Kiyoko Murata’s absorbing, slice-of-life novel is a meticulous depiction of the everyday lives of women living and working in the designated “pleasure districts” of Meiji era Japan. Murata’s focus is on Aoi Ichi, a teenage girl who’s essentially been sold into prostitution by her parents – a comparatively common way of making money for impoverished families. It’s 1903 and Ichi’s been dispatched from her small island community to the upmarket, Shinonome brothel in the Kumamoto quarter of Kyushu – similar to Tokyo’s famous Yoshiwara district. The brothel operates a society in miniature, with its own rules and concept of morality. Here what might be extraordinary in another context, murder, disease, suicide, is just background noise to the realities of existence for women of the brothel; girls suddenly have more worth than boys, and lies are often seen as more virtuous than truth. Every woman is strictly ranked, a hierarchy based on notions of beauty and acquired skills, from the lowly y?jo or woman of pleasure to the elevated, accomplished oirans, the highest-ranking courtesans.

The most celebrated courtesan at Ichi’s brothel is Shinonome, named after the brothel, a title that reduces her to a prized commodity, key representative of the house’s brand. Ichi is one of the select few chosen for special training by Shinonome, considered attractive enough to be a future oiran. Although Ichi’s rebellious nature soon becomes an obstacle, Ichi is sent with other trainees to the local Female Industrial School. There she becomes a student of Tetsuko an older prostitute, one of the few of her peers who’s dodged death by disease, suicide or violence. Murata delves into the minutiae of Ichi’s enclosed world, where women are regarded as more valuable than an overflowing wallet, carefully supervised, unable to go outside without permission, immersed in specialist training, from sexual techniques to poetry writing to sophisticated speech, all ways to increase earning potential. Menstruation is a welcome form of escape, because it results in a regular ‘red silk’ holiday.

Murata is less interested in plot or character here than in historical events and in the day-to-day experiences of Ichi and women her. She deliberately sets her story in the run-up to the real-life, courtesan strike of 1904, partly inspired by news of general industrial unrest and the devastating impact of a faltering economy on many people’s livelihoods. Ichi and her fellow workers follow the progress of the Nagasaki shipyard strikes, and wonder if they too might be able to fight for better conditions. The brothel not only uses them to pay off family debt or further loans but charges inflated prices for food, tobacco and other necessities. Murata’s narrative features a mix of lyrical and docu-style prose, as well as striking imagery. Although, and I’m not sure how far this relates to translation decisions, some of the more informal passages are a little jarring – ‘hot sex’ for ‘penis’ is a prime example. But, despite minor flaws, I found this fascinating. I d the way that Murata uses her narrative to reflect on broader social and political issues during this moment of change: a time in which legal shifts, spurred on by pressure groups, including a growing workers' and women’s movement, offered up the possibility of liberation for sex workers Ichi. Although Murata is widely acclaimed in Japan, where she’s won multiple awards for her fiction, as well as worked with directors Kurosawa, this is the first of her books to be available in English, I look forward to more. Translated by Juliet Winters Carpenter.

Thanks to Netgalley and publisher Footnote Press for an ARC

Rating: 3.5contemporary-fiction japan netgalley-arc ...more49 s2 comments Roman Clodia2,615 3,547

I found the material fascinating in this story of young Japanese girls sold into prostitution by their poor families but this worked less well as a novel for me. Set in 1903, the main character is Ichi who is spirited and also naive: short extracts from her diary light up each chapter with her quirky take on life in a brothel and I could easily have read more in this format.

But the book shifts between background and history (such as the legal regulations on prostitution) and the story of Ichi and her fellow sex workers. Their day to day lives, the record of their 'training', the two men a day, the medical exams and diseases, the way the 'debt' works is told in the kind of granular detail I wanted - but, somehow, the story got left out. There is a last minute strike against bad conditions but there isn't really pace and momentum.

Nevertheless, this remains an intriguing insight into a horrific practice: that families are so poor they're forced to sell their daughters into prostitution, sometimes having to add to the debt again. It's also interesting that when prostitutes get pregnant, it's the girl children who have value, cutting against the more usual patriarchal system - though, of course, this is because the girls can be brought up to work in the brothel. It's worth noting too that the 'pleasure' of the title is the one these women have to give to men.

So I found all the details of this enclosed world absorbing, but the writing could be a little dry and most of the characters are no more than names. Ichi stands out for her difference and her love for the island from which she has been exiled but the fiction elements are distinctly downplayed.

Thanks to Footnote Press for an ARC via Netgalley netgalley women-in-translation28 s Sofia1,234 248

Set in Japan 1903, inspired by the courtesan strike, Murata takes us on a journey with Aoi Ichi, who is indentured into a brothel at a tender age because of family debt.

The pleasure mentioned here is not a pleasure this woman or other women feels. The pleasure is solely that of the buyer, the man, in the case, who makes use of the woman, and that of the brothel owners who make money out of such sales of pleasure.

Murata is a great storyteller who is an artist able to measure her words and choose the right ones. Her novel is a haiku. It's words are measured and accurately placed to create the right feeling, create the right images that pertain to the story of these prostitutes and the work that they are forced into by their own loved ones. A tragic reality that they have to bow down to until..........

An ARC gently provided by author/publisher via Netgalley.2024 arc-netgalley25 s Willow Heath227 1,104 Read

Set in 1903, during the Meiji Restoration of Japan, A Woman of Pleasure is a feminist novel that paints a vivid picture of the lives of courtesans. The novel primarily follows Aoi Ichi, a girl from a poor island community sold, so many girls her age, by her impoverished parents. Through Ichi's eyes, we learn about the world of courtesans in post-Sengoku Japan, and we meet women who struggle, fall, and fight back.

My full thoughts: https://booksandbao.com/japanese-lite...20 s Afi (WhatAfiReads)519 349

"Leaving meant stepping into hell, but staying was another kind of hell. Each woman had to decide for herself what hell to choose."

What a book.
This book had left me with all sorts of feelings. It made me sad, it made me angry and it made me laugh, bust most of all, it left me with a feeling of guilt and also hope. A hope for something bigger to come, even if we are still far from it.

The prose of the book feels simple and straightforward. We follow the narration from a 15 year old Aoi, who had been sold as a prostitute by her family at a brothel. There we go through the lives of hers as she grew up, the female friendship that was formed, the betrayal from someone that was supposed to protect you and about freedom. I really d that we went through this book from the lenses of a child. Its a reflection of the cruel society and how women were forced to sell their bodies even if its against their will.

Reading this reminded me a lot of the Indian Movie -Gangubai Kathiawadi - where the premise sets at a red light district in Mumbai. And the key to freedom, in both the movie and the book, is education. The privilege to have education and to even be educated - as without having learning to write, read and count, there will be no freedom for a person. I absolutely loved the solidarity of the women in this book and it made me feel thankful for the privilege that I had with my education.

I feel that if you are new to japanese literature and wants to try going into the genre without it being too heavy - I would definitely recommend this book. Not only that the proses are simple, I d that the critics for the government and social class is subtly intertwined but it is prominent. And at the end of the day, since this story is based on true events and in par with our reality now - to make a change, there needs to be a resistance. The fight for human rights and equality is a never ending journey and this book will be one of the books that I will remember for a very very long time.

Highly recommended!

Personal Ratings : 4.5
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