There are very few scholarly treatments of Miura's works available in English, and what few there are, are usually papers published in academic journals to which most Miura fans, and other readers (i.e. potential fans), do not have easy access. So I was very pleased when I discovered Spirit Matters: The Transcendent in Modern Japanese Literature by Philip Gabriel. Here is a review of the book which I posted on amazon:
A scholarly study of this quality and from this perspective was long overdue. I was especially captivated by the first half of the book, which discusses the works of two contemporary Japanese women authors, Miura Ayako and Sono Ayako. As a passionate fan of Miura Ayako's writing, I was thrilled to see her works taken seriously by a Western scholar, and I find it difficult to understand why it has taken so long for her to be noticed. Gabriel "gets the point" of the books he discusses, he grasps the nuances of the original Japanese, and his analysis is thoughtful, scholarly, and at the same time highly readable. I hope to see more studies of this nature in the near future.
See more reviews and book details here.
