Why one should not read

'It’s very bad to read books. The plain truth is that there is probably no greater obstacle to enlightenment than reading. Even those of us who have made a little progress read books like the Hekigan-shu without understanding much. When we get beyond the level of our experience we are completely at sea. Should one get the habit of putting his own subjective interpretations on the passages he does not understand, he will be handicapped considerably when he sits in zazen. He will not be satisfied with the stage he is at but will anticipate the next and wait impatiently for satori to come. The result is that for want of proper application at his present level, his way becomes obstructed. Reading can thus be a real poison. So I advise you not to attempt it….'
– Natsume Sōseki, Mon

Halfway through Mon (Natsume Sōseki)

I'm halfway through Natsume Sōseki's novel Mon (The Gate), translated from Japanese by Francis Mathy. I left it hanging last year, having been distracted by other books. It's not that this book did not interest me; on the contrary, if it proceeds as beautifully as it started, it is bound to become one of my favorite reads this year. The book is slow and meditative, and I do not regret leaving it midway. The prospect of dipping into it again is enough assurance for me that beauty is not lost and I can always go back and continue my journey to Sōseki's inner landscapes. And now, I'm planning to pick it up again. So I have to consult my notes and review what transpired in my previous reading. Reading my notes allows me to channel back to the Sōsekian universe wherein characters walk and talk as if stricken by their mere existences, their hearts and minds contemplating the deafening silences.

Spoilers? Certainly. Contemplation of past events will spoil our present and future, but they are only spoilers up to the middle of the book.

Characters of the novel (up to Chapter X): Like Sōseki's other book Kokoro, Mon contains only a handful characters.

Sosuke – husband

Oyone – wife

Koroku – Sosuke’s brother

Mr Saeki – uncle

Mrs Saeki – aunt

Yasunosuke (Yasu) – son of the Saekis

Kiyo – servant/helper

Sakai – landlord

antique dealer

Plot synopsis of each chapter:

Chapter I: Sosuke hesitating to post a letter to her Aunt Saeki.

Chapter II: Letter posted. Sosuke’s half-day off on a Sunday was spent leisurely walking about Tokyo. He did not buy anything, for him or for his wife. A man who lost his interest in material things, a man who lost his drive for living? He went home in time for dinner.

Chapter III: The two brothers Sosuke and Koroku going on a public bath; evening meal; talk of politics (Ito Hirobumi being assassinated)

Chapter IV: Reply was given by aunt; flashback to the younger days of the two brothers and family situation; death of their father; Sosuke’s entrusting their late father’s estate to their uncle, Saeki; the struggles of the couple (Sosuke and Oyone) while living in two cities, Hiroshima and Fukuoka, before finally transferring to Tokyo with the help of Sosuke’s friend. The issue of the estate’s proceeds had still not been brought up with Sosuke’s uncle, even until the uncle’s death; the issue brought only to the surface when the aunt decided to stop paying for the education of Koroku. With the death of the uncle, the Saekis were now in dire straits as their son, Yasunosuke, also needed financial help for his work and for his marriage. Sosuke and Oyone’s plan to shoulder partly Koroku’s future (his board and lodging) and to propose to the Saekis that they shoulder another part (Koroku’s expenses) was written down in a letter by Sosuke and finally sent to the aunt after much dithering. Aunt’s reply: to wait for Yasunosuke who was in Kobe at the time the letter arrived.

This chapter is the most revealing so far in presenting the character of Sosuke in times of conflict. It also highlights the major conflict in the novel. Sosuke's stoicism is evident in that he takes everything inside him, even after his trust has been betrayed by his relatives. Outwardly, he did not feel wronged; inwardly he must be imploding from injustice done to him by his relatives.

Chapter V: Aunt finally visited while Sosuke went for a dental checkup of a clamped tooth, which was a fitting metaphor for his lack of resolve. Like what the dentist said to him: “I’m afraid that if it [the tooth] gives like this, it’ll be impossible to make it as firm again as it was before. The core seems to be dead…. Necrosis has set in…. It’s as if the core of the tooth were rotten.”

