- Paperback: 224 pages
- Publisher: Univ of Michigan Center for (May 2003)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 192928022X
- ISBN-13: 978-1929280223
- Product Dimensions: 22.4 x 15.2 x 1.6 cm
- Shipping Weight: 322 g
- Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (1 customer review)
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Most helpful customer reviews
5.0 out of 5 stars
Essential reading,
By A Customer
This review is from: Song of Sadness (Paperback)
Anyone interested in post-war Japan, or in Endo's other books, will be fascinated by this translation of a novel never before available in English.The plot revolves around Suguro, a physician who is also at the center of Endo's earlier novel "The Sea and Poison." Suguro was forced by the circusmtance of war to participate in medical experiments on POWs during WW2 (that is the subject of "The Sea and Poison"). "Song of Sadness" revisits him thirty years later, when he is at work in a small clinic in Tokyo's Shinjuku district. An ambitious, self-righteous journalist seeks to expose him, under the pretense of writing a disinterested series of articles about aging war criminals. But that is only one element of a very complex plot, which interweaves four or five stories to make a kind of total portrait of life in Tokyo in the changing 1970s. The novel tackles a number of big questions having to do with medical ethics, war guilt, the possibility of forgiveness, but its touch is always deft and gentle, and there are real moments of humor in it that display Endo's wide range (from the tragic to the satirical to the comic). The translation is among the best ever done of Endo's work--vivid, nuanced, and smooth. In a word, this novel is simply essential reading.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta) Amazon.com:
5.0 out of 5 stars (1 customer review) 9 of 9 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
Essential reading,
By A Customer - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: Song of Sadness (Paperback)
Anyone interested in post-war Japan, or in Endo's other books, will be fascinated by this translation of a novel never before available in English.The plot revolves around Suguro, a physician who is also at the center of Endo's earlier novel "The Sea and Poison." Suguro was forced by the circusmtance of war to participate in medical experiments on POWs during WW2 (that is the subject of "The Sea and Poison"). "Song of Sadness" revisits him thirty years later, when he is at work in a small clinic in Tokyo's Shinjuku district. An ambitious, self-righteous journalist seeks to expose him, under the pretense of writing a disinterested series of articles about aging war criminals. But that is only one element of a very complex plot, which interweaves four or five stories to make a kind of total portrait of life in Tokyo in the changing 1970s. The novel tackles a number of big questions having to do with medical ethics, war guilt, the possibility of forgiveness, but its touch is always deft and gentle, and there are real moments of humor in it that display Endo's wide range (from the tragic to the satirical to the comic). The translation is among the best ever done of Endo's work--vivid, nuanced, and smooth. In a word, this novel is simply essential reading. |
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