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A review by thisamtheplace
Dandelions by Yasunari Kawabata
2.0
2.5
'That's what's been scaring me lately - the notion that something exists, but you can't see it'
Pleased to announce I am still on the disappointing books train & I love it for me !
I typically love Japanese lit and I hadn't read from Kawabata before but was enticed by the synopsis - Ineko has developed a mental illness where she is unable to see things, starting with a golf ball and escalating to her fiancé's entire body. Her mother and fiancé place her in a psychiatric clinic and contemplate what her illness means and if it is an expression of her love.
I was surprised to find that this novel spans just one day of dialogue between her mother and fiancé after they have left her at the clinic and discuss whether this was the best way to help her recover and try come to terms with their loss of Ineko. I was also quite disappointed that we did not get any of Ineko's direct experience of her illness and how she rationalised what was happening to her. I really wanted a gut punch of how love can drive us 'mad' or some kind of hopelessly romantic story…
Overall I did enjoy many of the themes Kawabata explores - the way in which we prove we are alive by our relationship to and impact on other people; the things we remember when people are lost to us; and the idea that despite progress in language and medicine there are still so many things that are unfathomable about the human condition.
I also did like this taste of Kawabata's very quiet writing style with absurdist elements as the fiancé and mother begin to rationalise things in a 'magical' way and perceive things that are possibly not there.
I think my main problem was the disjointedness of the 'plot' and abrupt ending (as well as not getting my fix of hopeless romanticism!), but I think this can at least in part be accounted for in the fact that this was Kawabata's final novel, which I believe went unfinished.
All in all I would like to try another piece of Kawabata's writing - perhaps Snow Country? I am hoping that his surrealist and unnerving atmosphere and exploration of memory, loss and loneliness carries over into his other works.
'That's what's been scaring me lately - the notion that something exists, but you can't see it'
Pleased to announce I am still on the disappointing books train & I love it for me !
I typically love Japanese lit and I hadn't read from Kawabata before but was enticed by the synopsis - Ineko has developed a mental illness where she is unable to see things, starting with a golf ball and escalating to her fiancé's entire body. Her mother and fiancé place her in a psychiatric clinic and contemplate what her illness means and if it is an expression of her love.
I was surprised to find that this novel spans just one day of dialogue between her mother and fiancé after they have left her at the clinic and discuss whether this was the best way to help her recover and try come to terms with their loss of Ineko. I was also quite disappointed that we did not get any of Ineko's direct experience of her illness and how she rationalised what was happening to her. I really wanted a gut punch of how love can drive us 'mad' or some kind of hopelessly romantic story…
Overall I did enjoy many of the themes Kawabata explores - the way in which we prove we are alive by our relationship to and impact on other people; the things we remember when people are lost to us; and the idea that despite progress in language and medicine there are still so many things that are unfathomable about the human condition.
I also did like this taste of Kawabata's very quiet writing style with absurdist elements as the fiancé and mother begin to rationalise things in a 'magical' way and perceive things that are possibly not there.
I think my main problem was the disjointedness of the 'plot' and abrupt ending (as well as not getting my fix of hopeless romanticism!), but I think this can at least in part be accounted for in the fact that this was Kawabata's final novel, which I believe went unfinished.
All in all I would like to try another piece of Kawabata's writing - perhaps Snow Country? I am hoping that his surrealist and unnerving atmosphere and exploration of memory, loss and loneliness carries over into his other works.