Post-war Japan. Kazuko and her sick mother must sell their family home in the destroyed by the war Tokyo and move to the country. They pass the days reading books, knitting, and waiting for Kazuko’s brother to come back from the front. When Naoji returns to Japan, Kazuko must tend to not only her ailing mother — a lost in the world dame from the past — but also her brother who uses alcohol and drugs to escape from reality. But a shadow is slowly growing in her heart. In search of solace, she decides to break social conventions.
Zmierzch [The Setting Sun] is a story about trying to find yourself in a world turned upside down. It’s a lyrical and poignant story of people trying to function in some way while looking for their form of defiance. Pictures from life in the time of changes occurring in Japanese society after the lost war, are laced with fragments of intimate love letters and diaries, and full of symbolic retrospections.
The revised and improved translation by professor Mikołaj Melanowicz lets the reader discover the fascinating beauty of Japanese Zmierzch [The Setting Sun] anew. The edition begins with a preface by Karolina Bednarz, which will help with understanding the historical background and introduce the reader to the mood of the story.
One of our most loved Japanese novels that you can’t miss.
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