Edward G. Seidensticker Boeken

Go is a game of strategy in which two players attempt to surround each other's black or white stones. Simple in its fundamentals, infinitely complex in its execution, Go is an essential expression of the Japanese spirit. And in his fictional chronicle of a match played between a revered and heretofore invincible Master and a younger and more modern challenger, Yasunari Kawabata captured the moment in which the immutable traditions of imperial Japan met the onslaught of the twentieth century.

Duizend kraanvogels (1951) - een begrip dat in Japan tot symbool van geluk en zuiverheid is geworden - is een liefdesroman waarin twee families verwikkeld zijn: de vader en de zoon van de ene en de moeder en de dochter van de andere. Als een boze, onreine geest spookt de schuld om de geliefden, die gestalte lijkt te hebben gekregen in de verzuurde lerares van de theeceremonie.

This memoir is by a translator who has introduced two generations of English-language audiences to the masterpieces of classical and modern Japanese literature. His patient rendering of novels ranging from the 11th-century Tale of Genji to works of such modern masters as Junichiro Tanizaki, Yukio Mishima and Nobel-Prize winner Yasunari Kawabata has earned him the National Book Award as well as the Order of the Rising Sun, Japan's highest honour for foreigners.