Status
Available
Call number
Genres
Collection
Publication
Berkley Publishing Corporation (1974), Mass Market Paperback, 186 pages
Description
Go is a game of strategy in which two players attempt to surround each other's black or white stones. Simple in its fundamentals, infinitely complex in its execution, Go is an essential expression of the Japanese spirit. And in his fictional chronicle of a match played between a revered and heretofore invincible Master and a younger, more modern challenger, Yasunari Kawabata captured the moment in which the immutable traditions of imperial Japan met the onslaught of the twentieth century. The competition between the Master of Go and his opponent, Otaké, is waged over several months and layered in ceremony. But beneath the game's decorum lie tensions that consume not only the players themselves but their families and retainers--tensions that turn this particular contest into a duel that can only end in death. Luminous in its detail, both suspenseful and serene, The Master of Go is an elegy for an entire society, written with the poetic economy and psychological acumen that brought Kawabata the Nobel Prize for Literature. Translated from the Japanese by Edward G. Seidensticker… (more)
User reviews
LibraryThing member SqueakyChu
This is a gorgeous book. Beware though, the book is character-driven and based on the game of Go. The book includes diagrams of gameboards and the movements of stones (the black and white game pieces). You can either learn the rules of Go online (they're very simple) or just read the book for the
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beautiful story that it is. The action is of the Master (the elderly and sickly Japanese Go champion) and his younger opponent during the Master's last game. The narrator is a newspaper reporter who is sent to cover the game. The action (moves take hours!) of the book belies the great beauty its writing. Show Less
LibraryThing member daniel.links
Brilliant. A fictionalised account of a real go game (a strategic board board game that is very popular in Japan) from the 1930s might not sound a great setting for a novel, but it is. The ageing expert with declining health plays a young challenger in a game lasting several months with breaks for
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medical treatment and the like. It is a brilliant slow-moving drama. My only hesitation in recommending this book would be that a basic understanding of the rules of go is probably important to get the full impact of this book. Show Less
LibraryThing member Arctic-Stranger
When the old meets the new, someone loses and maybe someone dies.
The old Go master (Go is a game, invented in China, and played in Japan, Korea and China much like Chess in the West) meets the young upstart who hopes to unthrone him. Of course the context for this is Imperial Japan, as it enters
The language is delicate, as are the characters. It helps to know something about Go to understand parts of the book, but you can find enough on Wikipedia to get by.
This did make me buy some books on Go strategy.
The old Go master (Go is a game, invented in China, and played in Japan, Korea and China much like Chess in the West) meets the young upstart who hopes to unthrone him. Of course the context for this is Imperial Japan, as it enters
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into the modern age. The fictional match takes place in 1940, although the real match this book is based upon took place in 1936. The language is delicate, as are the characters. It helps to know something about Go to understand parts of the book, but you can find enough on Wikipedia to get by.
This did make me buy some books on Go strategy.
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LibraryThing member lucybrown
The Master of Go chronicles the progress of a championship Go match, one which spanned nearly half a year. When I picked out this book, I wondered will I need to know anything about the game Go for this book to meaningful to me? As I flipped through the pages I saw illustrations of the placement of
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the stones on the Go board showing the games progression. This was not encouraging. I was leery. My knowledge of Go would not make a hurdle for even a pygmy amoeba. Furthermore, I do not really like games which are purely strategic. Worse still, I really dislike games that last more than a couple of hours. However, I was armed with a book store gift certificate and a short list of books I wanted to buy with the certificate. Any book by Kawabata was on that short list. And this was the only one by the Nobel Laurette. I went with it and am glad I did. As always, Kawabata weaves a deft story, this one of tradition and change on the eve of the WWII. While the focal point of the story is the chronicling of the Go match between the reigning Master and his would be heir to the title, the between session jockeying is a subtle study in personality and generational attitudes. It is hard not to sympathize both with the old guard and the new. One night about three-fourths of the the way through the book I was too sleepy to continue with the chapter I was reading. Unfortunately for me, I left off right before an important play was made. That night I dreamed of Go. I'd wake up and try to return to sleep, but again I dreamed of the game and the play that Otake might make. I woke up and finished the chapter. Obviously my only defensive strategy if I wanted to not be hounded by Go in my dreams. Show Less
LibraryThing member antiquary
This is generally considered Kawabata's masterpiece, but personally I do not like it as well as some of his other works. One merit is that it is not as kinky as House of Sleeping Beauties or The Lake.
LibraryThing member ExplodingSuns
Though I didn't (and still, to be honest, don't) know much about the game, "The Master of Go" was a book I couldn't put down--it was beautifully written. The book at times seemed to be mourning a past age while faithfully detailing all of it's problems--the Master's quirks, his illnesses, his
A great book that ultimately seemed a fitting requiem for an bygone era of nobility.
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temperament--but the discussion of the game was never bogged down by any of this. As the narrator admits, the story is about the players, not about the game, and this enables this discussion to remains technical, slightly unapproachable, and yet enjoyable.A great book that ultimately seemed a fitting requiem for an bygone era of nobility.
