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The Makioka Sisters (Vintage Classics Japanese Series)

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( 11,413 ratings, 1,427 reviews)
Book Hero Magic crafted this summary to help describe this book. While it's new and still learning, it may not be perfect - your feedback is welcome! Summary
The Makioka Sisters, set in pre-war Japan, follows the lives of the four Makioka sisters as they navigate societal expectations and personal aspirations. The story delves into themes of tradition, family honour, and change, providing an intimate look at the family dynamics and cultural shifts during a transformative period. Through vivid characterisation, it portrays the sisters' struggles to balance their desires with the demands of familial duty.
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Book Hero Magic created this recommendation. While it's new and still learning, it may not be perfect - your feedback is welcome! IS THIS YOUR NEXT READ?

This book may appeal to you if you enjoy exploring the complexities of family dynamics and societal change through the lens of pre-war Japan. It offers an evocative portrayal of tradition versus modernity, all set against a backdrop of elegant prose and meticulous detail. If you appreciate richly developed characters and a nuanced portrayal of cultural tensions, this classic narrative could be a delightful addition to your collection.

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Book Hero Magic formatted this description to make it easier to read. While it's new and still learning, it may not be perfect - your feedback is welcome! Description

The Makioka Sisters is part of the Vintage Japanese Classics series, which follows the success of Vintage Russian Classics and European Classics. These editions feature the best Japanese writers on the Vintage list.

'An exquisite novel about four sisters living through a turbulent decade...I'd put it in the 10 greatest books of the 20th century' β€” David Mitchell

'A near-perfect novel' β€” Hanya Yanagihara

In the years leading up to the Second World War, four sisters live in dilapidated houses in Osaka and Ashiya, each navigating their own complex, personal relationship to the fading lustre of the Makioka family name. Rich with breathtaking descriptions of ancient customs and an ever-changing natural world, Junichiro Tanizaki evokes in loving detail a long-lost way of life, even as it withers under the harsh glare of modernity.

Translated by Edward Seidensticker.

The Vintage Japanese Classics series features five masterpieces of Japanese fiction in gorgeous new gift editions.

Series: Vintage Classic Japanese Series

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  • The Makioka Sisters (Vintage Classics Japanese Series)
    The Makioka Sisters is part of the Vintage Japanese Classics series, which follows the success of Vintage Russian Classics and European Classics. These editions feature the best Japanese writers on the Vintage list. 'An exquisite novel about four sisters living through a turbulent decade...I'd put it in the 10 greatest books of the 20th century' β€” David Mitchell 'A near-perfect...
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Book Hero Magic summarised reviews for this book. While it's new and still learning, it may not be perfect - your feedback is welcome! HOW HAS THIS BEEN REVIEWED?

The Makioka Sisters by Junichiro Tanizaki is celebrated for its exquisite craftsmanship, capturing the life of four sisters during the turbulent 1940s and 1950s. Critics have lauded it as a near-perfect novel, with its complex, detailed narrative offering both nostalgia and an objective look at its themes. The book is described as subtle, moving, and richly textured, blending the exotic and mundane in an absorbing story.

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Book Details

INFORMATION

ISBN: 9781784875435

Publisher: Vintage Publishing

Format: Paperback / softback

Date Published: 03 October 2019

Country: United Kingdom

Imprint: Vintage Classics

Audience: General / adult

DIMENSIONS

Spine width: 42.0mm

Width: 134.0mm

Height: 189.0mm

Weight: 500g

Pages: 576

About the Author

Junichiro Tanizaki was one of Japan's greatest twentienth century novelists. Born in 1886 in Tokyo, his first published work - a one-act play - appeared in 1910 in a literary magazine he helped to found. Tanizaki lived in the cosmopolitan Tokyo area until the earthquake of 1923, when he moved to the Kyoto-Osaka region and became absorbed in Japan's past. All his most important works were written after 1923, among them Some Prefer Nettles (1929), The Secret History of the Lord of Musashi (1935), several modern versions of The Tale of Genji (1941, 1954 and 1965), The Makioka Sisters, The Key (1956) and Diary of a Mad Old Man (1961). He was awarded an Imperial Award for Cultural Merit in 1949 and in 1965 he was elected an honorary member of the American Academy and the National Institute of Arts and Letters, the first Japanese writer to receive this honour. Tanizaki died later that same year.

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