Aunt’s reply was that she and Yasu cannot shoulder part of Koroku’s college education. Before bedtime, Sosuke read Confucius’ Analects.

Chapter VI: Koroku was invited to the house but he dithered. The future inconvenience of having Koroku live with them was also felt by the couple. Oyone feeling somewhat ill. Long hard days of rain. Oyone and Sosuke debated on whether to sell the folding screen painted by Hoitsu, an heirloom from Sosuke’s father which was the only remaining unsold (unsquandered) property given back by Aunt Saeki.

Bargaining with the second-hand dealer for the folding screen. After four visits from the dealer, the price offered went up from seven yen to thirty-five yen. The couple then decided to sell the heirloom.

Chapter VII: Cold winter set in. Description of neighbors and landlord. Thief in the night woke up Oyone. The thief apparently carried the mailbox and the gold watch of their neighbor and landlord Sakai. The mailbox was dumped in Sosuke’s yard while the thief escaped. In the morning, Sosuke brought the mailbox to Sakai’s house. They had a conversation. Sosuke returned home and while talking with his wife, reflected on the life of his wealthy landlord. He assumed that Sakai took things easy because of his wealth.

Chapter VIII: Koroku finally moved to his brother’s house. Impelled by his cousin Yasunosuke’s promise of help, he filed a temporary leave of absence in school. In this chapter we find him helping Oyone set up the shoji (a sort of sliding window made of paper). The awkwardness between the two is heightened by the cold weather which affected Sosuke’s labor and by Oyone’s headache which prohibited her from communicating well. Koroku's curtness was due to the coldness he felt from the weather, but Oyone mistakenly thought it was due to her brother-in-law's contempt for her. During lunch they sat facing each other, which all the more made Oyone uncomfortable. In the afternoon, they continued their wallpapering.

Chapter IX: Sosuke became close friends with Sakai. Accidentally meeting Sakai in the antique dealer shop. Suspecting that the wallpaper sold to Sakai was the same one bought by the dealer from him. Later he called on Sakai’s house. Envying Sakai’s many children. Learning that the folding wallpaper Sakai bought from the dealer (for 80 yen!) was the one he sold earlier.

Chapter X: Koroku started drinking. His friends start to loathe him. He started to get along with Oyone. He began to suspect that Yasunosuke (whose planned wedding was postponed) couldn’t really assist him in his studies.


*****


The first half of the novel already brings into focus the complex character of Sosuke. One is surprised at the passivity with which he accepted his aunt’s explanation of the way her husband squandered Sosuke’s family properties.

Sosuke goes through the motions of life as if he is only alive in body, but dead in spirit, not unlike Sensei’s enigmatic attitude in Kokoro. Is his indifference absolute or feigned? At the surface of the pond it is calm and uneventful, and below it is raging tsunamis?

What is lacking? What drives Sosuke to complacency? To a deadened existence? Almost like a zombie.

Disappointments eat at his soul, gnawing his innards, and leaving him without reason to expect anything from his life. What is the cause of his disappointment? Living a hard married life? His lack of children? His inability to support his brother's studies? Modernity? Living in the city? Life in suburbia? The curse to live in the routine of day to day? The lack of riches? Maybe all of these.

As with Kokoro, the conflict is introduced by immediate relatives who are entrusted with the family fortunes. They are supposed to take care of the orphan brothers, but instead they squandered the inheritance. Money, as always, is the corrupting factor that strains family relationships.

Trekking the apocalyptic path

The better part of January has elapsed yet it's never too late to draft a reading plan. The trek is never too steep when it comes to the written word. Writing lists is always a favorite activity, and when I review the end result, I will say, that looks fine. Months and years will pass, and I will say, I can't believe I even bothered. I've made a list of authors and titles for this, my Reading Plan. I'd rather call it that than "Reading Challenge." I feel it will intrude too much on my freedom to choose books from my pile if I rigidly constrain myself to specifics. In short, I shall deviate from the plan from time to time and pick out books from the pile based on a very definite criterion called "whim."

