The Breaking Jewel: A Novel

by Makoto Oda, Donald Keene (Translator)

Overview

Set on an island in the South Pacific during the final days of World War II, when the tide has turned against Japan and the war has unmistakably become one of attrition, The Breaking Jewel offers a rare depiction of the Pacific War from the Japanese side and captures the essence of Japan's doomed imperial aims. The novel opens as a small force of Japanese soldiers prepares to defend a tiny and ultimately insignificant island from a full-scale assault by American forces. Its story centers on squad leader Nakamura, who resists the Americans to the end, as he and his comrades grapple with the idea of gyokusai (translated as "the breaking jewel" or the "pulverization of the gem"), the patriotic act of mass suicide in defense of the homeland.

Well known for his antiestablishment and antiwar sentiments, Makuto Oda gradually and subtly develops a powerful critique of the war and the racialist imperial aims that proved Japan's undoing.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780231518871
Publisher:	Columbia University Press
Publication date:	01/23/2003
Series:	Weatherhead Books on Asia
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	136
File size:	18 MB
Note:	This product may take a few minutes to download.

About the Author

Makuto Oda is a novelist and peace activist. His first literary fame came with the 1961 bestseller Nan demo mite varo (I'll Look at Anything). He is also the author of Hiroshima, first translated into English as The Bomb and later republished as H.Donald Keene is Shincho Professor of Japanese Literature and University Professor Emeritus at Columbia University. He is the author of more than thirty books, most recently, Emperor of Japan: Meiji and His World, 1852–1912 and Five Modern Japanese Novelists, both published by Columbia. He divides his time between Tokyo and New York City.

Editorial Reviews

This slim novel by one of Japan's anti-establishment writers depicts the horrors of war during the final days of World War II. Japan is losing its battle against the much more powerful Americans for a small South Pacific island. The soldiers want to believe in the glory of dying for the emperor but sometimes have doubts; the leaders are not always trustworthy or pure in their feelings either. In a subplot, the relationship between Japanese soldiers and soldiers of Korean origin in the Japanese army is fraught with prejudice, condescension, and suspicion. The formal style evokes an epic quality that transcends this one small battle, something that will sit well with Americans, Chinese, and other enemies of Japan in World War II. The book is superbly translated and introduced by Keene, a preeminent scholar and professor (now emeritus at Columbia) who has devoted his life to Japan and things Japanese. Recommended for libraries with good collections of Japanese literature.-Kitty Chen Dean, Nassau Community Coll., Garden City, NY Copyright 2003 Cahners Business Information.

Library Journal

A 1998 novel about the defense of a small South Pacific island against American invasion-its Japanese author's first in English translation-displays a riveting economy and intensity. Oda's central character Sergeant Nakamura is a skillfully drawn "war lover": a dedicated solider sworn that "My body will be a bulwark of the Pacific," and a harsh disciplinarian whose fervor is effectively contrasted, especially in its closing pages, with the more fatalistic dutifulness of his Korean subordinate Corporal Kon. The climactic "war of attrition" that demands the anticipated and foreshadowed ultimate sacrifice is depicted in unflinchingly graphic detail that makes this excellent little tale very much something of an Asian Red Badge of Courage.

Kirkus Reviews

Oda, a prominent and controversial novelist known for his outspoken antiestablishment and antiwar sentiments, gradually and subtly develops a powerful indictment against World War II... The novel openly questions whethergyokusai (literallythe breaking jewel) is truly an act of patriotism or one of futile self-defeat.

Translation Review

With Donald Keene, our most important scholar of Japanese literature, we are guaranteed an accurate and graceful rendering into English as well as a significant novel, the first by Makoto Oda to be translated. Oda has provided a dramatic and compelling story about the Pacific War from the other side.

World Literature Today - Sidney DeVere Brown

The Breaking Jewel is heart-rending and tactfully moving. It is also remarkable that Oda (and Keene's translation) proved to be as powerful as a novella.

Historical Novels Review

This is a novel that is intellectually engaging.

Persimmon

Oda compresses a lot of literary razzle-dazzle in these 116 pages... On one level we have the narrative of a good fighting story and on another level, a novel of race and class... [that] works on other levels of irony and myth. It is really an impressive job...The Breaking Jewel, indeed, fits our present times.

Pacific Reader - William Witherup

Oda compresses a lot of literary razzle-dazzle in these 116 pages... On one level we have the narrative of a good fighting story and on another level, a novel of race and class... [that] works on other levels of irony and myth. It is really an impressive job... The Breaking Jewel, indeed, fits our present times.

— William Witherup

Pacific Reader

With Donald Keene, our most important scholar of Japanese literature, we are guaranteed an accurate and graceful rendering into English as well as a significant novel, the first by Makoto Oda to be translated. Oda has provided a dramatic and compelling story about the Pacific War from the other side.

— Sidney DeVere Brown

World Literature Today