The Commoner: A Novel
by John Burnham Schwartz
|
List Price: Our Price: $1.22 You Save: $23.73 (95%) Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Buy Used: from $0.01 (click here) Category: Book See more book details and other editions |
|---|
Book Reviews of The Commoner: A Novel
Book Review: The rating fell as I read on
Summary: 1 Stars
I began this book willing to give it a definite three or possible four based on the concept and the writing, but as I read on the rating steadily fell, until I got to the end convinced that this was worth one star at best. As one other reviewer said, it touched my head but not my heart -- that's a big part of it, but hardly all.
The characters were flat and none of them, including Haruko, ever really came alive. She herself was tepid, and most of the others were worse. This made it very hard to sympathize with any of them or their problems. I've lived in Japan for 20 years and know the ins and outs of the royal family pretty well, so I was very disposed in this book's favor when I began. There were a few moments during Haruko's falling in love with the Crown Prince that I did feel a spark of life in the book, and interest in myself. But that faded fairly fast. I suppose the author's intention was to create a book as mannered as the Imperial Family -- well, that succeeded. Mannered unto death, and boredom. Maybe that was his intention too.
It also seemed as if the author was more interested in having each phrase be a work of art than in actually bringing the plot or the characters alive. But this "art," enjoyable enough at the start, gradually became cloying, until by the end of the book I was cringing. A few examples:
"He spoke from his heart, and then he took it with him."
"The eyes I found looking back at me held no past and no future.
"The lack of evidence was so astounding....that over time it had the effect of a powerful narcotic...separating them from their honest perceptions and absorbing all curiosity."
This is purple prose you might expect of a novice, or a romance writer (sorry, romance writer friends), not an author with four published books to his credit. In addition, it seemed he chose images and incidents designed to play to a Western idea of what Japan is. All the cliches are trotted out: red falling maple leaf, the kimono (once a sash is "blood red" -- bit overdone, again), a child whose hair smells of "plum blossoms" (in autumn, metaphors getting a bit messy there). While the problems of Japan's imperial family partly -- or largely -- stem from aspects of their nationality, he's missing the biggest story here, a universal human one. A woman whose job is to produce a child suffers from fertility problems, etc. If drawing a story from the real imperial family, there are much more interesting stories to write than the one we get here. Even this one could have been told with much more life, if the author weren't determined to make it "artful" and "exotic." Japan is way less exotic than people think these days -- it's the land of Toyota, Nintendo, anime -- all of which are part of our lives. Yet people persist in loving these little bits of exoticism more than the true face. Most Japanese didn't like "Lost in Translation" because it played to stereotypes. This book does too.
Finally, a lot is simply unbelievable. Besides the ending, which could never, ever, ever take place. The supposedly touching scene where a father sits on his daughter's bed to talk to her at nighttime, in early 1960s Japan? Well, to start with, I find it hard to believe that a traditional family -- the father's a sake brewer, for goodness' sake -- would have had a bed in that era. But for the father to come in and sit on the side of his daughter's bed -- that would never have happened. It's a very American gesture that even in Japan today would be almost unimaginable. A Japanese father would be far too embarrassed to do that with a grown daughter even now, never mind the early 1960s. The way the Empress expresses herself. What the young, new Crown Princess says at a news conference.
And the author, for all his supposed years of research, messed up some very basic facts. The worst was when he had two people at the imperial family's villa in Nasu, taking "small walks by the seaside." I'm sorry, Nasu is in the mountains. Some people may say that a tiny slip of fact shouldn't make a difference in fiction, but it makes the author seem sloppy. This, on top of the purple prose, really detracted from my reading experience.
I wasn't impressed with "Bicycle Days," which I thought was a patronizing look at Japan that pandered to stereotypes. This book hasn't changed my impression of the author much. I wish I hadn't bought this book in hardcover. Borrow it from the library or wait for it in paperback, please.
