Thousand Cranes
Thousand Cranes
Author: Yasunari Kawabata
Desc: An alternate cover of this ISBN can be found here. Nobel Prize winner Yasunari Kawabata’s Thousand Cranes is a luminous story of desire regret and the almost sensual nostalgia that binds the living to the dead. While attending a traditional tea ceremony in the aftermath of his parents’ deaths Kikuji encounters his father’s former mistress Mrs. Ota. At first Kikuji is appalled by her indelicate nature but it is not long before he succumbs to passion—a passion with tragic and unforeseen consequences not just for the two lovers but also for Mrs. Ota’s daughter to whom Kikuji’s attachments soon extend. Death jealousy and attraction convene around the delicate art of the tea ceremony where every gesture is imbued with profound meaning.