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Reviews by Contributor: Ogawa, Yoko (4)

It’s So Simple

The Housekeeper and the Professor: A Novel

By Yoko Ogawa  (Translated by Stephen Snyder)

7 Jun, 2023

Translation

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Yōko Ogawa’s 2003 The Housekeeper and the Professor: A Novel is a stand-alone mainstream novel about … a housekeeper and a professor. The 2009 translation is by Stephen Snyder.

The housekeeper, a hard-working single mother, is used to Akebono Housekeeping Agency’s frequent reassignments. Her latest client has very particular needs, needs that previous domestic staff struggled to meet. Will the housekeeper be successful where others failed or will she be another anonymous face in a succession of housekeepers?


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Gray Fog

The Memory Police

By Yoko Ogawa  

16 Jun, 2021

Translation

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Yoko Ogawa’s 1994 dystopic The Memory Police: A Novel was originally published under the title Hisoyaka na kesshō. The 2019 translation is by Stephen Snyder.

Life on the island is a process of slow erosion, as memory after memory is stripped from the inhabitants. Escape is impossible; among the memories lost is any recollection of seafaring. 

A minority are seemingly immune to this process. No worries! Where there is some natural immunity, the Memory Police intervene without fail or mercy.


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