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61st out of 184 books
—
101 voters
The Ruined Map
Of all the great Japanese novelists, Kobe Abe was indubitably the most versatile. With The Ruined Map, he crafted a mesmerizing literary crime novel that combines the narrative suspense of Chandler with the psychological depth of Dostoevsky.
Mr. Nemuro, a respected salesman, disappeared over half a year ago, but only now does his alluring yet alcoholic wife hire a private e...more
Mr. Nemuro, a respected salesman, disappeared over half a year ago, but only now does his alluring yet alcoholic wife hire a private e...more
Paperback, 304 pages
Published
December 4th 2001
by Vintage
(first published 1967)
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May 25, 2009
Amy
rated it
3 of 5 stars
Recommended to Amy by:
Rough Guide to Cult Fiction
Shelves:
cult-fiction
For me, the highlights of The Box Man had to do with the level of weirdness combined with a comment on identity and dropping-out of society. These themes come up often in the films I have seen based on Abe novels as well (Woman in the Dunes, Face of Another) Unfortunately, The Ruined Map is quite lacking in every way.
This time Abe presents us with a fairly straightforward mystery. There are a couple of diversions into bizarre Japanese underworld territories, but overall these didn't really captu...more
This time Abe presents us with a fairly straightforward mystery. There are a couple of diversions into bizarre Japanese underworld territories, but overall these didn't really captu...more
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Nov 08, 2008
Matthew
rated it
1 of 5 stars
Recommends it for:
self-important existencialists
Shelves:
japan
This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it,
click here.
I hadn't read a novel by Kobo Abe before, but was intrigued by the cover of the Vintage International Edition of The Ruined Map. And when I read the back it piqued my interest: "In Ruined Map, Kobo Abe fashioned a literary crime novel that combines the narrative suspense of Chandler with the surreal imagery of Kafka and the psychological acuity of Dostoevsky."
I'm finding that I have trouble appreciating surrealism these days (see my bafflement with Buenel films). I found it interesting, but inex...more
I'm finding that I have trouble appreciating surrealism these days (see my bafflement with Buenel films). I found it interesting, but inex...more
I read Kobo Abe's "The Ruined Map" in Russian translation, so some of my comments below may or may not find relevance in any English translations.
Something intrinsic to Kobe Abe's writing is a deep-rooted undercurrent of psychological weight that seems to hang on for an indefinite time after finishing any of his works. Having read this a little over a year ago, I can still recall fairly easily the discomfort and a sort of quiet anxiety when reading "The Ruined Map".
I noticed that a few readers r...more
Something intrinsic to Kobe Abe's writing is a deep-rooted undercurrent of psychological weight that seems to hang on for an indefinite time after finishing any of his works. Having read this a little over a year ago, I can still recall fairly easily the discomfort and a sort of quiet anxiety when reading "The Ruined Map".
I noticed that a few readers r...more
One of most inviting aspects to reading The Ruined Map (1966) is that it is, essentially, a mystery novel. There is a desire harbored in the heart of every devotee of contemporary literature who began life as a fan of genre fiction, be it mystery, western, or science fiction; and that is to see an established literary master direct his skills to one's beloved genre, to enrich and redeem it with a creation that is elegant, thoughtful, and most of all, literary. The Ruined Map satisfies this cravi...more
I rarely give a book such a low rating. I am pretty open to all books. I was especially disappointed with this book because I rather enjoyed the woman of the dunes, by the same author. This book was confusing and hazy. An investigation of a disappeared husband with strange characters that are impossible to read via the descriptions in the book. The book becomes more confusing and the characters less pronounced the more you read on. The ending of the book reminds me of the movie memento in that a...more
Less than a third into the book, I realized from the outset that: a)we were not in the quotidien world we know, and b)the author was making no accommodation to the hard time any reader was going to have negotiating the 'map' of the storyline and characters. This pleased me at first - it reminded me of James Dickey's "Deliverance", and how the map in that opening foreshadowed the dreadful resistance the characters were going to get from the land into which they were planning (as they thought) the...more
Jan 12, 2008
Andy
rated it
5 of 5 stars
Recommends it for:
new wave movie fans
Shelves:
kool-imports
If you like Michaelangelo Antonioni movies you'll love Abe. Just like Antonioni he plays with issues of lost identity in the modern world. I also recommend "The Face of Another". Abe deserves a much wider audience.
The second Abe novel I've had the pleasure of reading. The translation is a little unreliable (there are numerous incomplete sentences) but overall I found it much easier to follow than The Box Man.
Kobo Abe explores the nature of identity through the eyes of an unnamed detective hired to locate a missing department head for a local company. Beginning his search with minimal clues, and offered nearly no direction by the missing man's aloof wife, the narrator is constantly misled by relations and...more
Kobo Abe explores the nature of identity through the eyes of an unnamed detective hired to locate a missing department head for a local company. Beginning his search with minimal clues, and offered nearly no direction by the missing man's aloof wife, the narrator is constantly misled by relations and...more
Apr 01, 2010
Juha
rated it
3 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Recommends it for:
fans of 1960s Japanese avant-garde noir.
The blurb on the back cover of my Tuttle edition says it all: "Told in the form, and with the suspense of a mystery novel, The Ruined Map is a melodrama of the mind." Except for the suspense part. I found it to be a tedious read. I had started it a couple of years ago when I bought the book, but then I couldn't get very far. I started it again recently and forced myself through the entire book. It's not that it's a bad book; in fact it does have some interesting aspects and parts of it were a go...more
Jul 26, 2011
Taka
rated it
3 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
japanese_lit,
japan_jul07-aug11
Hmmm...
