Status
Available
Call number
Genres
Collection
Publication
Kodansha America, Inc (1981), Edition: 1st pbk. ed, Paperback, 288 pages
Description
In Oe's masterpiece of the human condition and family psychology, estranged brothers Mitsusaburo and Takashi have long since left their family home in a remote forested valley on Shikoku, in the south of Japan: Mitsusaburo for work in Tokyo; his younger brother Takashi for the United States, to atone for his part in anti-American student protests. Takashi's return to Japan coincides with a local Korean supermarket magnate's offer to buy the brothers' ancestral storehouse, pitting the brothers against one another and dredging up family histories best forgotten. The Silent Cry is the most important Japanese novel of the post-war period and a strange, unsettling tale of how the call of blood and history echoes down the generations.
User reviews
LibraryThing member missizicks
Based on some reviews I read online, I was expecting this book to be hard work. Most reviewers complained that the book is miserable, the characters unpleasant and unsympathetic. While there isn't much in the way of joy or levity in the pages, I felt some sympathy for the main characters. Their
From this novel, the only one of Ōe's I have read so far, it is clear to me why Ōe was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature, while his contemporary Mishima wasn't. Ōe's prose, in comparison to Mishima's, is poetic and graceful. While there are political messages in the story, they aren't thrust down the reader's throat. The novel is an exploration of human fragility, of our responses to uncontrollable events, of the choices we make in life. It examines the stories we tell ourselves and the way we manipulate memory to both form our self-image and justify it. It considers the nature of truth and whether we ever truly know it or speak it. It documents events that demonstrate social compliance and the fallout when such compliance is exploited for ill. The Nobel judges cited The Silent Cry as a key work in the imagined world Ōe created across his writing, 'where life and myth condense to form a disconcerting picture of the human predicament'. Although it was a difficult read at times, I loved it.
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lives are hung about with tragedy and hard decisions, and their relations with each other are corrupted as a result. Mitsu and his wife are struggling to make sense of their child's birth defect. Mitsu's remaining brother Taka is trying to find a place for himself in the world. He is angry and misguided, and the least likeable of the characters, but he stands as an example of those in Japanese society unwilling to accept their post war subjugation who seek to establish their relevance through violence. Mitsu is weak and floundering in depression. I wanted him to stand up to his brother, but could see why he didn't, in his self-imposed role of guardian of his family's heritage and shame. Largely set in the dying village of their youth in winter, the sense of claustrophobia mounts as Mitsu, prevented by snow from returning to Tokyo, retreats into isolation and Taka exploits the pent up frustration of the village's young men. As events escalate, Mitsu seems on the brink of losing everything, but then Taka makes an unexpected move.From this novel, the only one of Ōe's I have read so far, it is clear to me why Ōe was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature, while his contemporary Mishima wasn't. Ōe's prose, in comparison to Mishima's, is poetic and graceful. While there are political messages in the story, they aren't thrust down the reader's throat. The novel is an exploration of human fragility, of our responses to uncontrollable events, of the choices we make in life. It examines the stories we tell ourselves and the way we manipulate memory to both form our self-image and justify it. It considers the nature of truth and whether we ever truly know it or speak it. It documents events that demonstrate social compliance and the fallout when such compliance is exploited for ill. The Nobel judges cited The Silent Cry as a key work in the imagined world Ōe created across his writing, 'where life and myth condense to form a disconcerting picture of the human predicament'. Although it was a difficult read at times, I loved it.
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LibraryThing member TheCrow2
In this strange book form the japanese Nobel prize winner a miserable man, living in an unhappy marriage and have a disabled baby, travelling with his brother to their home village just to face the history of their family and his worthless life till the shocking end.
Too much typos in the hungarian
Too much typos in the hungarian
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edition. Show Less
Language
Original language
Japanese
Original publication date
1967 (original Japanese)
1974 (English: Bester)
Physical description
288 p.; 7.2 inches
ISBN
0870114662 / 9780870114663
Local notes
in Japanese: Man’en gannen no futtobōru