I love that name - Banana Yoshimoto. It makes me always wonder what the author may be like. What stories would she write? I didn't pick up the most famous of Banana Yoshimoto's books - Kitchen - as my foray into one of Japan's most famous writers but instead drew the quixotically name N.P. What is N.P.? Well, it is after an old song called "North Point." It is also the title of a short story by a noted Japanese writer Sarao Takase. This is all from the book, not what I am researching! And, incidentally, Banana Yoshimoto is just her pen name - her real name is Yoshimoto Mahoko.
Takase commits suicide shortly after writing this book and from the beginning of N.P., we are led into an atmosphere of sad melancholy (can melancholy be anything but sad, you may well ask? But melancholy of the deepest sort may be well be called so, don't you agree?). It is at a party with her boyfriend Shouji that the narrator, Kazami, meets Takase's twin children - Otohiko and Saki. Shouji is attempting a Japanese translation of Takase's short story, N.P., and Otohiko and Saki are his friends, helping in that endeavor. Fast forward a few years later - Shouji has committed suicide, and Kazami, a translator herself, meets Otohiko by chance. That leads on to Saki, and finally to the most troubled, disturbing character in the book - Sui. Now, it gets interesting. Sui is the daughter of Takase - her mother was one of the prostitutes who used to service him. And Sui was also Takase's lover. The knowledge that they were father and daughter perhaps prompted the writer to kill himself. But Sui is now also Otohiko - her step-brother's current girlfriend. They love each other - but is love enough if it has to cross society's strict boundaries of incest?
Into this web of passion, intrigue, drama and love is Kazami thrust into for a summer. She becomes friends with Saki but is irrepressibly drawn to Sui. You get the feeling as the novel progresses that they are all heading towards a doomsday type of disaster. There is no happiness for anyone here. No redemption, or so you feel, till the end when the novel allows in a faint glimpse of hope and laughter at this crazy ball called life we roll on. Yoshimoto herself says that in this novel she tried to present themes ranging from "lesbianism, love within the family, telepathy and empathy, the occult, religion, and so on." I would add "eccentric characters" to Banana's own description. None of the characters here are 'normal' as we define that term by. But that is precisely what made this novel engaging to me. Cast into a slithering mass of emotions, the reader only emerges a bit breathless in the end. Yet, happy really that " everything that had happened was shockingly beautiful, enough to make you crazy." I would not recommend this book for everyone. You need to be slightly crazed yourself to move through it, I feel. But I? I liked it well enough as it mows through the filth of human hypocrisy.
My favorite quote:
Sometimes the presence of a third person smooths everything out, and gives you the illusion that everything is as it should be.
And that is something I have felt often.
Verdict : Challenging Read.
Rating : 4/5
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