Saturday: I completed The Doctor’s Wife

Sawako Ariyoshi’s The Doctor’s Wife was actually assigned novel in a Japanese film and fiction class that I took but I was never able to get around to finishing it until today. The book was enjoyable in that it was simply written whether that’s due to Ariyoshi’s writing or the way it was translated, either way it was a quick and smooth read. 

The narrative of The Doctor’s Wife consists of two intertwined parts. The first part, mostly factual, is over how Hanaoka Seishu was able to concoct an anesthetic and how he was the first to be successful in surgically removing a tumor caused by breast cancer. The second part, mostly fictional, revealed the rivalry between Otsugi, the mother-in-law, and Kae, the daughter-in-law.

Ariyoshi’s narrative consists of two themes. The first being how women sacrifice and vye for love while the second is how men, almost exclusively, benefit from these forms of devotion. In this narrative both Otsugi and Kae were vying for the love of the same man and both were determined to win that they both were willing to become test subjects and even die in order to prove their love and earnestness. While Otsugi never developed any disabilities, since she was given a weak sleeping potion, Kae, however, became blind due to the strong anesthetic. At the end of the novel when the tombstones of Otsugi, Kae, and Seishu are compared to one another, one is able to see who the beneficiary of the rivalry and the sacrifices. One can also see how these two women and how most women in the past and perhaps even in the present are compliant in taking a subservient and subordinate position.

Although my feministic viewpoints would have liked the book to have focused more on the latter theme rather than the former, the book, nevertheless, accomplished its wistful purpose of showing the role of women.

Sunday: Did a lot of shopping and watched a movie with Sydnee and Sam. 

The first thing that caught my attention about Lisa See’s Shanghai Girls was the beautiful cover. After admiring the cover and design, I evaluated the synopsis in order to determine if it would be worth the read. After reading the synopsis I decided that it would be since I had never heard of “beautiful girls” and because I have in interest in Asia’s involvement during the Second World War and Asia in general. These two reason encouraged me to read Shanghai Girls.

No only were “beautiful girls” and China’s involvement in WWII covered but other aspects were as well, many of which are considered universal. The two aspects that stood out in See’s novel, that were well written about, were family and immigration. The familial relationships that are established between each character show how important family is regardless of one’s culture. The sibling relationship between Pearl and May, for example, was something from which I drew a lot of parallels from my own relationship with my sibling. The same is true of Pearl, who as a parent, had the responsibility of raising her daughter as American while instilling the values of their culture which my own parents, as immigrants themselves, have tried to do as well. This along with the faithful portrayal of the immigrant experience helps See’s narrative come to life. 

One minor aspect of the novel that I disliked, however, was the rapid lapse time, which is more prominent at the end of the book. It felt as if at one moment I was reading about how Joy was starting kindergarten, the next about how she was in the 5th grade. Understandably, though, I see that the accelerated lapse of time was needed in order to carry the narrative along but I think that See could have made the transitions a bit more smoother. 

Apart from this, however, I really enjoyed the novel. The characters were very well developed, the settings were vivid and the narrative genuinely entertaining. That being said, I’m looking forward to reading the next book in the series, Dreams of Joy, and seeing what other universal elements are touched upon.

Banana Yoshimoto’s Kitchen was an assigned reading for a Japanese culture class that I took last year. For that class I was only assigned to read the first story included in the book called, Kitchen. Two weeks ago, I finally finished this book by  reading the second story entitled Moonlight Shadow. At first I was excited to read a book by a popular and contemporary Japanese author but after reading Kitchen I was confused as to why the author is so popular.

I found the book to be okay. The main reason the book didn’t resonate with me as much as other books that I’ve read is due to the subject matter of the two stories in this book, death. I, personally, have been fortunate in not having to loose someone close to me and so the concepts of loss, mourning, and accepting death are unknown to me and perhaps that personal lack of understanding weakened the two stories in my eyes. 

In comparing Kitchen and Moonlight Shadow, though, I would have to say that the former was a better narrative due to the fact that it better developed its characters and settings. The later was weaker because it included a bit of elements of surrealism, which I’m not a fan of. 

Overall, the book an okay read. From what I’ve read about the author, she seems to mostly write about themes that I’m personally not interested in. Although, I enjoyed having the experience of reading a work by one of Japan’s more popular contemporary writers, this read has made me weary of her other works. This, however, won’t stop me from trying to read one her other novels in the future that are more inline with my interests.

I bought Adele’s 19 last night. 

This will be joining Adele’s 21. 

So Syd and I decided to celebrate my birthday a bit early since I won’t be here in June. Although I had given her a wishlist of the things I wanted, she deviated from it. These two gifts, however, were suppose to be on my wishlist so I was happy with the gift. Thanks Syd! 

The reason I won’t be here in June is because I’ll be in Mexico. In preparation to going to Mexico, I went to the Mexican consulate to apply for dual citizenship. This didn’t go as planed since my birth certificate had an error on it (my mother’s maiden name was mispelled) and since the birth certificate that I had to present needed to be an apostille copy. So I’ve had to mail my birth certificate to the Vital Records’ Changes Unit in Georgia in order for them to correct it and once it’s corrected I can proceed to obtain an apostilled copy of it. 

It’s my mother’s idea that I obtain dual citizenship for the primary purpose of opening accounts in Mexico in the future. There are other benefits that come with dual citizenship that include acquiring properties that are restricted to foreigners, having access to any educational institution, among other things. For now, I’ll have to wait until my birth certificate is corrected. 

It’s apparent that I like to compare novels with the movies that they’re adapted into. I actually began reading this book after I had seen the film and bought the book last year. I never came around to finishing the book and ended up postponing the book. This week I had the chance to finish the book and after having read the novel, I think that the novel and the film adaptation compliment each other well. The novel, obviously, gave more background information that the film adaption wasn’t able to fit in but the screenplay did a great job of combining dialogue from the novel and even adding to the dialogue to make it better. As is the case in the following line:

We all complete. Maybe none of us really understand what we’ve lived through, or feel we’ve had enough time.

Beginning of Summer Updates: 

I did go to see Delicacy opening night at the Keystone Art Cinema with my friend Sydnee. The film did not turn out to be as great as I expected it to be but it was an enjoyable movie to watch, nonetheless.

Last week was the last week I had classes/finals. I’m officially done with my sophomore year of college. I enjoyed each class and my professors as well.

After thinking more about my future I’ve decided that French won’t become a minor since the times the classes are held are very inconvenient. The Women’s Studies minor is still a possibility, though. With these decisions I’ve played around with my schedule a bit more and have come up with a finalized schedule for next semester.

Since school is over, I’ve had time to do what I’ve wanted to do for quite a while now, which is read. Two days ago, I finished The Complete Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi. I first saw the animated film adaptation of this graphic novel and I absolutely loved it so it’s no surprise that I loved the original source as well. A couple days back I also ordered the blu ray of the film, although I have the DVD, in order to expand my mini blu ray collection.

Going to go see this film Friday. 

EALC-J 301 Third Year Japanese 1

SPAN-S 363 Intro A La Cultura Hispanica

SPAN-S 326 Intro To Spanish Linguistics

SPAN-S470 Woman & Hispanic Literature

WOST-W 105 Intro To Women’s Studies

HIST-H 108 Perspectives: World To 1800