Banana Yoshimoto

哀しい予感

The internationally beloved author of Kitchen and Dead-End Memories returns with a beautiful and heartfelt story of a young woman haunted by her childhood and the inescapable bitterness that inevitably comes from knowing the truth Yayoi, a nineteen-year-old woman from a seemingly loving middle-class family, has lately been haunted by the feeling that she has forgotten something important from her childhood. Her premonition grows stronger day by day and, as if led by it, she decides to move in with her mysterious aunt, Yukino. No one understands her aunt’s unusual lifestyle. For as long as Yayoi can remember, Yukino has lived alone in an old gloomy single-family home, quietly, almost as though asleep. When she is not working, Yukino spends all day in her pajamas, clipping her nails and trimming her split ends. She eats only when she feels like it, and she often falls asleep lying on her side in the hallway. She sometimes wakes Yayoi at two in the morning to be her drinking companion, sometimes serves flan in a huge mixing bowl for dinner, and watches Friday the 13th over and over to comfort herself. A study desk, old stuffed animals––things Yukino wants to forget––are piled up in her backyard like a graveyard of her memories. An instant bestseller in Japan when first published in 1988, The Premonition is finally available for the first time in English, translated by the celebrated Asa Yoneda.

A Novel

The Premonition

joana ashley

Love wasn't like anything else - it was a creature with a mind of its own. There was no stopping it now. 

I felt like we were talking about something very unhappy. Every word that came out of my mouth seemed as white and cold as the stones on the shore of the mythical Sanzu River which led to the afterlife. I felt distant, in every dimension, from where hearts beat and blood flowed, from things like life and death, and home and family... and love... 

"Take the whole pot, with the umbrella and all, and throw it out in the yard. Then just stay inside for the day. It's raining, after all," she said, and retreated back under the covers. 

I gave up and took the heavy pot around to the back of the house like I'd been told. Striding through wet weeds that came up to my knees, I saw the back of the ramshackle house for the first time. It was in total disrepair. On top of that, the yard was full of a hair-raisingly large pile of things that my aunt had previously decided to forget, abandoned to the rain. It was hard to even fathom how long she had been throwing things away there. All manner of things she had haphazardly tossed onto the pile so she could avoid having to look at or think about them ever again-

Elisa

The reason these things still came across as somehow being virtues, I thought, was because my aunt was beautiful. She had pretty features, but in that sense, there were plenty of people more attractive than her. What made her beautiful to me was more like a specific mood whose tendrils pervaded everything, from the way she moved to the way she passed her days to the fleeting expressions that passed across her face when some- thing happened. The feeling was so stubbornly consistent that it seemed unshakable, like something that would continue, untouched, all the way until the end of the world. It made her seem strangely beautiful no matter what she was doing. The vacant yet bright light she gave off filled the space around her. When she lowered her long eyelashes and rubbed her eyes sleepily, she was as dazzling to me as an angel, and when she sat on the floor with her legs sprawled carelessly in front of her, her slender ankles were as smooth and neat as a marble sculpture's. 

I grieve for the clarity of that time I had with my aunt- how lucky I was to share that space with her during a sliver of time that had appeared only by sheer chance. It was over now, but it had to be. In coming to an end, it had given me something, and only by making my way through was I able to begin to live the rest of my life.

SF. Sutcliffe 

liked the story but the relationships between the girl and her adopted brother as well as the sister and her high school student were weird and too normalised

Thea Sophie

The premise and writing style was good! Personally couldnt get over the emotional incest tho... I mean you find out you're not blood related with your brother and the first thing you think: oh yea, lets kiss and start a life together????!?? Here I thought this was a wholesome sibling dynamic and then.. this?

Milo

“We were in love, but he smiled at me again, looking like my brother.”

lauren

“We were in love, but he smiled at me again, looking like my brother.”

How beautiful 🥺🥺

i felt like i was dreaming while i was reading this. it was such a fun story to follow that kept me interested the whole time due to how short it was lol. love banana yoshimoto sm 

march🐇

i wanted to stop reading this at so many points but it was as if it had a hand in my hair forcing me to watch as cars collided from opposing lanes—only for a third one to swerve from a hidden alley and slam into them both. but maybe that’s too violent an image for what this actually did to me. it was more like watching a polaroid develop. at first the appeal was the fadedness of it, the before-ness, all light and shape. banana yoshimoto’s prose, and asa yoneda’s translation of it, was like skimming a hand over that image and my fingers passing into and through. then the colours started bleeding in, faint at first, and what you’re seeing is not what should have been normal to expect, uncomfortable, but it’s not like an image can will itself out of being an image, and in the end there’s no looking away from a sight your eyes have already completed inside your mind before it even finished forming in front of you. 

i do think it’s a testament to the atmosphere this blanketed me in that despite all the bizarre discomfort of the novel’s romantic relationships, that surreal feeling never wavered. 

 suspended me in the weightless air of a dream, and the writing shone brightest in mundanity: descriptions of the weather, yayoi’s grasping for memories she didn’t know where she had placed, a manic pixie dream house, and the instances where yayoi seemed to become intangible as she sunk into her nostalgia and the haziness that her supernatural abilities lent her reality. it was nice to live in her melancholy for the brief transition from summer to fall.

