Andrew Miller chooses for his novels a variety of historical situations to frame common themes. So too here. It is 1940, Japan is stepping up the War, soon to spread to Singapore and across the Pacific. The principal character is a young man, Yuji Takano, an aspiring poet as indicated in the title. In part it is a love story, in part a bildungsroman. I enjoyed the novel although readers might feel a sense of incompletion – the story finishes in late 1941 before…well before everything that was to turn the world upside down.
Yuji himself lacks heroic qualities when we meet him. He is a disappointment to his father, less than loyal to his friends and generally selfish. He is a reluctant citizen, enamoured of French culture, film and the work of Rimbaud. He does not wish to join the army. We understand he is in his twenties but behaves like a schoolboy. His growth and development is the subject of the story. Forced by circumstance and accident, the example of others who are better and, in time, his own moral sense, he comes to find a destiny. I grew to sympathise with him and like him – in the end he acknowledges his mistakes and takes responsibility.
Other characters are more engaging from the start, particularly Alissa, a French girl who loves Japanese culture and provides a counterpoint to Yuji in her honesty and maturity. At the more unpleasant end of the spectrum is Saburo, neighbour and bully. The two are contrasted by both having a disability but responding to it very differently.
Contemporary Japanese life is detailed to provide context and colour. I have no reason to doubt its accuracy, though the author mixes up the true and the invented, poets and film-makers historical and imagined. That said, the story is really a universal tale. All war poses challenges to the young and idealistic.
Some of the writing is really good. Miller catches quirky characters and settings in the fashion of Dickens - a visit to a slum alley could have come from Little Dorrit. I never felt his narrative to be implausible or his characters to act improbably. It all made sense. But I wanted to know what happened next – perhaps that is a strength not a weakness.
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gerardpeter
Enigmatic Title Traditional Themes
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