Diary of a Mad Old Man
Format:Paperback
Publisher:Vintage Publishing
£9.99
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At once hilarious and sad, Tanizaki's last novel - written during his final illness - echoes his own life.
While recovering from a stroke, seventy-seven-year-old Utsugi turns to his diary to wryly record his struggle with his ageing body and his growing desire for his beautiful daughter-in-law Satsuko, a chic, Westernised dancer with a shady past.While recovering from a stroke, seventy-seven-year-old Utsugi turns to his diary to wryly record his struggle with his ageing body and his growing desire for his beautiful daughter-in-law Satsuko, a chic, Westernised dancer with a shady past. Shining with a self-effacing humour, Tanizaki's last novel is a tragicomedy about desire and the will to survive.
Wonderful -- Hanif Kureshi * Independent *
His work is unclassifiable: by turns outre and dignified, passionate in its embrace of all things Western and eloquent in its memorializing of the traditional Japanese aesthetic, lightly comic, lyrically evocative and savagely cruel. In a land reputedly inhospitable to the individualist, it demands attention and has earned Tanizaki an undisputed place in the pantheon of 20th-century Japanese literature. * New York Times *
An artistic masterpiece * Irish Times *
A writer of wicked subtlety and grace * Sunday Times *
ISBN: 9780099285199
Dimensions: 198mm x 129mm x 12mm
Weight: 138g
192 pages