(
ReplyDelete(Followed you here from the Japanese Literature Challenge 14.)
~ Lex (lexlingua.co)
That's a really good point. A cultural phenomenon of sorts -- and hasn't seemed to have changed much since the late 70s when she was writing this.
DeleteThat is a good point, Lex. I will look for it more now, since you brought it up, and I think it is quite an apt observation. Actually, I wonder if most of the Japanese people aren’t exhausted all of the time. They work so hard! Their standards for perfection and cleanliness are so high. How do we find the balance between peace and such effort?
DeleteI think the fact that it was “sparely written”, as you so wisely point out, fooled me with its simplicity. (That often happens to me with Japanese literature. While I’m reading, I find myself thinking, “What’s the big deal?” and then months later I’m still thinking about the book.) I, too, was shocked about the ways that the mother seemed abusive to her daughter, and yet clearly she loved her. It made me think, sorrowfully, of the way that I would lose my patience with my son when he was small which is something I regret very much. Fortunately, we are close and can laugh about it now. Anyway, I wish I had thought more about the play of light and shadow while I was reading this novel. Thank you for your observations, and your wonderful review. So glad to have you as a part of the JLC14.
ReplyDeleteThanks so much for your comments, Meredith. I think you're right about the sticking power of Japanese novels. They really do stay in the mind for a long time. I'm enjoying finding other titles via the JLC14.
DeleteAs a mother who, though not single when they were small, often felt as though I was single and struggling with two children, it rang remarkably true. And this was in a different time and place, so I can imagine it must have been even worse back then in Japan. As you and Meredith say: the expectations placed on mothers are so high in Japan - those fancy, artistic bento boxes alone would drive me mad!
ReplyDeleteGood point - the expectations on mothers and on women generally, seem to be a topic often focused on. I certainly couldn't do it.
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