Scelta di romanzi del ‘900 con uno sconfinamento nella narrativa contemporanea, rispettando un criterio cronologico. Escludendo volutamente autori arcinoti come Banana Yoshimoto e Haruki Murakami, Yukio Mishima, Kenzaburo Oe, che meriterebbero bibliografie a sé stanti.
Letteratura che alterna temi classici (l’amore in tutte le sue sfaccettature, la natura e la storia) all’impegno sociale e allo studio dell’io.
• VITA SEGRETA DEL SIGNORE BUSHU
Junichiro Tanizaki, Bompiani 2010 (edizione più recente), traduzione dal giapponese di Atsuko Ricca Suga, pagine 145, euro 8,50
Il Giappone del ‘500, percosso da battaglie e lotte intestine, eserciti, assedi, castelli and samurai on one side and erotic fantasies of the protagonist, the first guy and then an adult, on the other. Recurring themes in the fiction of the last century (the novel is 1924), described with elegance and intensity.
• The Love of a fool
Junichiro Tanizaki, Bompiani 2010 (latest edition), translated from Japanese by Carlo De Dominicis, 262 pages, € 9.00, introduction of Alberto Moravia.
A contemporary Japan (written in 1925), where in addition to the description environment, meet other two subjects dear to Tanizaki narrative: the disappearance of traditions and the approach to the idea of \u200b\u200bthe West experienced as something higher. All through a story of love and sex, in which the characters' psychology supports a sociological analysis.
• THE SUN GOES
Osamu Dazai, Feltrinelli 1959 (first Italian edition), translation by American Bianciardi Luciano, 139 pages, € 7.50
Coming from a family of wealthy landowners, Dazai is one of the most representative and troubled writers from the first half of the 900.
In this short novel, published in 1947, returns to the theme already proposed by Tanizaki the clash between tradition and changing times, very pronounced dall'irrompere the Second World War: The aristocratic world that degenerates in the new industrial civilization, disillusionment in the face of a radical change that actually does not occur (and Daza, who committed suicide in 1948, will not see), the anxiety and the feeling of personal inadequacy give structure to the work. •
the suspended
Osamu Dazai, Feltrinelli 1962 (first Italian edition), translated by Marcella Bonsanti the American version, 150 pages, € 7.50
Here is even more striking than the previous novel, although it's only been a year between The two publications, the sense of loss, inadequacy of the individual, and in particular of many postwar Japanese writers: self-exclusion and exclusion from society, that ravaged the protagonist. Interesting gimmick Dazai to close the novel, which you can define existentialism, moving the narrative view outside of the character.
• Snow Country Yasunari Kawabata
, Einaudi 2002, translated by Luca Lamberti version in English, 145 pages, € 9.50
A small masterpiece of Japanese literature, written in 1947, describes a magical world, the sounds muffled and colors. In the theater of a spa resort, the tradition of the geisha and the game of love, of passion and fleeting fantasies.
• shotgun
Inoue Yasushi, 2004 Adelphi, translated from the English version of George Amitrano, 101 pages, € 9.00
Pubblicato nel 1949, è l’opera forse migliore di Yasushi, la più breve ma quella tecnicamente perfetta. Il tema centrale è quello delle relazioni sentimentali, che si mantengono in equilibrio armonico dalla prima all’ultima pagina, in una costante tensione che non altera tuttavia la tranquillità della vita dei quattro personaggi, un uomo e tre donne, coinvolti nel gioco amoroso.
• QUARTIERI LONTANI
Jiro Taniguchi, Coconino 2010, traduzione di Maria Chiara Migliore, pagine 411, euro 19,50.
Quella di Taniguchi è narrativa disegnata: Taniguchi è un autore di fumetti e attraverso il disegno racconta storie dei generi più vari (fantascienza, sport, western, storico). Spesso is also the author of the texts, as in the case of remote districts in which he describes the transition from adolescence to adulthood of the protagonist, who is catapulted into the past. Moving away from tradition
Japan to approach that of Europe, seems Taniguchi join the two ends of the world, such as technical content as the psychology of the characters.