Book Review: The subtle intricacies of each quiet word
Summary: 4 Stars
Haruko marries a prince and becomes a princess. Such are the fanciful dreams of young American girls, as they watch the lives of Disney's most well-known fictional heroines. They know, too, that most of these princesses-by-marriage become so almost against their humble will, as if the pretty dresses and privileged lifestyle can only be rightfully placed upon those who don't fight for such a crown. In John Burnham Schwartz's novel, THE COMMONER, Haruko is no exception.
Born in Japan to a well-off but common family, Haruko attends private school and a prestigious college, and she defiantly rejects the arranged proposals of a handful of Japanese men. Playfully called "Gazelle" by her high school track friend, she remains active throughout her young adult life by playing tennis as a semi-professional hobby. Her life changes when the Crown Prince is set to be her opponent. Against her parents' wishes, and most likely the entire country's, she wins the match. This graceful victory makes her an increasingly intriguing woman in the eyes of the Crown Prince, and after many attempts have been made on his behalf, he wins her hand not on the tennis courts but in marriage.
Contrary to the reader's anticipation, this is not a beautiful beginning to a beautiful life. Haruko is the first non-royal woman to enter into the bloodline, and though the country is in an era of progression, her mother-in-law, the Empress of Japan, is not. Haruko is given one job to do --- to give birth to a son. Aside from this act, which itself is surrounded by ritual that is out of Haruko's hands, she is to be merely a silent idol for her people. After a nervous breakdown, she becomes reconciled to the fact that she can never be what she was before entering the monarchy, and her one consolation is in providing happiness to her husband and children, who she loves dearly. As the next generation comes of age, Haruko's dual feelings of unhappiness and duty conflict when her son courts another commoner. Haruko wants her son to be happy, but she does not want to see this outspoken woman follow in her laden footsteps to be silenced against her will.
While the specifics in THE COMMONER are entirely made up, Schwartz based his story off of scant details of the real Crown Princesses of the 20th century. His pursuit of a degree in East Asian Studies resulted in living abroad in Tokyo, and he recently returned there to interview key people for his book, among them the Grand Chamberlain to the Emperor Akihito. His novel is not a critique of Japanese culture; instead, it is a critique of any monarchy, and any such institution that silences and distances its members. Schwartz gives this critique through the lively Haruko, who is slowly recreated into a mournful prisoner with each turn of the page. This recreation is not written through grand explosions of feeling and remorse but through the subtle intricacies of each quiet word.
Schwartz uses the brevity of each chapter to make the reader turn the page for just one more. The jacket, the paper and even the font are beautiful; it is like holding a tragedy under the guise of serenity, with the only clue being the rain that falls from the dark sky on the otherwise enchanting scene on the cover. The author effortlessly speaks through the eyes of a female born and raised on foreign soil. He enters her mind and her heart, and he shares them with us most intimately. And like any story of oppression, the reader closes the book with a mixture of satisfaction and sympathy.
--- Reviewed by Shannon Luders-Manuel
Book Review: His Daughter-in-Law Elect
Summary: 4 Stars
John Burnham Schwartz's roman à clef about the Japanese imperial family takes as its centerpiece one of the most startling stories of the continuation of ancient royal tradition into the twentieth century: the life and career of the current Empress Michiko, the first commoner in memory to marry an heir to the throne. The empress's life has been paradoxically both intensely dramatic and intensely stultifying. Despised by the court insiders (and supposedly in particular by her imperial mother-in-law) for her common birth and unfamiliarity with court customs, and worn down by the dullness of court routine and the strictures of imperial tradition, the empress allegedly had a nervous breakdown in the early 1960s after the birth of her first son, losing her voice completely for several months. Then, when her husband succeeded to the throne and her son wanted to marry another commoner (this time an Oxford-educated career diplomat), she saw her own new daughter-in-law go through the same horrors she had three decades previously and then even more when the young woman cannot produce a male heir.
