![]() ![]() ![]() We are then told of the true meaning behind this seemingly innocuous ad, and what it implies for Japanese women in a nation occupied by US forces: Will reimburse applicants’ travel expenses from anywhere in Japan.’ We hear of an advert placed in the newspapers:Įxcellent pay and benefits - food, clothing and lodging provided salary payable in advance upon request. In the title story - the translation of which was previously published in a special issue of Granta focusing on Japanese literature - the discussion of the postwar experience is at its most overt. In Things Remembered And Things Forgotten, the three works that open this collection are in many ways the clear standouts here technical exercises, almost, in showcasing the kind of literary mechanisms outlined above. Her narrators come to feel like friends, gentle companions guiding you through the reading experience - which makes the inevitable ‘surprise’ they hold in reserve all the more impactful when it finally comes. ![]() Much like Kazuo Ishiguro - to make an obvious comparison - Nakajima has a listener’s ear for both the easy rhythms of conversational dialogue and the way this can be interweaved so artfully into the central narrative drive of a tale. There, what begins as a seemingly humble, almost banal depiction of domesticity and scenes of a historic Japan lost to time slowly reveals itself as a powerful statement on the postwar experience pulling back the veil that conceals the often cavernous gulf between official histories and personal memory. Part of the compelling power of The Little House was its status as a quiet masterpiece in subverting expectations. Now, by way of a series of highly capable translations from Ginny Tapley Takemori and Ian McCullough MacDonald, we are given another bite of the cake, another opportunity to contend with - if only for a short while - the minutely intricate workings of a Japan that is never quite what it initially seems to be. These resonances will no doubt be familiar to those that enjoyed Nakajima’s previous work to be translated into English - the Naoki prizewinning The Little House. Gathered here in an attractive new collection from Sort Of Books, Things Remembered And Things Forgotten presents us with ten takes on the themes of cultural amnesia, of past and present colliding, of a Japan still very much coming to terms with years long gone by. ISBN-13: 978-1908745965 Review by Laurence Greenįor Tokyo-born author Nakajima Kyoko, memory stands as an incredibly fruitful font from which to draw a multitude of short-form confections. Translated by Ian MacDonald and Ginny Tapley Takemori ![]()
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