Book Review: Four Seasons in Japan by Nick Bradley

Four Seasons in Japan by Nick Bradley
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

"There will be plenty of times for celebration in your life...but you haven't earned the right to celebrate. Not yet."

Can a British author write a convincing J-Lit novel, with the flavor and profundity its genre is known for? Nick Bradley's FOUR SEASONS IN JAPAN answers a resounding YES, with its keen observations of Japanese culture and the author's love and respect for the Japanese shining through. Perhaps this is the appeal of a gaijin, for who better to write of a culture than one who observes it from the outside, and yet knows the language and its literary traditions well enough to work as a translator?

It's a novel within a novel, and works so well as both stories blend and merge: a tribute to how life on the page and reality so often coincide as they feed off of each other.

An American translator, in the midst of both a professional and personal slump, finds a mysterious book left behind on the train. This is our frame narrative.

The charming heart of the book is the Japanese novel, with a lost Tokyo pre-college student learning about life when he comes to live with his grandmother in his late father's hometown. (The novel made me want to visit Onomichi someday!)

The story seems simple enough, but the delight comes in the clash between generations, the passing on of knowledge paid for with a terrible price, and the overcoming of personal tragedy.

Bradley's novel is a reflection on life's seasons, and a beautiful literary tribute to Japan's authors and way of life.

It begins with a poem by Miyazawa Kenji, which is now one of my new favorites. May the books we read enable us all to keep smiling through life, "without losing to the rain, without losing to the wind."

~ ~ ~
WITHOUT LOSING TO THE RAIN by Miyazawa Kenji

Without losing to the rain
Without losing to the wind
Neither beaten by snow
nor summer's heat
Keep a strong body
absent of desire
Neither angry nor resentful
always smiling calmly
Four cups of brown rice
miso and a few vegetables each day
Observe all things
impartially and selflessly
Look, listen, understand deeply
never forget lessons learnt
Dwell in a humble thatched house
in the shade of forest pines
To the east if there is a sick child
go nurse them to health
To the west a weary mother
go help her harvest rice
To the south a person dying
go tell them there's no need to fear
To the north a fight or squabble
go tell them to make peace
In the time of drought shed tears
wander at a loss in cold summer
Called a nobody by all
without praise or being noticed
That's the kind of person
I wish to be

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