The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet by David MitchellMy rating: 5 of 5 stars
The book with the most beautiful prose I've ever read. It's a lot better than the more popular "Cloud Atlas", but it is like one of those promising short novels in that book given room and time to breathe. I was reminded of parts of Clud Atlas' "The Pacific Journal of Adam Ewing" as well as "Letters from Zedelghem".
The japanese setting is beautifully conveyed, as was expected, but the most impressive thing is the prose itself, which mimics perfectly the timing and feeling of classical japanese writing. The sentences are awe-inspiring at times, with particular sections that flow like music and sting with feeling.
These two passages struck me as perfect in their simplicity. All writers shouls aspire to that simple, zen-like clarity, and they encapsule all of the novel:
"Shiroyama’s heart stops. The earth’s pulse beats against his ear.
An inch away is a go clamshell stone, perfect and smooth …
… a black butterfly lands on the white stone, and unfolds its wings.”
“The clock’s pendulum catches the firelight, and in the rattle-breathed final moments of Jacob de Zoet, amber shadows in the far corner coagulate into a woman’s form.
She slips between the bigger, taller onlookers unnoticed …
… and adjusts her headscarf, the better to hide her burn.
She places her cool palms on Jacob’s fever-glazed face.
Jacob sees himself, when he was young, in her narrow eyes.
Her lips touch the place between his eyebrows.
A well-waxed paper door slides open.”
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