The Enlightenment of Katzuo Nakamatsu

4.5/5 -- An 'Enlightening' Read

This book has a certain quality to it that is hard to pinpoint, but it's beautifully written and says much about what it's like to feel like a foreigner in a land in which you were born. When Katzuo Nakamatsu is let go from his job due to "old age" he goes on a late-life journey of discovery, both of himself and his identity as a man of Japanese descent living in Peru. This manifests through long, insomnia-driven walks throughout the city, as Katzuo reflects on his neglected novel about an inspirational man he knew as a child, who he begins to embody in the way he dresses, and the poems of another man which he has been working with for his job as a professor.

Overall, this was an extremely well-written, enlightening read that offers a perspective rarely explored in literature translated into English.

P.S. I will be diving into this a bit further on my podcast ('Cafe Au Lit') on May 9th, once the title has been officially released.

After he loses his job as a literary professor, Katzuo Nakamatsu becomes a listless flaneur. He wanders the streets of Lima, meandering aimlessly, meeting with old colleagues, observing flowers in the park and experiencing intermittent mania. He leaves flowers at the grave of his dead wife; he borrows a friend's gun; he visits brothels and smells the young men's feet in their espadrilles. Suddenly without a job and any sense of purpose, he is disintegrating into gerontic lassitude—"a big old capitulating body, which would not stop oozing odors". As he wanders the city, he reflects on his ethnic status as a "Nisei", a second-generation Japanese Peruvian. He feels like an outsider, in South America, in the gardens and barrios of Lima alike, even among the coteries of professors. He remembers the days during the Second World War, the forced detention of Japanese residents and expropriation of their businesses, and he sees the pervasive legacies of that racist history. He imagines the skeptical eyes of his fellow Peruvians warily regarding him with suspicion; he feels he has no true friends and he avoids his more successful family members. He remembers his father's friend, Etsuko Untén, a former brothel-owner who had resisted the Peruvian government and then, even after the end of the war, waited for the Japanese ships to come and take them back, trapped in a permanent state of patriotic conviction (it reminds of Werner Herzog's recent novel, <i>The Twilight World</i> about a soldier who continues to believe he is fighting in the war, unaware that it has ceased). Despite Katzuo's sense of machismo and derisive comments about "the perverse homosexuals", he winds up naked before a young man exclaiming "beauty does exist".

Delirious, hallucinatory, deranged, an homage to Martin Adán's own flanerie novel <i>The Cardboard House</i>, this is a beautiful novel about an old man on the margins. It's a poetic tableau of the intersecting evils of ageism, racism and heartless economics. His enlightenment is a sad revelation of ephemeral beauty.

Translated from the Spanish by Jennifer Shyue, The Enlightenment of Katzuo Nakamatsu by Augusto Higa Oshiro tells stories and remnants of memories in a troubled mind of the main character; Katzuo Nakamatsu.

The book reads like a bunch of Google history searches for synonyms put together and is consistent until the last page. It is the kind of writing I enjoy a lot as a sucker for “no plot, just vibes” reader but it can be confusing when characters with some sense in them bring their solid and proactive existence into the paragraph. I’d love to imagine that this was what Katzuo must have felt when there is no proper leverage to balance his thoughts and his bright, bright surroundings—it’s like playing see-saw alone.

As the story progresses, we will gain insights to the origin of Katzuo’s miserable schizophrenic nightmares, sleep-walking and dissociative episodes that mostly happen in public.

Wars have been long imbedded in the “defeated” sides as forms of mysterious physical pains, sixth sense, and unexplainable insanity. Why do we say “Everyone has a war going on in them”?

Because that is literally the case. I feel my bones freeze up when I connect the dots between the fact that schizophrenia is highly hereditary in most cases and that Katzuo is a half Peruvian half Japanese man without a soil to truly plant his two wobbly “reptile feet” in.

Sustaining a Japanese community in Peru post World War II was close to impossible as a second generation. Katzuo can only dream of escaping the desire to better the community while wishing it is possible all along. My initial misunderstandings were replaced by shock, grief, sympathy even for the amount of loneliness and aloneness that do not belong.

The Enlightenment of Katzuo Nakamatsu offers the closest account of a Japanese man exiled from his second country, a job he is passionate in, a community that was fictionally warm, a ghostly ghosted family and eventually the last sane piece of himself. Reading this short fiction can be a dizzying experience and might trigger unpleasant somatic sensations especially if you are struggling yourself.

