JR上野駅公園口

I don’t think I would recommend this book to anyone still actively „learning“ the language. Of course I don’t want to discourage anyone from reading it! Just I don’t think it would be a very pleasant experience.

Difficulties include but are not limited to:

• Lots of 東北弁
• Random conversations that our main character is eavesdropping on that have absolutely no context provided
• historical events and the history of the park being explained in great detail, which means lots of unknown names, place names, historical terminology
• Buddhist traditions (vague spoiler)(a Buddhist funeral explained in great detail, including explanations of how certain schools of Buddhism differ, the history of the Buddhist priests in a certain village, etc., all in 東北弁)
• Uncertainty of place and time (vague spoiler)(for large parts of the book, it wasn’t clear (at least to me) whether the MC was actually there and alive, or whether he was looking onto a scene from the afterlife without being present)

Still, I really liked it! I learned a lot about the lives of homeless people, about the 60’s when 出稼ぎ was still commonplace, about the importance of the 天皇 in people’s lives (the 解説 talks a lot about this).

There were some really moving situations as well. The way the author described (spoiler around 1/3 into the book)the grief of the MC when his son died at 21 was unbelievably gripping, as if I could feel his emotions myself.

Some quotes I really liked (spoilers around 1/3 into the book)(some of MC’s thoughts after his son’s sudden death):

自分は、浩一の死を告げられてから努力をしている。 これまでも働く努力はしてきたけれど、今している努力は、生きる努力だ。 死にたいというよりも、努力することに、疲れた。

浩一が死ぬ前は、いつも瞼の中で目を覚まし、自分がどこで何をしていて、今はいつなのかということを納得して目を開けたものだが、浩一が死んでからは、浩一が死んだ、という事実に叩き起こされる。

The more difficult parts with the Buddhist and historical terminology were present primarily in the first half, after that it was more easy-going. There was also some heavy foreshadowing, hinting at the ending.