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margaretatwoodIn her 2003 novel Oryx and Crake, Margaret Atwood describes a future after humanity had been almost entirely wiped out by a plague. Jimmy, aka Snowman, lives... Continue »
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The Woman in the Dunes

by Kobo Abe

The Woman in the Dunes Cover

ISBN13: 9780679733782
ISBN10: 0679733787
Condition: Standard
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Synopses & Reviews

Publisher Comments:

One of the premier Japanese novels of the twentieth century, The Women in the Dunes combines the essence of myth, suspense, and the existential novel. In a remote seaside village, Niki Jumpei, a teacher and amateur entomologist, is held captive with a young woman at the bottom of a vast sand pit where, Sisyphus-like, they are pressed into shoveling off the ever-advancing sand dunes that threaten the village.

Review:

"Abe follows with meticulous precision his hero's constantly shifting physical, emotional and psychological states. He also presents...everyday existence in a sand pit with such compelling realism that these passages serve both to heighten the credibility of the bizarre plot and subtly increase the interior tensions of the novel."

-- The New York Times Book Review

"Some of Kobo Abe's readers will recall Kafka's manipulation of a nightmarish tyranny of the unknown, others Beckett's selection of sites like the sand pit...as a symbol of the undignified human predicament." — Saturday Review

What Our Readers Are Saying

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Average customer rating based on 1 comment:
Lainie, September 26, 2006 (view all comments by Lainie)
Like a bad dream any imagination can identify with, Abe's story is at once beautiful and terrifying. Feeling trapped has never had this spin. Read this book with a glass of cold water nearby.
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Product Details

ISBN:
9780679733782
Editor:
McDonald, Erroll
Translator:
Saunders, E. Dale
Translator:
Saunders, E. Dale
Author:
Abe, Kobo
Author:
McDonald, Erroll
Publisher:
Vintage Books USA
Location:
New York :
Subject:
Literary
Subject:
Fiction
Subject:
Japan
Subject:
Psychological fiction
Subject:
Near and far eastern fiction (fictional works
Subject:
Near and far east
Subject:
Japan Fiction.
Copyright:
Edition Description:
Vintage Intl
Series Volume:
P2734
Publication Date:
April 1991
Binding:
Paperback
Language:
English
Illustrations:
Yes
Pages:
256
Dimensions:
8.06x5.22x.53 in. .42 lbs.

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