Thousand Cranes

This is one of the three Kawabata novels cited by the Nobel Prize committee in their 1968 award to the author. Of the three, this communicated least to me. Edward Seidensticker seems to have done a masterful translation, but Kawabata's themes did not touch me personally the way they did in _Snow Country_ or _The Old Capital_.Here the salient themes are the bitterness of an old woman and the confusion of a young man and young woman; all brought into focus through the lens of the Japanese tea ceremony and its accoutrements.Personal disclaimer: although I have taken part in a tea ceremony in Japan, I was neither impressed nor moved by it. Perhaps it has something to do with my dislike of green tea? My boredom in the face of ritual for ritual's sake? My ho-hum attitude to antiques in general? All of these appear very meaningful to the author and at least some of the characters. I do find cranes (the birds) interesting, but they play no part whatever in the story - there's only a brief mention of a young woman with a crane-decorated scarf.Bitterness is the salient motivator of the story. In this case, the bitterness of an old, disfigured woman who was briefly the illicit lover of the protagonist's father. The intensity of the bitterness became a barrier to my enjoyment of the book.The bitterness is directed most obviously at the father's second illicit lover, who supplanted her - as well as the second lover's daughter. The bitterness is also indirectly aimed at the father through his son, whom she seeks to punish through control.Though the cause of bitterness can be directly laid at the feet of the amorously unfaithful father, Japanese culture holds that philandry is a man's privilege and a woman's misdeed. Therefore, the old woman's bitterness is mediated by the complex rules of Japanese hierarchy and politeness. Kawabata masterfully illustrates how these cultural rules can be used by the weaker party (the old woman) to gain mastery of the socially stronger young man, jujutsu-like. (柔術 can be translated "the art of weakness").Here, the tea ceremony is used to distract the characters - and the readers - from the underlying theme of love and lust - its beauty, its power, its misuse. There is only one "love scene" which, as in other Kawabata novels, is described not physically, but emotionally. The father's second mistress uses her sorrow to seduce her lover's son through his pity, another example of emotional jujustu.The ultimate result is tragic. In typical fashion, Kawabata ends the tale by implying - but not confirming - that the young man and young woman both commit suicide, driven by shame and hopelessness. Could this tragedy have been prevented? By whom? For Kawabata, the question is not even worth asking.

as a first-time reader of kawabata, i found Thousand Cranes a poor introduction to his work. there was the sense i was missing something as a western reader, something i might have caught had i been more familiar with japanese culture, particularly, the tea ceremony, the guiding symbol of this brief novel.at first glance, what seems to be the story of a young man who inherited a tea house from his father, a man who had affairs with several women, a couple of them prevalent in the life of the young man after his father’s death, complicated by two younger women presented as matrimonial possibilities to the reluctant young man content with his status as a bachelor, is actually a look at a dying tradition. objects lose the function for which they were intended after four centuries of intended use, replaced by the traditional ways of the flesh as the young man takes up with one of his father’s mistresses.the pace of the story is slow and, a word i use with reluctance, meditative. i was reminded of japanese water colors and the atmospheric staging of the films by yasujiro ozu. while i did find traces of a generalized japanese sensibility, what was personally disappointing was a lack of an appreciation of the sensibility of the artistry of yasunari kawabata possible only from reading more of his work.

An interesting book on the relationships between two families in the time period after WWII, when the old traditions were being replaced by the new. An understanding of the Japanese tea ceremony and its tea vessels is essential to understanding the story, as they often represent the characters in their quality and characteristics. Almost everyone in or talked about in the story is either already dead at the time of the story, or they commit suicide during the tale, so the story is not for the weak of heart. The main character is a young bachelor who is tortured by the conflicts with old and new as well as the realization of the reasons for the faults of his father - and the fact that he is a lot like his father. I gave it 4 instead of 5 stars because the indecision and conflict of the young man seems a bit contrived and overdone, and the obvious hatred of one of his his father's mistresses for almost everyone (assumably because she resents being flawed by her ugly birthmark) becomes too predictable. I was also bored by the young man's continued toleration of a person whom he so dislikes (and supposedly is also attracted to) - and who is rude, destructive, and obnoxious. Again, overall it was an interesting read and glimpse into the culture of the time.

I have an issue with the pricing which i have communicated separately .Rest all good .

I bought it new and it came according to my expectations.

I recommend it to all those who appreciate the simplicity and intensity of Japanese literature.

表紙の絵が全然違っていたのでびっくりした。頼まれて買ったものなので、中身が一緒だったのかは不明。

good