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| The Memory Police / Yoko Ogawa trans. from the Japanese by Stephen Snyder New York : Vintage, 2020. 274 p. |
This is one I have been meaning to read for a long time, and it's one that I wanted to like more than I did. On an unnamed island, with an unnamed protagonist, we find a dystopian society in which things are "disappeared" -- they are wiped from people's memories so that there is no connection to them anymore. Only a few people are immune to this, and they must pretend that they've forgotten, or the Memory Police will show up and drag them away.
Our heroine is a novelist, and this loss of memories is obviously a problem for her, especially once novels are disappeared late in the narrative. But she discovers that her editor is one of those who can remember, and offers to hide him in a secret room in her house -- she lives in her old and rather large family house alone after both of her parents were taken away by the Memory Police years prior.
But she's not quite on her own in this venture; the old man living on the beached ferry (after ferries were disappeared) -- also an old family friend -- helps her with this plan, in this strange society they find themselves in. There are philosophical themes of identity and belonging, and how people react to having their civil liberties slowly stripped away. Some people go along with it fully, some quietly resist but continue going along in general, some remember and try to escape, and of course some happily join the Memory Police.
I thought it was an interesting setup for the story, and some parts are beautiful and evocative. But I found that it just got stranger and more esoteric as it progressed, until near the end I wasn't really convinced by it, I wasn't buying in to the characters or their dilemma anymore. Maybe that was a flaw in my concentration but I just lost interest in the situation as it became more metaphorical than potentially possible. Anyhow, it was thought provoking in many ways, and as mentioned, had some memorable passages. But in the end, not fully satisfying for me.
The basic premise of this one is enticing...so many possibilities for the author to choose from. It's a shame that it may have taken one step too many to remain believable, though. Regardless, it's an author I'm not at all familiar with, so I'll see if my library has a copy or two on the shelves.
ReplyDeleteI know a lot of people have really liked this one -- I found quite a bit in it that I liked, and some strong imagery that was effective. But the ending wasn't great for me -- others might like it more than I did.
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