i wanted to stop reading this at so many points but it was as if it had a hand in my hair forcing me to watch as cars collided from opposing lanes—only for a third one to swerve from a hidden alley and slam into them both. but maybe that’s too violent an image for what this actually did to me. it was more like watching a polaroid develop. at first the appeal was the fadedness of it, the before-ness, all light and shape. banana yoshimoto’s prose, and asa yoneda’s translation of it, was like skimming a hand over that image and my fingers passing into and through. then the colours started bleeding in, faint at first, and what you’re seeing is not what should have been normal to expect, uncomfortable, but it’s not like an image can will itself out of being an image, and in the end there’s no looking away from a sight your eyes have already completed inside your mind before it even finished forming in front of you. 

i do think it’s a testament to the atmosphere this blanketed me in that despite all the bizarre discomfort of the novel’s romantic relationships, that surreal feeling never wavered. the premonition suspended me in the weightless air of a dream, and the writing shone brightest in mundanity: descriptions of the weather, yayoi’s grasping for memories she didn’t know where she had placed, a manic pixie dream house, and the instances where yayoi seemed to become intangible as she sunk into her nostalgia and the haziness that her supernatural abilities lent her reality. it was nice to live in her melancholy for the brief transition from summer to fall.

I devoured this in one sitting this afternoon and loved it. Published in Japan back in 1988 but only last year in an English translation (and a wonderful one at that, by Asa Yoneda), it will now make me seek out the few Banana Yoshimoto books I haven't read yet. 

Mario Menti 

This book is written the way it feels to experience dreams. They're nonsensical and appear random. But meaning can still be derived. (What is this meaning? Come back to me later) It felt dissociative reading about Yayoi's journey leaping between two realms of two lives she previously did not realize - or remember - she had. 

I enjoyed this experience very much, lost in the space of dreams trapped within pages. That is my main takeaway. I was very much here for the ride. And I'm very satisfied with that. 

This book is written the way it feels to experience dreams. They're nonsensical and appear random. But meaning can still be derived. (What is this meaning? Come back to me later) It felt dissociative reading about Yayoi's journey leaping between two realms of two lives she previously did not realize - or remember - she had. 

I enjoyed this experience very much, lost in the space of dreams trapped within pages. That is my main takeaway. I was very much here for the ride. And I'm very satisfied with that. 

the plot seemed really interesting at first since it has a bit of mystery in it, but unfortunately, it didn't live up to my expectations. plus, the incest and student-teacher relationship gave me the biggest ick.

the descriptions were dreamlike, almost like a moment suspended in time & space, and the story unfurled almost like memory as well — a little like we were filling in the blanks here and there. remembering alongside yayoi.

i was also left ??? by the romantic relationships here but in a way it contributes to the overall nostalgia n sentiment of the narrator bleeding through in the book. like they too were things that should be looked upon and remembered fondly but not dwelled upon for too long

karina

the descriptions were dreamlike, almost like a moment suspended in time & space, and the story unfurled almost like memory as well — a little like we were filling in the blanks here and there. remembering alongside yayoi.

i was also left ??? by the romantic relationships here but in a way it contributes to the overall nostalgia n sentiment of the narrator bleeding through in the book. like they too were things that should be looked upon and remembered fondly but not dwelled upon for too long

I loved the beggining of the book so much, I was dreading the moment I would end it. However, I am quite confused about the romances (I disliked it, a lot) and it took away the magic the book had for me... 

Very subtle and dreamy writing by Banana Yoshimoto. Every words, every emotions and inner thoughts, running through my head clearly and as calmly as the stream during the summer.

shuf

This was good until it got very weird in a very not-good way (multiple very inappropriate relationships).

Rana Sulieman

I’m still a little iffy about how I feel about the romance in it but the recollection of what never was from what is was quite good. 

Diana 

I romanzi di B.Y. vengono davvero amati e compresi da chi, amante della cultura giapponese, in particolare modo, vi ritrova elementi tipici della spiritualità eclettica giapponese: il rapporto con la natura e con gli esseri spirituali che la abitano, le prove emotive da superare con la sola forza interiore, la purezza dei sentimenti, l'accettazione del ''nulla''. 
La semplicità, la scelta misurata delle parole, il districarsi di pensieri, i riferimenti alla vita quotidiana sono punti riscontrabili in molti romanzi dell'autrice. 
Si ha la sensazione, leggendo, che la trama sia sospesa che, aldilà di quella semplicità, venga celato qualcosa di più profondo. Questo connubio di semplicità e di mistero può far risultare incompleta o banale la narrazione. Abituati, forse, a dire esattamente cosa si pensa, mostrando chiarezza e coerenza, noi occidentali forse dimentichiamo la spontaneità di gesti o pensieri.
Il mio errore forse è stato quello di leggerlo nel momento sbagliato, con superficialità. Cercando coerenza logica, ho apprezzato poco la trama e i personaggi.
Consiglio altri della scrittrice, come L'abito di piume, dove vi è la medesima dolcezza nelle parole, ma la storia è più avvincente.

哀しい予感

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