Schwartz has as his narrator the empress, here known as "Haruko." The names are changed not to protect the innocent, but rather because Schwartz varies from the story of the current empress particularly at the end, where he imagines a different fate for the current crown princess heroically engineered by her kindly mother-in-law. There's little here critical at all of the current empress or of her husband, son, or daughter-in-law: only the emperor's dead parents are treated as in any way less than fully sympathetically (his mother is basically treated as a wicked witch). As a result it seems almost impossible that the crown princess (here called "Keiko") could get into the emotional fix she does, since everyone here seems constantly brimming over with high promises and kindly intentions. (Surely there could have been a more balanced and honest way to tell these women's stories, even as told from the empress's own perspective.) The best thing about the book is its lovely prose style, which seems simultaneously elegant and understated, as prettily befits its subject. And where else will you find a novel told from the point of view of an actual living empress? That rarity alone makes it worthy of attention.
Book Review: If a Prince Proposes Say NO
Summary: 3 Stars
Based upon real people and events, this novel follows the life of Haruko Endo, the commoner of the title, who eventually becomes Empress of Japan. At the beginning we find Haruko a girl of ten, living through the horrors of war time Japan. She is a lively, intelligent daughter of a successful Japanese businesman. As a young woman she meets Shige the Crown Prince who woes her. When Shige proposes her parents at first are opposed to the marriage. But Haruko is in love and her parents relent. After the marriage Haruko is swallowed by Court life and its stultifying traditions. She is surrounded by hostile ladies in waiting, and Shige's mother,the Empress, who is surely the mother in law from hell. Haruko produces the requisite male child, Yansu (only male children can ascend to the throne of Japan). Against her will he is virtually taken away from her, but despite numerous insults to herself by the Imperial Court Haruko never stands up for herself.
The novel then jumps twenty years of so. Yansu is now seeking a wife of his own. He falls in love with Keiko an up and coming career woman, who speaks several languages fluently and is European educated. Keiko spurns his proposals because of her own fears of being swallowed up by the traditions of the Court. Haruko, now Empress herself,intervenes and convinces the young woman to marry her son. History repeats itself. Keiko is engulfed by traditional expectations. Poor Keiko seems unable to produce a child. After years of trying she produces a daughter, unacceptable as progeny to the Court. I will not divulge what happens.
There is much of interest in this novel, particularly the descriptions of the rituals and traditions of Imperial Japan. The story holds one's attention. The problem is the characters are cardboard characters. The tension in Haruko's mind when she must decide whether or not to accept Shige's proposal is never revealed. Nothing is shown of the relationship between Haruko and Shige or Yansu and Keiko. The problem is that it is impossible to bring to life 50 years of history in a mere 300 pages. What we have here is more an outline of a novel, then a fully realized novel. The only thing I could take away from this novel was that if a Prince proposes it is wise to say 'no thank you'.
Book Review: 1.5 out of 2: Good premise, Poor Execution
Summary: 2 Stars
The Commoner tells the story of Haruku, the daughter of a Japanese business man who catches the eye of the Crown Prince of Japan. Basically, this is a Japanese Cinderella story with a more equivocal ending. Despite the timelessness of the story and the evocative setting of the Imperial Palace, The Commoner is unsuccessful on many levels. Schwartz's attempt to do too much in too few pages is the most glaring problem. The narrative covers Haruku's life before the Imperial Palace, the Crown Prince's courtship, her integration into the Imperial Palace, the birth of the next generation, and the next generation's repetition of Haruku's choice to give up the life of a commoner for the life of a royal. Schwartz raises interesting themes and introduces some promising characters and relationships along the way, but he doesn't have time to examine anything in depth. Superficiality of plot development and characterization is the unhappy result.
Additionally, Schwartz's prose is sometimes so ridiculous that I almost gave up reading at several points along the way. I cannot explain what I mean except with a few examples:
"The air-raid siren was so loud it obliterated the self; it sent us running from where we stood with such terror that our pasts were momentarily left behind."
"A light but stirring breeze entered the house through the open windows and breathed innocent secrets onto the legs of every woman in the room." (I promise I am not making these up.)
"The tremor had been in my imagination, that deep underground cavern where hope and feeling need not live in fear of each other."
"[L]ife is not an echo, endlessly returning the past to us so that we might read and reread in its fading variations the meanings we cannot keep ourselves from wanting." (Huh?)
These sentences do not make any more sense in context than they make in this review. If you enjoy well-crafted prose that actually means something, The Commoner is likely to annoy you.