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LibraryThing member nandadevi
Having played Go (badly) for many years I can observe that, yes, some knowledge of the game is useful before you begin this book, or perhaps it's something you might pick up as you go along. But you will need to consult one of many fine guides (or the internet) for instructions on how Go is played,
In 1951 when this book was first published these themes of old and new Japan, and the culture of Go would have all been familiar conversation points in Japan. In that sense this book was then as contemporary and central to popular culture as baseball, basketball or tennis might seem to us today. With the passage of time, and translated out of it's original language and context this story might strike the modern reader as far more obscure and exotic than it's original audience perceived it or its author intended. Kawabata described this as his favourite work, and it is perhaps it held this place in his regard not because of it's obscurity, but because of its directness, in the moves of the game it is the essential story of thought and action. There's the same fascination in much of the work of Hemingway, and a great many others who have chose sports as their theme.
This would make a great pair with any of the books detailing the story of Boris Spassky's and Bobby Fischer's battle for the World Chess Championship in 1972. Recommended, but with the caveat that you don't read too much into it. Sometimes a story is just a story.
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because while 'The Master of Go' will tell you about the soul of the game, it won't teach you the rules. The story is very simple, the new challenging and overcoming the old. Or perhaps it is more a case of the 'old' losing its grip and stumbling, while a less worthy successor takes its place. Or perhaps it's a commentary on how we mythologise the past and the present. Kawabata takes the reader into the story, peeling back the layers, a writer writing about a journalist writing about a board game, gradually becoming part of the story he is writing about. And at the very core, exposed in a way that a person's soul could never be, the moves of the game are laid out, one stone at a time.In 1951 when this book was first published these themes of old and new Japan, and the culture of Go would have all been familiar conversation points in Japan. In that sense this book was then as contemporary and central to popular culture as baseball, basketball or tennis might seem to us today. With the passage of time, and translated out of it's original language and context this story might strike the modern reader as far more obscure and exotic than it's original audience perceived it or its author intended. Kawabata described this as his favourite work, and it is perhaps it held this place in his regard not because of it's obscurity, but because of its directness, in the moves of the game it is the essential story of thought and action. There's the same fascination in much of the work of Hemingway, and a great many others who have chose sports as their theme.
This would make a great pair with any of the books detailing the story of Boris Spassky's and Bobby Fischer's battle for the World Chess Championship in 1972. Recommended, but with the caveat that you don't read too much into it. Sometimes a story is just a story.
Show Less
LibraryThing member dazzyj
A gripping and elegaic psychological drama.
LibraryThing member BayardUS
I read this and Stefan Zweig's Chess Story back-to-back, and was very happy that I did. Both deal with the psychological effects of obsessing over complex boardgames, and explore a central character whose life has been consumed by such obsession. Despite the fact that Chess Story takes a fictional
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approach, while Kawabata's book is based on an actual person, there were many parallels between the two works, and each highlighted aspects of the other that otherwise I might have missed. While both books on their own are probably only worth three stars, the resonance created by reading them one after the other magnified my enjoyment so much that I'm giving both four stars. Show Less
LibraryThing member buffalopoet
Beautiful. As much as the game Go, and the match that takes place over 6 months, are the driving forces behind the novel, it has little to do with 'teaching' the reader about Go. I finished with a spotty, vague understanding of the game - but with a clear picture of a critical time in Japan, and
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old-guard-to-new tipping point. A quiet, beautiful elegy not to an age as much as to those who belonged in that age and wouldn't come around again in the next. It was the perfect book for me to read over a few days that had quiet time built in: a business trip in my case, with a couple hours in a hotel room each night where I could count on not being interrupted. Show Less
LibraryThing member dbsovereign
A journey into a national psychology, this book is an exploration of how Japan is changing. A game, but a haunting one.
LibraryThing member robinmusubi
A style like a glass of fresh water, highly refreshing to me between reading more complicated books
LibraryThing member kakadoo202
While beautifully written, you really should know about the game GO to really appreciate this book about one match.
LibraryThing member bell7
First published in Japan in 1951 and translated into English in 1972, Kawabata's story slightly fictionalizes a real game of Go, played in 1938 by a Master of the game and a younger challenger.
The story begins with the Master's death about a year after the match, and then plays with time a little
The story begins with the Master's death about a year after the match, and then plays with time a little
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as we go back and forth, slowly revealing the events of the match. Kawabata himself had reported the real-life match for the newspapers, much like his narrator-reporter named Uragami in the text. The tension ratchets up throughout the match, and Go itself becomes not just a game but a stand-in for the old and the new guard in Japanese society, all the more elegiac for knowing that the Master died, and that Japan had lost in World War 2. I'm sure some of the nuances of both the game (which I knew nothing about before opening this book) and society were lost on me, but it was an absorbing read all the same. Show Less
LibraryThing member AQsReviews
Really, I want to give this 3.5. It is one of Kawabata's best works, but it probably isn't the one we readers like the best. This is even more spare and subtle than Kawabata's other work and it takes reading it at the "right time, in the headspace" to really appreciate it. And I think, as time goes
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on, it will be more and more difficult for readers to connect with and/or comprehend this novel (and the historical 1938 game). Show Less
Language
Original language
Japanese
Original publication date
1942-1954 (original Japanese)
1954
1972 (English)
Physical description
186 p.; 6.8 inches
ISBN
0425026450 / 9780425026458