I do not want to give away too much of this brilliant work as it’s best to dive in with your very own expectations based on the title or the cover. I find it relatable, but that is just mostly of a bunch of classic symptoms of an unhealthy mind.

Katzuo’s journey towards enlightenment is ironically enlightening to the people who observes him more than he himself.

Liminal, filmic, this novel unfolds itself like cinema, capturing the wanderings (physical and mental) of its narrator as he navigates his complicated thoughts.

I loved an interesting topic of this little book. It follows a Japanese man in Peru, who is contemplating his life and identity.
As the book unfolds, thoughts, actions, routines and memories start to slowly fall in place like a puzzle. And by the end of it feels like it is story within a story, which connects at several points and essentially is still talking about this complex identity.
Beautifully written, short but definitely slow read. Might not be for everyone because of the pacing and flowy sentences it feels dark, atmospheric and yet, absorbing.

My thanks to both NetGalley and the publisher Archipelago for an advance copy of this novel on a man suddenly lost, who wanders the streets of Lima, Peru, trying to find his thoughts and himself.

Purpose is something many of us think that we have, but purpose is also something that can be easily stripped from us. For many it is a job, a job that might not not be liked, but it gives a person a reason to awaken, to get ready for the day, and to come home from. Maybe it is writing a book or a biography. This give a a person purpose. Until they have to be completed. Or maybe they are always there, as something to be gotten to, when a person has more time. Without purpose humans can get lost. That purpose was more inertia it kept the organism moving, but really where was it going. This realization, that life was purposeless, and now, inertialess, that can hurt. That can leave one lost. And wandering. The Enlightenment of Katzuo Nakamatsu by Augusto Higa Oshiro, translated from Spanish by Jennifer Shyue is the story of a man who suddenly one day finds himself at a loss, and tries to find himself by wandering thinking thoughts of lost people, places, and what might have been.

Katzuo Nakamatsu does not want to go to work this day. The school he teaches at is annoying him slightly, and he is having a hard time getting the energy up to go. Nakamatsu steps out, has a nice meal, that is interrupted by gunshots, as a boy robber is killed by a street merchant. Bumping into a friend, Nakamatsu asks what is the best way one can kill himself. Later he asks to borrow a gun to protect himself from the dangerous streets of Lima, Peru, a gun which is given over no questions asked. Arriving at work at his school Nakamatsu is informed that he is at the age of retirement, and the school is doing so. Nakamatsu does not take this well, and loses some time in arguing, threatening and having a fit. Colleagues try to calm him down, but inside Nakamatsu can hear them laughing at him, something that Nakamatsu is starting to notice happening all of the time, along with the sounds of birds that no one else seems to hear. Nakamatsu plans to work on a novel and short story, or biography on the poet Martin Adán but this comes to naught as he can not concentrate, and wanders the neighborhood at all hours, sleep also eluding him. Nakamatsu's thoughts turn to his long dead wife, growing up Japanese in Lima, and other thoughts, as he wanders, looking for a solution to his thoughts.

This is a short novel, but is a novel that hits on a lot of levels. Being lost, and adrift is something that is common to most people in the age of Covid. Things that we counted on, not being there anymore, along with a sense of mental security. Nakamatsu is an outsider, though his entire life seems to have been lived in Lima, and without his job, or wife he has no rudder to help him keep a course in the river that is life. There are many meetings, odd events, and ways to spend time. However it really is the inner life of Nakamatsu that is the best part of this novel. I'm not sure if I liked Nakamatsu, but I understood him, and why he felt so outside of everything. The writing is really good, and has lost nothing in translation that I can see, or even feel. There are scenes that in other hands would make up entire books, but here are just a paragraph, and that is enough. This is a profile of a person we pass everyday, or even worse, used to know, but haven't kept up with. A person that we always go, oh yeah, and aren't really surprised at what the fates have for them.

Not an easy book, but a very well written novel about life, and not having much of one, and of a person trying to make the best of it. I really enjoyed the writing, and felt a lot of emotions while reading, and after I finished. This is the only title I have read from Augusto Higa Oshiro, but I know it will not be the last. I book that asks a lot of questions from the reader, and changes how we look at events in our own lives.

Thank you to Archipelago and NetGalley for providing an ARC in exchange for an honest review.
The Enlightenment of Katzuo Nakamatsu follows an ousted literature professor as he
He is a flaneur: an aimless wanderer. However, Nakamatsu is far from aimless. His journey allows him to contemplate his inner thoughts and life circumstances as a second-generation Japanese Peruvian all while exploring the streets of Lima, Peru.

