Natsume Soseki Soseki

Yasotaro Morri

Botchan is one of Japan's most popular novels for young people for its meditations upon Japanese culture, lively characters, and coming-of-age theme. The titular character is a young, headstrong and reckless youth who is nevertheless possessed of a serious sense of honor and integrity. Although his temper and impulsiveness create problems, Botchan's moral convictions underpin his journey: indeed, whether he will compromise his morals is the central question. After taking a job as a junior teacher in a local middle school, Botchan comes into conflict with Red Shirt; his school's eloquent but manipulative and conniving head teacher. Vying for the hand of a local beauty, Red Shirt will stop at nothing to achieve his aims, using his position and the system to undermine or defeat others. However a hot tempered but justice-seeking mathematics teacher, Yama Arashi, is determined to oppose such underhand behavior. Who will Botchan side with in the end?

A Humorous Story of Japanese Tradition and Morality in a Matsuyama on the Cusp of Modernity (Hardcover)

Botchan (Master Darling)

Natsume Sōseki

Publisher description: The setting is Japan's deep south, where the author himself spent some time teaching English in a boys' school. Into this conservative world, with its social proprieties and established pecking order, breezes Botchan, down from the big city, with scant respect for either his elders or his noisy young charges; and the result is a chain of collisions large and small.

Botchan

— lae

a very odd book. i love men who id probably hate if i knew them in real life.
this book is old and presents a different japan than today, which you see in the book, and which i really liked! it was super super interesting to read, and though lots of people say the protagonist isn’t likeable, i don’t think that’s needed. 

it’s a very slice of life, coming of age book. reading this book, you have to be willing to indulge in the life of a random previously rich teacher. for me, it was super interesting, given the era it played in etc. 

i really really enjoyed this. if you like books set in older times and reading about daily life of an era you don’t live in, then this book can hit the spot.

Natsume Sōseki

Among the classics of modern Japanese literature, Botchan is probably the most frequently read novel and the most often anthologized work in Japan. Its action is set in the 1890's, during the Meiji Restoration, when Japan was making its cataclysmic metamorphosis from a cloistered feudal state to a major modern world power. The novel focuses on a few months in the experience of a neophyte teacher nicknamed Botchan (young master). Born and educated in Tokyo, he has accepted a job teaching mathematics at a middle school in provincial Shikoku. Botchan's personality, values, and Tokyo manners clash with those of his new environment, and out of this conflict Sseki spins a comic tale that satirizes contemporary Japanese mores. The novel is narrated in the first person, and a substantial portion of its humor stems from Botchan's verbose and vigorous Tokyo dialect, which, by all accounts, Sseki has brilliantly captured.From his earliest childhood days, Botchan has been an impulsive and reckless scapegrace. He leaps from the upstairs window of his elementary school on a dare, fights with a neighbor boy in the middle of a vegetable garden, thus devastating it, and blocks up another neighbor's irrigation source out of sheer curiosity. Botchan's father dislikes him. Botchan's elder brother blames him for hastening their mother's death by his rowdiness. Through it all, Botchan grows into an unabashed and defiant individualist. Indeed, stubbornness, recklessness, and candor become marks of Botchan's character.

(Annotated Edition)

Stef

"The world seemed to be composed solely of impostors and schemers who were ever trying to scheme against, and impose upon, one another. Disgusted at this, I got tired of the world; I began to curse life itself."

Another best read this month. Bener-bener suka sama karakter nya Botchan, meski bukan karakter utama yang sempurna tapi kepribadian dan prinsip hidup nya benar-benar panutan. Ah, sedikit menyesal baru membaca buku ini sekarang. Semua karakter dan cerita meski di ceritakan dgn setting Jepang jaman dahulu, tapi masih saja related dengan permasalahan dan karakter manusia jaman sekarang.

nonchi

Natsume Soseki

A Comic Japanese Novel “One may be branded foolishly honest if he takes seriously the apologies others might offer. We should regard all apologies a sham and forgiving also as a sham; then everything would be all right. If one wants to make another apologize from his heart, he has to pound him good and strong until he begs for mercy from his heart” ― Natsume Sōseki, Botchan Botchan by Natsume Sōseki is a classic Japanese coming of age novel about a young man who is sent from Tokyo to the countryside to teach mathematics at a middle school. This Xist Classics edition has been professionally formatted for e-readers with a linked table of contents. This eBook also contains a bonus book club leadership guide and discussion questions. We hope you’ll share this book with your friends, neighbors and colleagues and can’t wait to hear what you have to say about it.

Dinda

Buku ini menceritakan kondisi wilayah pedesaan di Jepang melalui pikiran pemuda Tokyo yang masih polos, namun berusaha mencari kebenaran dan keadilan, kemudian berani untuk bertindak benar. Dunia digambarkan kejam, dikuasai oleh orang-orang jahat, dan orang-orang baik disingkirkan.

Awal baca aku berfikir bahwa buku ini tidak menginspirasi sama sekali dan jalan ceritanya bikin aku bosan. Tokoh utamanya ceroboh, bertindak terlalu gegabah dan cepat percaya dengan perkataan setiap orang (tapi kemudian aku sadar kalo itu cara penulis menyampaikan kepolosan karakternya). Sempat berhenti baca beberapa hari. Tapi untungnya bagian tengah bisa mengantar aku sampai ke bagian akhir karena cukup menarik dengan konflik-konflik dan kejenakaan yang ada.

Pada akhirnya, penulis mencoba memberitahu bahwa kejahatan pada diri manusia itu nggak ada silver bullet-nya, tapi kita tetap tidak boleh menyerah untuk menegakkan keadilan.
Kutipan yang paling aku suka di buku ini: "Tidak ada yang lebih tidak bisa dipercaya daripada manusia".

Botchan (1906) is a novel by Natsume Sōseki. Inspired by his experience as a teacher on the island of Shikoko, Sōseki composed a beloved tale of growth and moral decency that continues to be read in Japan and around the world to this day. Filled with humorous asides and heartwarming scenes, Botchan is a classic bildungsroman from one of Japan's most successful twentieth century writers. Ever since his childhood days in Tokyo, Botchan has experienced bouts of "hereditary recklessness," an inability to think and act as others expect him to. Frequently injured, always in trouble, he develops a reputation in his neighborhood as a young rapscallion, a misfit at home and in school. When his mother dies unexpectedly, Botchan is raised by Kiyo, his family's elderly servant, who sees something in him no one else has been able to recognize. Through positive reinforcement and a focus on fostering good morals, she helps Botchan achieve a certain amount of respectability without forcing him to sacrifice his fiercely independent nature. He excels in school and finds a job as a middle school math teacher on the island of Shikoku. Thinking the days of schoolyard drama are behind him, he is surprised to discover that the antics and conflicts inherent to boyhood are rampant among his fellow teachers. Joining forces with Porcupine, he sets out to dethrone head teacher Red Shirt, who indiscriminately wields his power over colleagues and students alike. Hilarious and eminently human, Botchan is a beloved story of class, morality, and conflict from a master of Japanese fiction. With a beautifully designed cover and professionally typeset manuscript, this edition of Natsume Sōseki's Botchan is a classic work of Japanese literature reimagined for modern readers.

Botchan (Master Darling) A Humorous Story of Japanese Tradition and Morality in a Matsuyama on the Cusp of Modernity (Hardcover)

Reviews