Japan's Mieko Kawakami Wants to 'Stir Things up'

Mieko Kawakami. (AFP)
Mieko Kawakami. (AFP)
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Japan's Mieko Kawakami Wants to 'Stir Things up'

Mieko Kawakami. (AFP)
Mieko Kawakami. (AFP)

Mieko Kawakami has called out cliched depictions of women by one of her country's most feted writers, and seen her own bold style attacked by a top politician.

But the award-winning Japanese author says she is happy to "stir things up" in her drive to depict the world as she sees it, as well as the experiences of people who might otherwise go unnoticed.

And it's a formula she's confident readers want.

"There is a growing desire to hear the real voices of Asian women," the 44-year-old told AFP, describing her desire to shed light on a broader sweep of Japanese society.

"(My focus) is the voices that would not be brought to the surface if they weren't written."

Kawakami shot to fame in her home country when "Breasts and Eggs", her second novel, was given Japan's most prestigious literary prize in 2008.

Not everyone was impressed by its experimental style, with Tokyo's then-governor, who is also a novelist and has often been critical of young Japanese writers, denouncing it as "unpleasant" and "self-centered rambling."

But her exploration of the discomfort and confusion women sometimes feel with their bodies was a big hit among the public.

A reworked and expanded version was published in English last year, becoming a fixture of the book club circuit and winning its author international acclaim.

'Not a feminist writer'
Its dissection of sexuality and reproductive ethics has seen Kawakami cast a feminist writer. But that wasn't her intention.

"I'm a feminist, but I'm not a feminist writer," she said.

"I want to write about women as a part of humanity as a whole."

But she is critical of persistent inequalities in her society, slamming traditional gender roles in Japan she says are so ingrained that "it's hard to even put it into words."

"There's a social structure that makes it difficult for women to be independent," she argues.

Outdated views on gender in Japan have been back in the spotlight since former Tokyo Olympic chief Yoshiro Mori last month declared that women speak too much in meetings.

For many in Japan, the comments were shocking, but not surprising.

"It's a human rights issue, but that seems to be something (he) didn't understand at all," Kawakami said.

"That's the most problematic thing."

Still, she sees hope in the fact that an outcry over the remarks eventually forced the 83-year-old to step down, while it "probably would have been overlooked as a gaffe, say, five or 10 years ago."

'I'm on their side'
Kawakami has been praised by her literary peers, but she hasn't been afraid to ask questions about their depictions of women.

She made waves with an interview published in 2017 where she asked one of Japan's most famous writers, Haruki Murakami, why so many women in his novels seemed to serve a purely sexual function.

Her upbringing has also made her sensitive to the importance of class and economic inequality.

Raised in a working-class family in Osaka, Kawakami has felt keenly the difference in her background compared to many in Japan's literary world.

"I will never forget the town, the people and their voices, that shaped me," adds Kawakami, who sometimes writes in the western city's distinctive dialect.

"Now I'm surrounded by highly educated people from the middle and upper classes in the publishing industry, but I'm working class... and I'm on their side," she said.

She was raised by a single mother in a poor household where "you had to work, it didn't matter if you were female or male" and she lied about her age so she could work at a factory during school holidays.

From music to poetry
Scouted as a singer in her early 20s, she pursued music for five years without a hit, and says she felt free when her record deal ended.

A poem she submitted to a magazine caught the eye of an editor, who encouraged her to write longer stories.

Her debut novella, "My Ego Ratio, My Teeth, and the World", told the story of a female dental assistant who believes her consciousness resides not in her brain, but her molars.

It was nominated in 2007 for the biannual Akutagawa Prize, the award she later won for "Breasts and Eggs."

This year will bring the English-language release of her 2009 novel "Heaven", about a 14-year-old who is bullied at school -- a work that grapples with questions of good and evil, with no easy answers.

And she's now working on a project about the day that precedes a life-changing event.

"I have an obsession with the day before something happens," she said.

"None of us knows what will happen tomorrow, that is natural, but it is also a wonder -- and terrifying to me."



The Author of ‘The Help’ Wrote a Second Novel. Yes, Following Up Was Daunting.

Kathryn Stockett
Kathryn Stockett
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The Author of ‘The Help’ Wrote a Second Novel. Yes, Following Up Was Daunting.

Kathryn Stockett
Kathryn Stockett

Fifteen years after her blockbuster novel “The Help” sparked conversation and criticism for its portrayal of the lives of Black maids in the South, Kathryn Stockett is publishing a new novel.
Set in 1933 in Oxford, Miss., “The Calamity Club” centers on a group of women whose lives intersect as they struggle to get by during the Depression. It will be published in April 2026 by the independent press Spiegel & Grau.
Anticipation for a follow-up from Stockett was high. When it was released in 2009, “The Help” caused a stir with its frank depiction of racial inequality. It went on to sell some 15 million copies, spent more than two years on the New York Times best-seller list, and was adapted into an Academy Award-winning movie.
In a video interview from her home outside of Natchez, Miss., Stockett admitted that writing a second novel in the long shadow of her debut was daunting.
“The pressure was definitely on,” she said. “The fear of failure, it really weighs on a writer.”
The novel also drew sharp criticism for its portrayal of Black characters and their speech, which some readers and critics found insensitive and offensive. Viola Davis, who was nominated for an Academy Award for her role in the film, later said she regretted participating, adding that she felt the film failed to accurately capture the voices and lives of Black women.
In some ways, the debate over “The Help” foreshadowed the “own voices” movement in the literary world, which pushed for more diversity in literature from writers drawing on their own cultural backgrounds.
Stockett said that “The Help” would most likely not have found a publisher in today’s environment, but that she doesn’t regret the way she told the story.
“I doubt that ‘The Help’ would be published today, for the fact that a white woman was writing in the voice of a Black woman,” she said. “I did get a lot of criticism but it didn’t get under my skin, because it started conversations.”
“The Help” was inspired in part by Stockett’s relationship with a woman named Demetrie McLorn, who worked as a maid for her family and died when Stockett was a teenager.
The story, which takes place in Mississippi in the early 1960s, has multiple narrators: a Black woman named Aibileen who works as a nanny and housekeeper for white families, Aibileen’s outspoken friend Minny, and a young white woman, Skeeter, who is appalled by the racism she witnesses.
Stockett’s new novel, set in the segregated South, also engages with the issue of race, but not as directly, Stockett said.
“Race is always in the background,” she said. “It’s probably always going to be in the background of any book I write.”
Stockett first began working on a novel set in Depression-era Mississippi in 2013. She did extensive research into the era, learning about the Farm Act, child labor laws, the eugenics movement and the forced sterilization of women in prison, and Franklin D. Roosevelt’s economic policies.
The story is narrated by two white female characters: an 11-year-old girl who lives in an orphanage and a young woman from the Delta who has come to Oxford in hopes of helping her family through hard times.
In 2020, after writing some 800 pages, Stockett felt stuck, and almost abandoned the book. A friend who had read the manuscript connected her with Julie Grau, co-founder of Spiegel & Grau. They worked for years without a contract, and kept the project quiet. A few years later, they signed a deal. With its release next year, the book will be published simultaneously in Britain by Fig Tree and in Canada by Doubleday Canada.
“There’s something really precious about giving writers the time and the space to execute that follow up,” Grau said. “It was really remarkable and ideal to shield her from the glare.”
Stockett said she was so stunned by the success of her debut that she’s set aside any expectations about how “The Calamity Club” will be received.
“I can’t believe it happened then,” she said, “and I have no idea what's going to happen this time around either.”

 

The New York Times