'For the umpteenth time he checked and confirmed the abyss of feeling alive, stricken, devastated. This is insanity, he noted with terror, and he could not fling himself down onto the avenue, could not screech, or bang against the wall, weeping over his misery.'

This is a remarkable short nove,l intriguing on so many levels, not the least being the perspective of a 2nd generation Japanese-Peruvian living in Lima, his parents having left Japan to move to Peru in around 1918. Our central character is the eponymous Katzuo Nakamatsu, a 58 year-old professor who, it's pretty fair to say, has hit an existential crisis. Reluctant to go into work, when he finally does it is to find that he is being forced to retire. Taking to the streets as a flaneur, Katzuo ponders his life, his family history, his late wife Keiko. He changes his attire to look and walk more like his favourite poet Martín Adán and his father's friend Etsuko Untén.

As the book develops we witness Katzuo's mental and physical deterioration in a flurry of dreams and visions, noted and recorded by our narrator who belatedly introduces himself into the book as a colleague and friend. There is a resolution, an end to the book, but it is the journey that is the heart of this story.

Not everyone will like the existential, philosophical and often ephemeral nature of the text. But this is exactly the kind of book that, even though it is quite short, just fills me with joy at the wonders that an author can achieve in prose. And it introduced me to the poetry of Martín Adán, which is an added bonus.

A very strong 4.5 stars, which I'm happy to round up.

(With thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for an ARC of this title.)

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for providing me with an e-arc in exchange for an honest review.
Tw: suicide attempt, violence, depression

This was a breathtakingly beautiful book, written in such a complex dizzying way that you will fall into the story and the character Katzuo Nakamatsu so much more. It was both sad and heartbreaking to read. Its certainly not for those who cant stand the slow pacing and the excruciatingly detailed writing but this was an amazing read. Learning on someone's thoughts especially a schizophrenic character can be tough to consume but it shed light on their side of story, given a place for them speak, to listen and to befriend.

Beautifully written book about a professor turned flaneur, contemplating his life and identity as a second-generation Japanese-Peruvian man who has never felt quite like he belongs in his own country. Enjoyed it a lot, thank you for this complimentary copy.

“The Enlightenment of Katzuo Nakamatzu” – Augusto Higa Oshiro

'For the umpteenth time he checked and confirmed the abyss of feeling alive, stricken, devastated. This is insanity, he noted with terror, and he could not fling himself down onto the avenue, could not screech, or bang against the wall, weeping over his misery.'

Originally published in Spanish in 2008. My thanks to @netgalley and @archipelagobooks for my copy of this one in exchange for an honest review.

A dark and engaging novella, if at times hard to follow, this book charts the title character, a professor in his late 50s living in 80s Lima. Forced out of his job, he wanders the streets lost in his own thoughts, his mind turning both back to the past and, more fearfully, towards spectres of his own demise.

It’s a labyrinthian and complex look at the effects of alienation and loss, a rumination on an immigrant experience that I had little knowledge of (early 2oth century Japanese migration to South America and specifically Peru), while also having echoes of Dostoyevsky and Ishiguro. A lot of the vignettes of the abuse and struggle of Katzuo’s family upon their arrival, coupled with the abuse they suffered during WWII, really stuck with me upon reading.

There’s a lot of watching the character try to cling to some sense of identity when much of what he has built it on is taken away. The loss of his wife, his cultural identity and, ultimately, his job forces him down a fever dream of hallucinatory trails, influenced by his favourite poet, Martin Adán, and his hugely patriotic Japanese uncle.

If this review feels like a jumble of thoughts, that’s because I’m still trying to get my head around some of the ideas here. The prose is staggeringly good at times, but also ethereal and hard to pin down. I enjoyed it, but I think others here would LOVE this book. A very interesting read, one I’m happy to recommend.

This was such a beautiful book, and it's evident how much care went into the translation. The prose was absolutely stunning, and Oshiro does a masterful job of weaving the mundane into a wonderfully complex and reflective story. As someone who loves character-drive books, I was hooked on every word.

It's rare to find a title with a nikkei protagonist, and I appreciated the discussion of this experience in Peru. This coupled with the portrayal of Katzuo's schizophrenia creates quite a philosophical, contemplative novel, but one that is greatly worth reading.