#authorreflections

As I spend my afternoon reading Tanizaki’s The Makioka Sisters, it just prompted me to discuss him as an author, based on the books that I’ve read from him. 

So far, I’ve read The Key, Naomi, and Quicksand, and I want to say that I actually liked them all. Despite being a man and being labelled as an “erotic writer,” the way he writes women are surprisingly tasteful and empowering (*spoiler*I mean sure, Naomi was sketchy because the titular character got groomed at an early age, but at the end, she did get the last laugh lol), unlike *cough* Haruki Murakami *cough* That says a lot, seeing as he was an author during the period where a woman having agency is unheard of. He gives his women characters agency, gives them a chance to reject tradition, to be their own people, not just plot devices for his male characters. In fact, he depreciates his male characters often (at least in the three novels that I’ve read), which I think is correct behavior lol.

He does praise the West a lot to the point of glorification, but I think this is his way of trying to make a compromise between tradition and modernity as Japan undergoes a transition during his time. It’s evident in his work how ahead of his time his notions of modernity is, especially with regards to culture and sexual politics. 

I jokingly say that Tanizaki is that one Wattpad-esque writer in Japanese classic literature, but his work actually gives relevant social commentary about the Japanese society during that time.