Day 1: The Best Book You Read Last Year
The "Memoirs Of A Geisha" published in 1997 by Author Arthur Golden, uses a fictional narrator to describe the life of young girl Chiyo; sold off to a tea house and her struggles through the World War 2 in Japan...
The "Memoirs Of A Geisha" published in 1997 by Author Arthur Golden, uses a fictional narrator to describe the life of young girl Chiyo; sold off to a tea house and her struggles through the World War 2 in Japan...
It also depicts beautifully and sometimes meticulously her growth as both a geisha and a person.
It brings an almost lost chapter and often a disturbing practice in Japanese culture.
What sets the book apart for me is the strong love that a young Chiyo(renamed Sayuri ) develops and nurtures for the kind man (referred to as Chairman) she meets at the temple. It is this need to be his concubine that makes Chiyo accept her reality and try to perfect her art and rise through the ranks.
A love story that never seems to pick till the ending which leaves us with a contented Sayuri at New York.
The Geisha system in my mind being similar to the archaic Devadasi system in India. Though the lofty ideals of being God's earthly consort, a Devdasi leads a life very similar to that of a Geisha.
Despite the controversies surrounding the book, its subject - exploitation of women for rich men's pleasures...it is the girl's struggles and her love story that moved me...
This is the first part of the 30 day book challenge created by Paulami at her blog Acotation Al Margen.
Added to Saturday Centus . Check different endings on
offer at Jenny Matlock's meme...
her blog off on my tangent.