That only made the boundary between the skin of ourentwined bodies even hazier. She endures this at first but later partakes in it, finding herself pulled into her husbands orbithis daily consumption of variety shows and deep-fried food. Her books have . He pulled the strip of squid from his mouth, and said, Itsbecause youre a housewife, San. . Motoya's stories tend to include a few odd details and features -- often contrasting with the seeming . . Or: What really would have happened if Id gotten on the roller coaster that day? [26], Nobuko Tanaka of The Japan Times has called Motoya "the darling of Japanese media" for her frequent contributions to Japanese magazines, television, and radio. He has received fellowships from the Edward Albee Foundation and the Ucross Foundation. Excitement becomes execution. Strangely, too, the men Id been with had all wanted me to grow in them. [21] Nilanjana Roy, in her review for the Financial Times, concluded that "Yukiko Motoyas shivery, murmuring voice will never completely leave you". Any changes made can be done at any time and will become effective at the end of the trial period, allowing you to retain full access for 4 weeks, even if you downgrade or cancel. or Main | the New | the Best | the Rest | Review Index | Links, Twelve stories from collections originally published in Japanese in 2015 and 2016, "Her characters seem to be searching for the strangest, and most estranged, parts of themselves. By emphasizing a characteristic nimbleness in Japanese storytelling, Mockett draws attention to these often-invisible constructs; she shows, using examples from a number of childrens stories, the ways in which the rigid archetypes that we learn to recognize as we grow upexpectations of character or plot; the solid demarcations of good or evilcan be blurred into something more delightfully nebulous than the western canon prepares us for. and then the short story "The Exotic Marriage" is a whopping eighty five pages long. Touch one and see, he said, so I tried pressing on a browndisc with my finger. Every time I noticed myself acting as though that was who Id been all along, a chill went up my spine, she confesses. Motoya's stories tend to include a few odd details and features -- often contrasting with the seeming normality of the narration, a mix of the absurd and matter-of-fact mundane. I waited for something else to happen, but that was it. So, for example, the husband in 'The Straw Husband', in a relationship otherwise most like any other, is really made of straw ("yes, that straw, stalks of dried rice or wheat, plant matter used as fodder for farm animals, or for bedding -- tied into bundles and rolled into a human shape"), while the narrator of 'The Dogs' describes how: "I didn't like beds, so I slept standing up, leaning against the windowsill" (apparently every night). Readers who are familiar with Japanese folklore, manga, or anime will probably find some of the themes to be mundane - there is much reminiscent of Rumiko Takahashi in the more fantastic stories, like The Dogs or An Exotic Marriage. But after four years, I hadnttried to escape from the soil that was my husband. The Lonesome Bodybuilder by Yukiko Motoya / Soft Skull Press / 224 pages / 978-1593766788 / 2018. I took a mouthful of grilled eel seasoned with plenty of sansho pepper. Motoyas characters suffer from a deeper affliction than alienation; theyre often lost in relationships and attempting to carve out identities amid ambivalence. can lose themselves to mundanity and wrestle to reclaim their selfhood is best illustrated in the novella-length "An Exotic Marriage . Her books have been published in French and Norwegian . The Lake Hamana eel was firmer and more succulent than the one from the Mikawa region. In the collection's longest and scariest story, "An Exotic Marriage," Motoya, through her narrator, lands a flurry of punches against the oppressive domesticity . "In Yukiko Motoya's delightful new story collection, the familiar becomes unfamiliar . I wasexpecting some cutting-edge visual effects, but what I saw wasan image representing what looked like oceans and continents,drawn in simple lines like in old Nintendo games. Her husbands features are always shifting on his face, and soon he resembles, variously, a monster, a snake, a new creature, his wife, and then, finally, a mountain peony. [29] As of 2017 she is co-host of the Fuji TV documentary series 7 Rules. Wilson Josephson is a young sapling spreading his roots in southern Minnesota. Motoyas protagonists feel quietly radical in a literary moment that seems particularly interested in unpacking various forms of narcissism. Remember?. He seemed not to realize that anything was amiss, and simplylooked at me with his terrifyingly wide-set eyes, and said, Are they all gone?. From The Lonesome Bodybuilder. Her only companionship comes from a pack of mysterious dogs that, unbeknownst to her, terrorize the nearby village until there is no one left. You