false 930 92 In this literary tour de force, novelist Arthur Golden enters a remote and shimmeringly exotic world. For the protagonist of this peerlessly observant first novel is Sayuri, one of Japan's most celebrated geisha, a woman who is both performer and courtesan, slave and goddess.<br><br>We follow Sayuri from her childhood in an impoverished fishing village, where in 1929, she is sold to a representative of a geisha house, who is drawn by the child's unusual blue-grey eyes. From there she is taken to Gion, the pleasure district of Kyoto. She is nine years old. In the years that follow, as she works to pay back the price of her purchase, Sayuri will be schooled in music and dance, learn to apply the geisha's elaborate makeup, wear elaborate kimono, and care for a coiffure so fragile that it requires a special pillow. She will also acquire a magnanimous tutor and a venomous rival. Surviving the intrigues of her trade and the upheavals of war, the resourceful Sayuri is a romantic heroine on the order of Jane Eyre and Scarlett O'Hara. And <i>Memoirs of a Geisha</i> is a triumphant work - suspenseful, and utterly persuasive.<br><br><br><i>From the Trade Paperback edition.</i> 1558965 book 1997 Memoirs of a Geisha total:174343|5:58116|4:65801|3:37109|2:9701|1:3616| 174343 688130 215797 10726 2 39 false false Tue Feb 21 00:00:00 -0800 2006 Wed Mar 26 17:12:42 -0700 2008 Wed Mar 26 17:13:46 -0700 2008 Memoirs of a Geisha is an American novel, and as such the attempt at West does East, especially on the complex and delicate subject of the geisha, is compelling, interesting, but also heavy-handed and ultimately ineffective (even more so in the case of the film). It is a wonderful introduction to ge...more...]]> 3 22 false false Sat Sep 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007 Sun Sep 09 20:19:58 -0700 2007 Sun Sep 09 20:28:12 -0700 2007 Memoirs of a Geisha is beautiful, melts lightly off the tongue and will be forgotten shortly after it's done. The language is strikingly lovely, and Golden paints a remarkable picture of a time and place.

If you're looking to learn som...more...]]> 5 16 true true Sat Mar 10 00:00:00 -0800 2007 Wed Feb 13 14:39:28 -0800 2008 Wed Feb 13 14:40:42 -0800 2008 more...]]> 4 12 false false Fri Apr 01 00:00:00 -0800 2005 Sun Apr 15 11:20:36 -0700 2007 Sun Apr 15 11:20:36 -0700 2007 more...]]> 5 7 false true Sun Sep 01 00:00:00 -0700 2002 Thu Jan 03 12:45:34 -0800 2008 Thu Jan 03 12:59:42 -0800 2008
I ...more...]]> 1 8 false true Tue Aug 19 00:00:00 -0700 2008 Wed Aug 20 15:34:05 -0700 2008 Wed Aug 20 16:01:36 -0700 2008 more...]]> 3 13 true false Tue Feb 15 00:00:00 -0800 2000 Tue May 13 17:42:04 -0700 2008 Tue May 13 17:47:32 -0700 2008
Like much of non-Asian America, I was swept up in the delight of reading this book in 2000. I was fifteen and precocious, and the narrative was arresting. I couldn't put the book down. I wrote th...more...]]> 2 8 false false Thu Jun 19 12:02:57 -0700 2008 Sat Jun 28 11:17:16 -0700 2008 more...]]> 2 5 false false Sun Jan 01 00:00:00 -0800 2006 Thu Jan 31 17:09:04 -0800 2008 Mon Feb 11 18:35:44 -0800 2008
The "memoir" of the elegant Sayuri, whose life as a high-class geisha is disrupted by the outbreak of war, is written in an intriguing and alluring monologue -- purportedly narrated by Sayuri herself to the autho...more...]]> 4 4 false false Thu Jan 01 00:00:00 -0800 2004 Fri Nov 09 14:01:57 -0800 2007 Fri Nov 09 14:25:04 -0800 2007 more...]]> 4 5 false false Thu Oct 11 10:31:45 -0700 2007 Fri Oct 12 15:24:57 -0700 2007
The culture of this book is what interested me the most. The role women played and their place in society. Although this is merely "based on actual events", I k...more...]]> 5 4 false false Mon Apr 02 12:35:34 -0700 2007 Mon Apr 02 12:38:00 -0700 2007 more...]]> 5 3 false false Thu Oct 30 05:27:18 -0700 2008 Wed Nov 19 15:57:53 -0800 2008
Memoris of a geisha is an astonishing novel that exposes the questionable secretive life of geisha specifically, and the superb Japanese c...more...]]> 4 3 false false Sat Aug 01 00:00:00 -0700 1998 Tue Aug 07 18:39:20 -0700 2007 Tue Aug 07 18:49:29 -0700 2007 more...]]> 4 3 false false Tue Nov 01 00:00:00 -0800 2005 Thu May 31 13:10:43 -0700 2007 Thu May 31 13:10:49 -0700 2007 more...]]> 2 3 false false Thu Jan 01 00:00:00 -0800 2004 Mon Dec 24 05:05:22 -0800 2007 Mon Dec 24 05:09:25 -0800 2007 True, until the second world war starts, the book's a pretty nice window into that hidden world (as much as Golden's resources allowed him to know) but beyond that this book becomes another...more...]]> 5 4 false false Wed Feb 06 12:49:13 -0800 2008 Sat Nov 08 13:55:44 -0800 2008 2 The movie wasn't as good as the novel. In fact it wasn't even that good ! I advise you to read the novel FIRST !
...more...]]> 5 3 false false Thu Nov 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007 Thu Nov 15 14:45:02 -0800 2007 Wed May 14 04:41:44 -0700 2008 more...]]> 3 2 false false Fri Aug 17 17:13:38 -0700 2007 Tue Aug 28 09:37:50 -0700 2007 more...]]> 4 2 false false Sun Jul 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007 Thu Jul 26 01:34:06 -0700 2007 Thu Jul 26 01:34:31 -0700 2007 more...]]>