Å·±¦ÓéÀÖ

A small gem of a book

The story starts Virginia Woolf stream of conscious like in narration while the dialogue is Japanese, in the way how the hosts, especially Gabriel in his speech, bring themselves down before accepting compliments. The part scene at the start of the book also made me think of the opening of Leo Tolstoy’s War and Peace, with a host of people (and names) who did not readily materialize all that much for my minds eye, because you are just dropped into their lives, making them feel very real. I liked how hospitality, humor and humanity is attributed by the narrator to the “old� generation, while the “new� generation is very developed but stern, mirroring generational tensions and platitudes we see and hear now as well. The time and age in general, with on the one hand carriages on the street and on the other girls in university and electricity in hotels, is nicely captured.

The second part of the story, when the guests go home, is truely gripping and made this story powerful. Gabriel reflects on the depth of the relationship with his wife (and rapidly cycles through lust, irritation, tenderness, indifference and jealousy) in a deeply realistic manner. His wife really suprises him, and me as reader, with a very sad story about the Dead of the title, touching on the nature of love and memory.