Yasunari Kawabata (1899–1972)

An elderly businessman with a troubled family and minor memory problems
Ogata Shingo awakens one night to a subtle sound, like a roar, that seems to come from the mountain behind his suburban Tokyo home. In Japanese lore hearing the sound of the mountain is an omen of approaching death. Shingo's life is not happy. He is worried about some lapses of memory, his wife argues with him about trivial matters, his son and daughter in law lives in the same home with Shingo, and Shingo's daughter returns home with her child when her husband abandons her. Shingo becomes attracted to his daughter in law, who, it is clear by the end of the book, is in love with Shingo. Shingo's life in post-war Japan is quiet, he commutes every day on the train, often with his son. He has a secretary who is fond of him, and his son has a paramour, who becomes pregnant. The action is all very quiet and emotional, but engaging. I was very interested in the descriptions of life in 1950's Japan.
Translated from the Japanese by Edward G. Seidensticker
Publisher's summary:
"By day Ogata Shingo, an elderly Tokyo businessman, is troubled by small failures of memory. At night he associates the distant rumble he hears from the nearby mountain with the sounds of death. In between are the complex relationships that were once the foundations of Shingo's life: his trying wife; his philandering son; and his beautiful daughter-in-law, who inspires in him both pity and the stirrings of desire. Out of this translucent web of attachments, Kawabata has crafted a novel that is a powerful, serenely observed meditation on the relentless march of time."… (mer)

A good deal of Thousand Cranes takes place in the context of tea ceremonies and tea dishes, so I must rant for a bit about tea.I'll admit it: probably my favorite thing to do with friends is have tea. It's important to set the scene just right. I have no education whatsoever on what is considered proper conduct when having tea formally, but at my house there are a few rules that cannot be broken: we must sit on the floor, we must use a proper kettle and/or pot and tea cups, and you are not allowed to pour tea for yourself at any point. Tea is a great setting to talk about everything you've been forgetting to tell each other because life is so busy. Tea is NOT a great setting to brag about the tea bowl that you have acquired that was once your dead affair partner's other mistress's dead husband's in front of said other mistress and her daughter. Really not your best moment, Chikako. Maybe that's why no one every wanted to marry you (I refuse to believe it is because of the reason put forth by the narrator).… (mer)

The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter was written by an unknown Japanese author around the tenth century AD. It is considered the earliest piece of Japanese literature still in existence. The story is a blend of romance and science fiction as a baby is found amongst some bamboo. As she grows, she reveals that she is a Princess exiled from the Moon, and eventually her people come in their spacecraft to take her home. Thus this story becomes the earliest known tale to tell of extraterrestrials visiting Earth. This version is a re-telling of the story by Japanese author Yasunari Kawabata originally published in 1998 and translated by Donald Keene.

This story would be at home in any collection of fairy tales as it is about a beautiful princess who cannot stay on Earth. The Emperor falls in love with her but stands aside and watches her return to the moon. Of course this is also a morality tale as many of the moon maiden’s suitors cheat at their tasks and suffer for that cheating. This very short tale was an easy read and an easy tick for the 1,001 Books To Read Before You Die list.… (mer)