The Thousand Autumns of Jacob De Zoet
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From the author of Cloud Atlas, now a major motion picture starring Tom Hanks, Halle Berry, Susan Sarandon, and Hugh Grant, and directed by Lana and Andy Wachowski and Tom Tykwer
In 2007, Time magazine named him one of the most influential novelists … More »
From the author of Cloud Atlas, now a major motion picture starring Tom Hanks, Halle Berry, Susan Sarandon, and Hugh Grant, and directed by Lana and Andy Wachowski and Tom Tykwer
In 2007, Time magazine named him one of the most influential novelists in the world. He has twice been short-listed for the Man Booker Prize. The New York Times Book Review called him simply “a genius.” Now David Mitchell lends fresh credence to The Guardian’s claim that “each of his books seems entirely different from that which preceded it.” The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet is a stunning departure for this brilliant, restless, and wildly ambitious author, a giant leap forward by even his own high standards. A bold and epic novel of a rarely visited point in history, it is a work as exquisitely rendered as it is irresistibly readable.
The year is 1799, the place Dejima in Nagasaki Harbor, the “high-walled, fan-shaped artificial island” that is the Japanese Empire’s single port and sole window onto the world, designed to keep the West at bay; the farthest outpost of the war-ravaged Dutch East Indies Company; and a de facto prison for the dozen foreigners permitted to live and work there. To this place of devious merchants, deceitful interpreters, costly courtesans, earthquakes, and typhoons comes Jacob de Zoet, a devout and resourceful young clerk who has five years in the East to earn a fortune of sufficient size to win the hand of his wealthy fiancée back in Holland.
But Jacob’s original intentions are eclipsed after a chance encounter with Orito Aibagawa, the disfigured daughter of a samurai doctor and midwife to the city’s powerful magistrate. The borders between propriety, profit, and pleasure blur until Jacob finds his vision clouded, one rash promise made and then fatefully broken. The consequences will extend beyond Jacob’s worst imaginings. As one cynical colleague asks, “Who ain’t a gambler in the glorious Orient, with his very life?”
A magnificent mix of luminous writing, prodigious research, and heedless imagination, The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet is the most impressive achievement of its eminent author.
Baker & Taylor
Dispatched to the influential Japanese port of Dejima in 1799, ambitious clerk Jacob de Zoet resolves to earn enough money to deserve his wealthy fiancâee, an effort that is challenged by his relationship with the midwife daughter of a samurai.
Baker
& Taylor
Dispatched to the influential Japanese port of Dejima in 1799, ambitious clerk Jacob de Zoet resolves to earn enough money to deserve his wealthy fiancée, an effort that is challenged by his relationship with the midwife daughter of a Samurai.
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Add a NoticeFrightening or Intense Scenes: Detailed descriptions of crude surgeries, midwifery, childbirth, poisonings, ritual suicide and infanticide.
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The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet by David Mitchell
Imagine an empire that has shut out the world for a century and a half. No one can leave, foreigners are excluded, their religions banned and their ideas deeply mistrusted. Yet a narrow window onto this nation-fortress still exists: an artificial walled island connected to a mainland port, and manned by a handful of European traders. And locked as the land-gate may be, it cannot prevent the meeting of minds -- or hearts. The nation was Japan, the port was Nagasaki and the island was Dejima, to where David Mitchell's panoramic novel transports us in the year 1799. For one Dutch clerk, Jacob de Zoet, a dark adventure of duplicity, love, guilt, faith and murder is about to begin -- and all the while, unbeknownst to him and his feuding compatriots, the axis of global power is turning...
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Add a CommentThis was the first book of David Mitchell I read and thoroughly enjoyed it. His flexibility with different prose styles and multillevels of story serve to engross the reader for the whole book. He is a masterful writer and has jumped to my favourite author. I like this book better than Cloud Atlas.
This is a beautiful book full of details of everyday life in late 18th and early 19th Japan.The author has a gift for creating tension by his use of dialogue interspersed with the characters thoughts. There are themes of deceit, betrayal, loss, love etc. The style is wonderfully descriptive and at times poetic. M.M.
Especially for anyone who has read and enjoyed Mitchell's other work, THE THOUSAND AUTUMNS will be a joy. Intricately researched and beautifully painted, this novel will rope you into a part of our world that most people don't even realize existed. A great introduction to the Dutch East India Company's time in Japan and an even better introduction to the fluid prose of David Mitchell.
A look at what happens when cultures collide. An account of a Dutch man's time in Japan, and the consequences of his friendship with a remarkable female Japanese mid-wife. Both moving and thought-provoking.
A great read, but after some consideration, I was disappointed. It went through the tabloid top-ten complaints about Japan and the Japanese and fictionalized them without enough effort put into providing perspective. This is a whale of a tale!
Interesting and well-researched look into the Dutch East India Company in 1800, and the goings-on at their Dejima port near Nagasaki. A very dense book; I found myself re-reading parts where I had missed an important nuance the first time through. I am interested in books on sailing ships and on feudal Japan, but I found the bits about magical priests who * *ok I went back and took this description out because, yes, it might ruin the story for someone,* * just a bit farfetched in the style of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. I'd love to see the historical references for that bit! Other than having to suspend belief, I enjoyed the book quite a lot. Perhaps if I hadn't been told it was historical fiction. . . I look forward to reading Cloud Atlas.
This man is a genius. "Her smile was both nettle and dock leaf." Aaigh!!!
A bit rambling at times but overall an excellent piece of historical fiction.
Historical fiction - 1799 in Dejima, Japan's single port. The Dutch East Indies Company ship has sailed in to trade bringing clerk Jacob De Zoet. I found this well written but a little dry.
Historical fiction, well-written. Not as engaging as Cloud Atlas , or Ghostwritten. You do learn something about the introduction of western culture into insular Japan, and there is an element of mystical fantasy in the section about the weird monastery.