#12-13: When the Emperor Was Divine and Woman in the Dunes
When the Emperor Was Divine by Julie Otsuka, was chosen as this year's "Vermont Reads" book, and I was very excited about it-- a book by a woman of color, set neither in Vermont nor in a rural community! But I found the book itself a disappointment. It's slim and the prose is elegant, but I only began engaging with the characters about midway through the novel, and then mostly with only one character-- the youngest boy in the family the book focuses on, a Japanese-American family split by the war and sent to two separate concentration camps. The family seems frustratingly passive, and even the signs of life in the camp-- a dance contest, the murder of a man who was likely only picking a flower-- happen offscreen. When the Emperor Was Divine attempts to illuminate through small details, but isn't always successful. It also probably suffered in contrast with Woman in the Dunes, which I read pretty soon afterward.
I'd heard of Kobo Abe's Woman in the Dunes as a novel that had been adapted into a famous cult movie, about a woman forced to shovel sand to protect her town and a hapless man kidnapped to help her. The premise always appeared faintly ludicrous, so I was pleased to realize when actually reading the book that things make a bit more sense in context. It's still more allegorical than realistic, but it's more believable than I'd thought. I am still not sure whether I was fortunate or unfortunate to read it so closely to When the Emperor Was Divine, because it drew my frustration with that book into sharp relief-- Abe does what Otsuka tries to do, only he makes it look elegant and effortless. Abe's protagonist is also angry, active, and sometimes self-destructive-- but at least he's clearly and brilliantly alive. A few paragraphs about sexuality brought the book to a bit of a screeching halt for me (and there is a certain amount of ingrained sexism in the lead character that might be difficult for some), but overall it was well worth the read.
I'd heard of Kobo Abe's Woman in the Dunes as a novel that had been adapted into a famous cult movie, about a woman forced to shovel sand to protect her town and a hapless man kidnapped to help her. The premise always appeared faintly ludicrous, so I was pleased to realize when actually reading the book that things make a bit more sense in context. It's still more allegorical than realistic, but it's more believable than I'd thought. I am still not sure whether I was fortunate or unfortunate to read it so closely to When the Emperor Was Divine, because it drew my frustration with that book into sharp relief-- Abe does what Otsuka tries to do, only he makes it look elegant and effortless. Abe's protagonist is also angry, active, and sometimes self-destructive-- but at least he's clearly and brilliantly alive. A few paragraphs about sexuality brought the book to a bit of a screeching halt for me (and there is a certain amount of ingrained sexism in the lead character that might be difficult for some), but overall it was well worth the read.