Wow! eBook
Sirens of the Western Shore – The Westernesque Femme Fatale, Translation, and Vernacular Style in Modern Japanese Literature
Author(s): Indra Levy (Author)
- Publisher: Columbia University Press
- Publication Date: 8 Dec. 2006
- Edition: Illustrated
- Language: English
- Print length: 352 pages
- ISBN-10: 0231137869
- ISBN-13: 9780231137867
Book Description
Indra Levy introduces a new archetype in the study of modern Japanese literature: the “Westernesque femme fatale,” an alluring figure who is ethnically Japanese but evokes the West in her physical appearance, lifestyle, behavior, and, most important, her use of language. She played conspicuous roles in landmark works of modern Japanese fiction and theater. Levy traces the lineage of the Westernesque femme fatale from her first appearance in the vernacularist fiction of the late 1880s to her development in Naturalist fiction of the mid-1900s and, finally, to her spectacular embodiment by the modern Japanese actress in the early 1910s with the advent of Naturalist theater. In all cases the Westernesque femme fatale both attracts and confounds the self-consciously modern male intellectual through a convention-defying use of language. What does this sirenlike figure reveal about the central concerns of modern Japanese literature? Levy proposes that the Westernesque femme fatale be viewed as the hallmark of an intertextual exoticism that prizes the strange beauty of modern Western writing. By illuminating the exoticist impulses that gave rise to this archetype, Levy offers a new understanding of the relationships between vernacular style and translation, original and imitation, and writing and performance within a cross-cultural context. A seamless blend of narrative, performance, translation, and gender studies, this work will have a profound impact on the critical discourse on this formative period of modern Japanese literature.
Editorial Reviews
Review
[An] insightful, carefully researched study… Highly recommended.–Choice
Sirens of the Western Shore takes a fresh and detailed look at the topic of vernacular style in Meiji literature.–Sarah Frederick “Journal of Japanese Studies “
Richly textured… cogently argued, lucidly written, and offers the reader insights on both theoretical and biographical levels.–Nanette Gottlieb “Monumenta Nipponica “
About the Author
Indra Levy is assistant professor of Japanese literature at Stanford University.
