Review of The Woman in the Dunes by Kobo Abe
Themes and Motifs of a Classic Japanese Novel
Apr 19, 2009
Imagine a weekend trip to the ocean, a quiet trek along a beautiful range of majestic sand dunes, and a curious village set along the edge of the sea. Sounds idyllic, doesn’t it? Now imagine missing the last bus back to the city and having to seek shelter with one of the villagers for the night. At first, you might consider this a small hiccup in an otherwise flawless holiday. Until it becomes quite clear the village has no intention of ever letting you out.
Questioning Individual Significance
Amateur entomologist Niki Junpei experiences an unwelcome surprise after being lowered by rope ladder into one of the strange village homes deep inside the sand dune. Expecting to acquire a funny story to tell back at work on Monday, he accepts his unconventional lodgings for the night only to discover in the morning that he has become a prisoner, a mate selected by the villagers for the strange, lonely woman of the dunes.
Kobo Abe’s riveting story asks Niki to face an extraordinarily difficult question. Not only does Niki slowly come to understand that the village has no intention of letting him out, but he must also come to grips with the reality that no one from his former life will ever come looking for him. He will vanish forever, without a trace. And so he must wonder whether his disappearance will actually ever matter and whether his life before coming to the dunes held any real meaning.
A Complicated Love Story
The Woman in the Dunes also revolves around Niki’s developing relationship with the village woman. She needs him to help her survive in the harsh atmosphere of the dunes. This is his only purpose and each day the two must work together to fight back the encroaching sand. But their constant interaction and the near-complete solitude of the setting bring these two strangers into an unusual affair.
Their complicated love story illustrates another of Abe’s preoccupying questions: when and how did men and women lose their ability to communicate, to connect? Abe confronts the mores of modern society through his dark and puzzling novel, asking the reader to examine their individual purpose with respect to the larger society, as well as to other individuals.
A Modern Fairytale
The Woman in the Dunes reads much like a fable. Its characters are eccentric and somewhat grotesque. The landscape is beautifully rendered, but extraordinary, and its architecture calls to mind the intricate designs of the insect kingdom Niki Junpei so lovingly studies.
Abe’s modern fairytale examines the structure and functioning of contemporary society, asks difficult questions about our role in that society and yet accomplishes this from within an engaging and complex human story. This is classic Japanese literature at its best.
The Woman in the Dunes, Vintage, 1991 (originally published 1962), 256 pp.
ISBN: 978-0679733782
