borders book club on the sailor who fell from grace with the sea

its the friday we have been waiting for. the book club day.

dr roy and i arrive at starbucks 15 minutes before time and we see faridah sitting there. this is our first encounter with her.

i pick up the god delusion by richard dawkins and am browsing through it when this gentleman comes to inquire about the book discussion we are having here. later i come to know that he is sam.

a while after that, an elegant and charming couple, oliver and penny walk in.

brian and jade complete the circle.

sam has not read. he just wants to listen. it is his first experience.

brian summarises the story basically for sam's knowledge. he talks of noboru, fusako and ryuji and their connections to each other.

it is now open to the floor.

faridah says the writer's background has affected the story.

like i said in my review, mishima the man and mishima the author cannot really be differentiated.

faridah also mentions the time, set way back during the war when people were trained to think like soldiers, samurais.

penny doesn't think it is about any one time in history. this book is more in the universal sense. she talks of the children. repressed kids.

well, yes imagine locking a child in his room at night. is it unthinkable?

penny has much to say. she is lively and full of views. the mother doesn't understand the child. she keeps her references to mother, son and sailor. are the names of these characters of any importance at all? the mother obviously knows something is going on with the child to have locked him up.

brian says something interesting. he sees it as a reflection of fear of childhood that the adults have. childhood denotes freedom and society is against it. he raises a simile to the pressure cooker, when you don't open the cover to release the steam, it comes out all warped and twisted.

oliver is sweet. he speaks politely and contributes a lot with his short sentences. reminds me of a time when i had to make a summary of this whole long story and i made such a terrible mess of it. he would have come out with an A+.

he says the boys dehumanise their surroundings. adult life is a bit dull. and jade laughs...a bit is perhaps an understatement.

brian insists that the whole thing seems phoney, superficial, he cites the murder of ryuji as an example. it is almost like a pagan sacrifice taking place on some wasteland, like a holy place, way out from everyone.

orlando feels a strong sense of japanese values. regimented and compartmentalised lives. along with him, penny adds their experience in disneyland and how they witnessed the japanese girls wearing the same type of dress like a uniform and carrying the same coloured balloons.

regimented or discipline? hmm.

we side-track a little. faridah talks of malaysians driving luxurious cars but still carry bullock-cart mentalities. and she goes into the malaysian mindset of desiring professionals out of their children, you know like engineers, doctors and the like. and children who take up art, theatre and other jobs are a definite let-down and disgrace.

brian and jade stress on a sense of loss. the loss of a dream.

of ryuji's? of fusako's? of noboru's?

as i ask this, i still cannot get over mishima's brilliance.

dr roy asks a general question. what do we think about ryuji, the sailor?

oliver says there is a parallel with noboru, the boy. they both yearn for the same thing. the freedom and to be away, the reason, noboru is disillusioned when ryuji wants to give up that heroic life for a dreary monotonous, good for nothing land life.

brian says ryuji is a good man. an innocent man. the tragedy is really his. neither does he achieve the glory at sea nor on land.

loneliness is apparent in all three. they are contained in their good lives, they excel in what they do, but they are all lonely. isn't that a misfortune in itself or an irony?

we touch on the actress and penny says she represents everything that has gone wrong with modern japan.

oliver compares the superficiality of the actress to the trust and innocence of the sailor.

brian says he is aware there is this unattainability of things, everything seems exquisitely beautiful but just a little beyond reach, and everything is wonderful but brittle.

it is affecting.

penny is quick to state, but then isn't that life? the grass is always greener on the other side right?

and brian says, yes but mishima doesn't point it out. he doesnt use the language, but it is still suggested.

i think back to his brilliance.

and it is here that i must mention how much i love his description of the sea when he compares and depicts it to be a woman. penny reads out that part to the whole group. and again, i fall in love with that paragraph.

brian talks of the culture. paradoxical. and surprisingly though, the japanese are at ease with the contradiction.

faridah and jade talk about the softness and care of the japanese people. jade points out that the actress says presents don't matter, it is the wrapping that's important. the little things and their presentation and attention to details seem to hold priority.

but then, these are the same people who have come up with the popular mangas (comics in nihongo) which are adapted into animes (animations) full of sex and violence.

brian agrees.

we talk of superficiality, artificiality, and manipulation.

dr roy mentions how manipulative noboru is at the chinese dinner where his mother and the sailor are about to inform him of their togetherness.

brian then asks her if she has enjoyed the book. she does not quite know how to answer that. the beginning is not very impressive but then she has not completed the book, so an opinion will not justify the question.

penny loves the description of the kitten's death. it is mishima's magnificence in directing the readers to the conclusion of the ceremony performed on ryuji at the end. so much is reiterated with silence, indication, and absence.

an outstanding writer.

oliver observes the contrast of portraying a homely pet, fluffy and loving, verses the heartlessness and violence of the act performed on it.

the structuring is superb. the two seasons. summer and winter, and with it, the attestation of the passage of time and the wonderful sunshine of happiness in disparity to the bleak and cold of disasters.

the japanese have to involve the weather in everything, and appropriately so too.

brian pretty much wraps it up by saying, mishima was incredibly brave as a writer.

lydia, the book has significance even if the title does not appeal to you. so do read it when you can. sarah, thank you for reading my blog. i am sure you would have contributed plenty if you had come for this one. kim, we missed your warmth and input tremendously.

the three of you missed the sailor and the sea, please don't miss the old man and the sea by hemingway, its only an hour's read (126 pages). don't want to miss your ideas this time.

ciao. until next month then.