قصة الكتاب :
Bungeishunjū (Bungei Bunko), 2010. 336 pp. ¥619. ISBN 978-4-
16-768502-7.
Seirai Yūichi
Born in Nagasaki Prefecture in 1958. Received the Bungakukai New
Writers Award in 1995 for “Jeronimo no jūjika” [Jeronimo’s Cross]
and the Akutagawa Prize in 2001 for “Seisui” [Holy Water]. Bakushin
won the Itō Sei Literary Prize and the Tanizaki Jun’ichirō Prize
in 2007. His other works include Tsukuyomi no shima [The Island
of Tsukuyomi] and Gankyū no ke [Hair in the Eyeball].

Almost all of Seirai Yūichi’s works are set in Nagasaki. However, there are two
other obvious reasons for calling him a “Nagasaki writer.” One is that his works
inherit the tragic memories of the dropping of the atomic bomb on Nagasaki on
August 9, 1945. (Seirai’s parents were bomb survivors, but he was born after the
war, so he did not witness the tragedy of the bombing himself.) The other is that
he is strongly aware of the tradition of “hidden Christians” in Nagasaki. Christianity
began to spread in Japan after the late sixteenth century through missionaries
such as Francis Xavier, but the religion was banned by the shogunate for much
of the Edo period (1603–1868). In Nagasaki and surrounding areas, however,
many people secretly held onto their faith as “hidden Christians” while being
persecuted.
These two characteristics are clearly visible in this short story collection. The
six works included in this collection are all set in contemporary Nagasaki, but they
do not directly recount people’s experiences of the bombing or their Christian
beliefs. Appearing in these stories are city folk who live in the city while harboring
problems of their own, such as a man who is haunted by delusions and ends
up murdering his beloved wife, a mentally disabled man who falls in love again
and again with women he meets, and a married woman who indulges in an illicit
love affair with a young man. In each work, however, there is a moment when
something like a memory of the land suddenly comes back. By intertwining with
the here and now of Nagasaki, these memories produce a unique world of “postatomic-
bomb literature.” (NM)