Description
Loftus (Japanese, Willamette University) presents the autobiographical writing of five Japanese women who came of age during the decades leading up to WWII. The women describe their experiences in the women's movement, labor activism, the arts, and politics. Their narratives illustrates the importance of gender in Japan's historical development. Each narrative is interspersed with notes and comments by Loftus, and overall introductory and concluding essays are included. Annotation ©2004 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)
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In this fascinating collection of translations, Telling Lives looks at the self-writing of five Japanese women who came of age during the decades leading up to World War II. Following an introduction that situates women’s self-writing against the backdrop of Japan during the 1920s and 1930s, Loftus takes up the autobiographies of Oku Mumeo, a leader of the prewar women’s movement, and Takai Toshio, a textile worker who later became a well-known labor activist. Next is the moving story of Nishi Kyoko, whose Reminiscences tells of her life as a young woman who escapes the oppression of her family and establishes her financial independence. Nishi’s narrative precedes a detailed look at the autobiography of Sata Ineko. Sata’s Between the Lines of My Personal Chronology recounts her years as a member of a proletarian arts circle and her struggle to become a writer. The collection ends with the Marxist Fukunaga Misao’s frank and explosive text Memoirs of a Female Communist, which is examined as a manifesto condemning the male chauvinism of the prewar Japanese Communist Party.
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