Inspector Imanishi Investigates

Although an avid reader of Nancy Drew books as a child, I've read very little fiction as an adult and fewer mystery or detective stories. Last Sunday, I picked up Inspector Imanishi Investigates and became slowly entranced.

Originally published in Japan in 1961 as Suna no Utsuwa (Vessel of Sand), the book is an amazing snapshot of life in Japan in the late 1950s. According to the jacket notes, Matsumoto is generally credited as the restorer and innovator of Japanese detective fiction following the Pacific War, (during which the government had actually banned mystery stories). In the 1950s he introduced the 'social detective story,' a police procedural that depicted society in realistic terms.

Whether or not it is a good mystery story, by 21st century standards, is more difficult for me to say. The opinions are divided on amazon.com, but most of the people there who really like it, seem to really like it for the same reason I do. It makes us nostalgic for a Japan that is quickly disappearing. It's a treasure for cultural anthropologists. I'll have to mull over it some more, but I do read quite a few books that use Japan as a setting written by foreigners in Japan. Maybe the authors spend too much time explaining, rather than just describing, but there is something slightly false about them; they don't shake the image of Japan as exotic, or themselves as outsiders. Matsumoto, of course, is writing as an insider, writing a contemporary account of modern life in the new Japan.

I was also very excited by the language of the book. Although reading it in translation, I could often "hear" the Japanese. Most of the sentences are short and simple with an emphasis on dialog rather than description. I would love to have the Japanese-language version and try to decipher it with the translation as a guide. Kudos to the translator, Beth Cary. I'm definitely going to see what else she's written.

Posted by M Sinclair Stevens
December 24, 2002

Comments

Reading your comments made me think of two things: the mystery/crime novel as a genre, and novels which lament the passing of traditional Japan. For the latter, I was intrigued by the novels of Kawabata Yasunari who committed suicide in the early 70's. His classics, among them Snow Country and The Old Capital, are also placed in modern times but deal with the theme of a Japan that is passing and nearly irretrievable. (I'm sure I've mentioned this before.) As for mystery/crime in general,I have not been a big fan of that either but in the last few years a friend introduced me to the novels of Nelson DeMille and John Grisham, both of which I have enjoyed. I particularly found Nelson Demille's Plum Island and Gold Coast very readable with good plots, well developed and psychologically interesting characters and good descriptions of settings. Alas, the last one I read didn't hold up so I am not inclined to go further.

I enjoyed your description of the Japanese crime novel though. It's great you are out there researching this stuff.

Comment by: jbl. Posted December 26, 2002 06:51 PM.

This novel did not explicitly "lament the passing of traditional Japan." Rather it describes a specific point and place in time so concretely and brings it to life so immediately to people reading it now, 50 years later, that we can't help but feel nostalgic. The writing itself, though, is in no way sentimental or longing.

The thing I enjoyed most was reading a Japanese story written to a Japanese audience. Life in Japan doesn't have to be "explained" the way it is in books written by foreigners. It just is the way it is.

Comment by: M Sinclair Stevens. Posted December 26, 2002 10:16 PM.

I have just finished reading the book, and I too found that it quickly and surely gave you a glimpse of what it would have been like to be a native japanese person living there during the late 50's...It was an excellent read.

Comment by: l Smith. Posted April 29, 2005 09:59 AM.

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