My wishful reading for the year includes the following books. They're mostly fiction in translation (from Japanese and Spanish) and some nonfiction science books.

1. Unfinished books from last year (includes Nineteen Eighty-Four; On the Road; War and Peace)

2. Rereads of a couple of books by Roberto Bolaño (includes 2666, Nazi Literature in the Americas, Distant Star).

3. The Murakami Q Reading Plan: The first 9 books by Murakami Haruki, in chronological order of their Japanese publication. The final book in this reading plan is The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, a book I encountered before in hostile terms. I’m now into the 4th book, Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World. Six books more to go. (Actually seven; I might just read the two translations of Norwegian Wood side by side.)

4. The Murakami's Choice Q Reading Plan: More Japanese writers, mainly those Murakami identified as the modern period's "top ten Japanese writers of national stature." He made the list in his introduction to the Akutagawa collection Rashōmon and Seventeen Other Stories. For my reading plan, that means at least a book each by Soseki (Murakami's top writer), Ogai, Shiga, Tanizaki, Kawabata, Dazai, and Mishima. Seven writers. I don't have anything to read by Shimazaki Toson and Akutagawa. That's nine. Murakami came up only with 9 writers for his Top Ten, and the latter two (Dazai and Mishima) I think he included somewhat grudgingly. There are some obvious omissions. If I can, I will also try to squeeze in works by Kobo Abe, Shusaku Endo, Fumiko Enchi, and Kenzaburo Oe. And of course this excursion is not complete without the Other Murakami. I'll be thumbing through Ryu's 69. Reading Plan #3 and #4 will be my Japanese Express theme for this year. I'm perfectly sure it will carry over to 2011.

5. Some thick books that excite me just by looking at them! I'll be a servant for some time to Cervantes's Don Quixote, in the translation by John Rutherford. I specifically bought this as it's the one preferred by Margaret Jull Costa (the brilliant renderer of José Saramago and Javier Marías) over Edith Grossman's translation. I just read that Burton Raffel's version is okay too. Says The Millions: "[Raffel] has made a business of bringing overlooked 'great books' [including Don Quixote] back to life by recasting them in a contemporary American idiom." But I'm totally buying (and have already bought the book) the recommendation by Margaret Jull Costa: "If you don't know Spanish and have never read Don Quixote or are thinking of reading it again, then this is the English translation I would recommend, recreating as it does the novel's vibrant (and, to the modern sensibility, sometimes cruel) humour, and doing equal honour to its pathos.")

For thick books, I might also finally start Rebellion in the Backlands by Euclides da Cunha (trans. Samuel Putnam. There's an upcoming translation, Backlands: The Canudos Campaign, but I think the edition I have will do) and Life: A User's Manual by Georges Perec. My copy of Life is a beautiful edition but it's not the definitive version. Does it matter? Who knows. It does if I own the definitive version.

6. NYRB Reading Plan: At least 5 books published by New York Review of Books. I'd like to include here The Siege of Krishnapur by J. G. Farrell and Love in a Fallen City by Eileen Chang. Perhaps a Simenon and that book that was hard to read (it's pronounced as Mardu Gorgeous or something).

7. Books by Amélie Nothomb that I can lay my hands on. She's exquisite in Loving Sabotage.

8. Science books (The Structure of Scientific Revolutions by Thomas S. Kuhn; Guns, Germs and Steel by Jared Diamond; The Double Helix by James D. Watson; Gaia by James Lovelock). I've been pining for these books. It's now or ... later.