should be careful, her neighbor tells her. Each of these titles represents an energizing alternative to the ripped-apart illogic of our contemporary reality. Motoyas book beguiles with its reversals: the bodybuilders husband may be unobservant to the point of eeriness, but, as it turns out, she is the shape-shifter, the trickster. I thought perhaps the gamegot more interesting the longer you played, but whenever I lookedover my husbands shoulder, the screen always looked the same. Id expected marriage to be an even more constricting flowerpot than my previous relationships. You can have two slices of my steak if you give me some ofyour eel.. On Midwest Gothic by Laura Donnelly. The Kenyon Review is supported in part by The National Endowment for the Arts and the Ohio Arts Council. The author reaches, with language, toward a reader who may or may not be there. I wanted to pretend I was asleep, but then he wentto switch on the light, so I reached out and caught his hand almostby reflex. Translated by Asa Yoneda. was published in 2005. I saw it on the local news the other day. Previously, her translated stories have appeared in GRANTA and CATAPULT . Motoya was born in Hakusan, Ishikawa. After moving to Tokyo to study drama, she started the Motoya Yukiko Theater Company, whose plays she wrote and directed. This sense of unpredictability traverses the entire collection, and yet the stories rarely seem desultory. Translated by Asa Yoneda. To revisit this article, select My Account, thenView saved stories, To revisit this article, visit My Profile, then View saved stories, Many unusual things happen in The Lonesome Bodybuilder, a new collection by the Japanese author Yukiko Motoya. April 2021 Micro-Reviews, Amanda Auerbach And so it is throughout: all these husbands are brutally banal in their ignorance, their apathies, and their cruelties. So, for example, in the (US-)title story the narrator is inspired to take up bodybuilding, sculpting her body through intense exercise, after catching a boxing match her husband was watching on TV. [5] It became the title story of a 2003 collection published by Kodansha. Such endings introduce a kind of ontological flexibility into the very structure of the storythey bring an essential playfulness to the work that is much more engaging and absorbing than a more rigid finale. . Standard Digital includes access to a wealth of global news, analysis and expert opinion. Soft Skull Press. In Yukiko Motoya's delightful new story collection, the familiar becomes unfamiliar. No one in Yukiko Motoyas new story collection, The Lonesome Bodybuilder, appears capable of seeing herself in the mirror. Her novel Funuke domo kanashimi no ai o misero (Funuke Show Some Love, You Losers!) THE LONESOME BODYBUILDER: STORIES by Yukiko Motoya, Tr. Motoya wards off fatigue by peppering this buffet of patriarchal cruelty with humorsurprising enough and sharp enough to elicit as many belly laughs as grimaces while reading. Malleability can imply a womans weakness, or it can imply power. The collection is more hits than misses, but a few stories, like Paprika Jiro and Typhoon, skew too quirky and become trivial, though theyre buoyant with fancy. [8], Motoya's novel Ikiteru dake de ai (Love at Least), about an unemployed and apparently depressed woman's relationship with her boyfriend, was published in 2006 by Shinchosha. In Front of Strangers I Sing: The Strange Intimacy of Paul Celan, Benjamin Hedin In the novella-length "An Exotic Marriage," San is concerned about her husband's increasing lassitude about work, and her perception that his facial . In 'Typhoon' people take flight with their umbrellas in a great storm -- so many that eventually the narrator finds: "as I scanned the sky, I spotted loads of tiny human figures floating among the dark clouds". But I guess that cant be right. The narrator is surprised, but not at the transformationshe just never knew he wanted that. In spite ofin fact, because ofher affection for the odd and comic, Motoyas stories grant sobering insights into the compromises of love and marriage, the fraught pursuit of art and desire, and the dangers of becoming stuck in the wrong version of your life. Matthew D. Rodrigues's writing has appeared in Quill & Quire, The Hedgehog Review, and Fandor. Some Googling I did found out that this was actually published as a novella . Only when you begin reading, when the . The stories are funny and creepy; they have a campfire vibe, a brush of the moonless night. It featured eel sourced from the Shimanto River, Lake Hamana,the Mikawa region, and Miyazaki Prefecture, grilled bothwith sauce and without. In The Straw Husband, the narrators husband is just that, straw, but his composition is less concerning than his inordinate devotion to his car. On If by Song by Marcia Karp, Brian Chander Wiora Motoya Yukiko, general information | review summaries | our review | links | about the author. 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