Botchan

Botchan is a novel by Natsume Soseki. The narrator leaves Tokyo for his new job as a middle school teacher for Ehime. He becomes increasingly frustrated with small town drama and the behavior of his students. It starts small but the grievances escalate until...

I think the book is alright. I lack the historical context of Meiji Era literature and can only view it through modern eyes. Definitely felt the frustrations of the narrator as I too hate my job and wish I could live in Tokyo. But Botchan is a pretty flawed person, is he not? He acknowledges that he has a short temper but it feels like he isn't even trying. As an adult he should be wielding his authority more around the kids. Surely he could have lasted longer than a few days before getting pushed around by a bunch of teenagers?

One thing that surprised me was that Botchan mentions a song having the English lyrics "I am glad to see you" (chapter 9). So J-Pop had English mixed in as early as 1906...

Pilgrimage

You can go and see the stuff yourself! Everything is located in or around Matsuyama.

• The "matchbox-sized" train that the narrator rides for 3 sen (100 sen = 1 yen) is still operational, now named the Botchan Ressha
• Turner Island exists. I don't know how easy it would be to rent a boat and row over.

Created 2024-03-12. Updated 2024-07-22.

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