9. Essays (The Art of Fiction by David Lodge; Seven Nights by Borges, Camera Lucida by Roland Barthes; A Sense of Life by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry)

10. Anthologies of Latin American short stories (The Oxford Book of Latin American Short Stories) and novellas (Masterworks of Latin American Short Fiction)

11. Maybe I still have time for Boom writers (Blow-Up and Other Stories by Cortázar; The War of the End of the World by Vargas Llosa; Love in the Time of the Cholera). I realize I have two books now with "the end of the world" in their titles (see # 3). And cholera epidemic... I think I just found my theme for this year's reading plan.

The Year of Apocalyptic Reading.

Scratch that. It's not yet 2012.

If this is an ideal world, I'll finish some 60 books this year.

Pinball, 1973 bounces back

This morning when I checked my LibraryThing account, I was surprised to learn in a group discussion on Murakami Haruki's books that Pinball, 1973, Murakami’s most sought-after second novel published in 1980 (and the first to be published in English translation by Alfred Birnbaum in 1985), is finally available again. My surprise is partly due to the fact that I am already two-thirds into finishing this book, which is the second volume of The Trilogy of the Rat. I’m reading the widely available pdf in the web which I downloaded last year. Because Murakami considers his first two works of fiction as minor novels, he restricted the publication of these two books. He only authorized their publication in Japan. Back in 2007, the weblog The Millions linked to a pdf copy of Pinball for the benefit of Murakami fans.

The pdf languished on my TBR and I only got to start reading it a few days ago as part of my “Murakami Q Reading Challenge” which requires me to read the first nine (9) books of Murakami in English in the chronological order of their Japanese publication. (More on this challenge later). I’ve read Murakami’s first book Hear the Wind Sing before Christmas holidays, and so I’m onto Pinball now. Part of my reading plan this year includes a couple of Jap-fic which I started collecting less than a year ago.

The binding of the new edition of Pinball is once again the same format used by Kodansha English Library series – a pocket-sized paperback with the same cover art as the original that came out in ’85. The official release date is Christmas Day 2009. The reprints are currently available in Amazon Japan and ebay.com. (It's the 12th printing edition and hopefully the print run was large enough to accommodate the surge in demand.)

The book retails for about ¥819 at amazon.co.jp (shipping not yet included). It's just under $9.00 (around Php400). Outside Japan the shipping cost is expected to be high, but it beats the amazon.com price hands down. A copy of the early edition (1985 or so) at Amazon US is sold at a very prohibitive price of more than $500.

A cursory search of the web led me to two early blog announcements of the new printing. A comment in the second blog (Jan. 11) is particularly interesting as it noted that the price of the book in ebay has drastically decreased. The book can be had at around $20 in ebay. The latest reprinting brings the price of Pinball from a whopping 3 to 4-figure price (dollars) to a two-figure price.

True enough, “supply and demand” is in effect. Though the current Amazon US prices are still pegged at higher figures, we expect the influx of new editions to somehow lower them (even if they are collectible early copies). Through international sellers, the book can now reach a wider readership outside Japan.

How I wish publishers would do the same to more deserving out-of-print works which are long overdue in the presses. Case in point: The Devil to Pay in the Backlands.

Most favorite reads of 2009

Out of my favorite books last year, which ones will I most likely re-read? That is the question I put to myself in order to come up with the Top 10 favorite books of 2009. In alphabetical order:


1. 2666 by Roberto Bolaño (trans. Natasha Wimmer)
2. Fermat's Last Theorem by Simon Singh
3. How Fiction Works by James Wood
4. The Mystery Guest by Grégoire Bouillier (trans. Lorin Stein)
5. Noli Me Tangere by José Rizal (trans. Ma. Soledad Lacson-Locsin)
6. Rashōmon and Other Stories by Akutagawa Ryūnosuke (trans. Takashi Kojima)
7. The Rings of Saturn by W. G. Sebald (trans. Michael Hulse)
8. A Sand County Almanac by Aldo Leopold
9. Trese: Mass Murders by Budjette Tan & Kajo Baldisimo
10. Written Lives by Javier Marías (trans. Margaret Jull Costa)