Description
Book SynopsisFrom one of the foremost poets in contemporary Japan comes this entrancing memoir that traces a boy's childhood and its intersection with the rise of the Japanese empire and World War II. This is the first English translation of the work originally published in Japanese in 1970.
Trade Review"It is magnificent that in this book, Twelve Views from the Distance, the poet Mutsuo Takahashi has managed to achieve firm prose that, while unmistakably the work of a poet, shines with a black luster much like a set of drawers crafted by a master of old. This book is a magnificent collection of sensations and of memories, much like the toys we might find in a dark closet. The part toward the end in which the theme of his ‘search for a father’ crystallizes in a copy of an erotic book radiates a certain tragic beauty." —Yukio Mishima
Table of Contents
Contents
Note about Japanese Names
Chart of Family Members
Translator’s Introduction
Twelve Views from the Distance
The Snow of Memory
Grandma’s House
Tales of Long Ago
Spirited Away
On Mother’s Back
Heaven and Hell
The Various Types of Sea
Princes and Paupers
The Shore of Sexuality
Skies of Blood
Imagining Father
Communities outside the World
Afterword to the English Translation
Glossary
English Translations of Mutsuo Takahashi’s Writing
Translator’s Acknowledgments
