November 2024 | Goods From Japan

Japan Book Review: Sachiko

ISBN: 978-0231-197311
Colombia University Press, 1982 (Translated into English in 2020)
411 pp; paperback

Set in 1930s and 40s Japan, Sachiko is another of Endo Shusaku's books infused with raw emotions and thought-provoking prose that captivate the reader.

The titular Sachiko is a young girl who enjoys her days growing up in her Catholic Nagasaki community, playing with her Japanese and American friends. Nagasaki, still the home of Japan's largest Catholic community, has been the Catholic capital of Japan since the 16th century. Of course, since 1945 Nagasaki has been known around the world for something else, something that plays prominently in this book. Except for a brief aftermath chapter, the book ends in 1945.

The apple of Sachiko's eye is Shuhei, a somewhat mischievous boy who turns into a want-to-be poet during his college days. Playing it close to the vest regarding Sachiko, he nevertheless has future plans, which do not include going off to war.

Sachiko

The third protagonist is a local priest named Father Kolbe, who is based on the tragic/sacrificial real life of Polish Franciscan priest Maximilian Kolbe who spent the years 1930-36 in Nagasaki. In the book, Kolbe has some interactions with the children, but is not an integral part of their lives. His main contribution to Sachiko was a bookmark he gave her with the words, "Greater love than this no man hath, that a man lay down his life for his friends," a quote from the Bible which is referenced several times later in the book.

Sachiko, Shuhei, the American boys and Father Kolbe go separate ways early in the book, with the Americans returning to America, Father Kolbe returning to Poland and Shuhei going off to college and then, as the World War II situation in Japan gets increasingly desperate, to serve in the military, much to his chagrin. Sachiko and Shuhei's historic Oura Church, a real church built in 1855 and which still stands today, has told him that for Christians to kill is a sin, so he is left perplexed. Sachiko stays in Nagasaki and eventually goes to college, never forgetting her unrequited love for Shuhei.

For much of the book, the chapters alternate between Sachiko's life obsessing over Shuhei and the life of Father Kolbe in Poland. As in many of Endo's books, the reader will wonder how the various characters will eventually tie together. Sometimes Endo's characters tie together, sometimes they don't.

Endo is a master at putting his characters in untenable positions and letting the reader decide if the characters' resulting actions are heroic or spurred by cowardice. Depending on his work, the answer is not always clear. Think of Endo's Silence, which was made into a well-known Martin Scorsese movie of the same name.

As usual in Endo's novels, there are unanticipated turns at the end of this book, and the reader may be left feeling melancholic. The writing is excellent, the characters believable, and the historical references real.

Review by Marshall Hughes.

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