This was my second novel by author Yoko Ogawa, and my first impression remains; there is a quiet elegance in acceptance. As with “The Housekeeper and the Professor,” Ogawa challenges the notation of memory – how much ‘self’ remains despite the loss of personal history, loss of sentiment attached to an object. The writing is simple, yet laden with symbolic meaning. There are gentle ebbs of pushing a notion to rebellion, which flows back again into acceptance. The Japanese title can be translated as “The Secret Crystallization,” which possibly serves as the title for both the novel, and the story within the novel. I believe it more fitting, as the two stories are mirrors to one another addressing the same question, leading to the same metamorphosis. It is haunting yet beautiful.
What I love about Ogawa is here Japanese-ness. There is no explanation of why there is such Memory Police, their purpose or right; those are Western questions stemming from Western philosophy. For Ogawa, there is only the present – the solemn struggle in the face of cruelty to accept any fate. When compared to “The Ocean of Minutes,” by Thea Lim, another book about loss and grieving, the novel’s effect on the malleable reader are night and day. While with the latter, I felt anger, sadness, and the burning question of “Why!?” with Ogawa, I was able to surrender to loss and therefore, receive serenity.
“A heart has no shape, no limits. That’s why you can put almost any kind of thing in it, why it can hold so much. Its much like your memory, in that sense.”
“You are the same person now that you were when you wrote novels. The only thing that’s changed is that the books have been burned. But even if paper itself disappears, words will remain. It will be alright, you’ll see. We haven’t lost the stories.”
JohannaAirth 