J-Lit Binge #12: Kobo Abe's The Ruined Map
In his characteristic postmodernist tendencies, he fuses literary fiction with detective fiction like Paul Auster but MUCH better. It's a story about a detective agent investigating a case of a missing husband. He discovers clues, follows them, and digs deeper, only to lost them all in the end.
The first fifty pages or so is a little slow, but it picks up speed and the story is engaging till the very end.
But the ending.
Oh, the ending.
It's frustrati...more
J-Lit Binge #12: Kobo Abe's The Ruined Map
In his characteristic postmodernist tendencies, he fuses literary fiction with detective fiction like Paul Auster but MUCH better. It's a story about a detective agent investigating a case of a missing husband. He discovers clues, follows them, and digs deeper, only to lost them all in the end.
The first fifty pages or so is a little slow, but it picks up speed and the story is engaging till the very end.
But the ending.
Oh, the ending.
It's frustrati...more
All I can really say about this one is that it's like City of Glass, but more substantial and textured. Which is to say, the plots of the two are nearly the same--possibly incompetent private eye investigates what may be a crime, but the case is set aside in favor of an identity crisis for the narrator. The difference is that Abe at least has some good old-fashioned prose style, whereas Auster lacks in that area (as far as I can tell), among others.
A few examples, and again, these aren't suppose...more
A few examples, and again, these aren't suppose...more
8 likes · like · see review
I’ll admit it. I was a little distracted while reading the ending of this book. I read the last 20-30 pages on a plane while a baby was screaming bloody murder. Yes, I had my head phones on and yes, I had trouble following the book. Under normal circumstances, a quiet room with a cup of tea, I don’t think I would have understood the book either. It moves in and out of focus for me. There was a lot in it about sexuality and the blurring of female/male relationships and aesthetic. In fact, that wa...more
Oct 15, 2009
Jeff
rated it
2 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Recommended to Jeff by:
John Gardner via *The Art of Fiction*
Shelves:
gardner-recommends,
lieberry_books
I can't write much more about this book than i wrote for my first status update, which was something along the lines of "it feels alien" or "feels like it was written by an alien mind."
Maybe "foreign" would be a better word, but that term smacks of ethnocentrism. Then again, "alien" sounds like i'm saying Kobo Abe is not human. Really all i'm getting at is that i felt like an alien trying to inhabit the mind of the narrator and i felt foreign trying to navigate the narrator's world(view).
I wonde...more
Maybe "foreign" would be a better word, but that term smacks of ethnocentrism. Then again, "alien" sounds like i'm saying Kobo Abe is not human. Really all i'm getting at is that i felt like an alien trying to inhabit the mind of the narrator and i felt foreign trying to navigate the narrator's world(view).
I wonde...more
It is a book I read because I am still haunted by Woman in the Dunes... and don't like to re-read books even though sometimes a type of writer makes me salivate with cravings, like for a hamburger from Sugar Park Tavern, or macaroni and cheese, or ice cream, or more often tastes for whisky, which I view as a medicinal remedy, a preparation for the next hour... so I read The Ruined Map in preparation for the next hour... I liked the concept, but could not follow... not that I could even follow th...more
I won't pretend that great swathes of this didn't move swiftly into and out of consciousness, or that I wasn't bored and totally adrift for entire sections. I had intended to give this 3 stars and call it a day, but Abe makes it so easy to read even the most redundant/superfluous sentences and the narrative/narrator's logic is so odd that it wasn't much of a chore to get through the whole thing. Of course there is a Twilight Zone ending. Of course there is. But it redeems (or at rate justifies)...more
I want to like this book more than I rated it. Truth is, as I rounded the final corner of the pages and found there was no turning back and no true perspective on the horizon of this literary journey...I felt both hit by a speeding car on a stretch of highway and dissipated by the surreal. A true mind-f*ck! And yet I fear I will end up buying this and placing it on my shelves to chart my course once more by Abe's "Ruined Map." Okay 3.5!
My ambivalence towards this book was enormously cumbersome and I still don't really feel like I understand it. A few passages jump off the page, but much of it seems somewhat plodding. The narrative neglects to include a "he said," "I said," (etc) in long sections of back and forth dialog and though normally this wouldn't be a huge probably, it was somehow incredibly vexing in this. Many sections also felt like they began halfway through and I was struggling to put together what was taking place...more
This book is extremely well written and was my introduction to Kobo Abe. He is gifted, no doubt about that. But as well written as this book is, I give it 2 stars because the story is so creepy! Couldn't STAND the private detective and the ending made me want to throw the book. Engaging book that made me stomach queasy about 1/4 of the way through and didn't settle down again until days after I had finished reading it.
Surprised by the number of poor reviews for this book. Did so much for mystery that most writers just fail to do. Thoroughly enjoyed the surrealism and psychological explorations of this work that refuses to hone in on a conclusion. Also found the story did an excellent job evoking the overwhelming massiveness of a city like Tokyo. If you want a cut and paste whodunit, then this is not your cup of tea.
I have yet to read a Japanese novel that is not at least somewhat bizarre and oblique. This one starts with a conventional idea -a private detective is hired by a woman to find her missing husband - but reads almost more like a surreal fantasy than a noir. The prose is spare and hallucinatory, and I admit I found it very hard to understand what was going on.
Raymond Chandler meets Haruki Murakami. This surreal noir tale about dislocation and loss of identity is a parable of the postmodern age. The unknowability of the world, and the inability of the human mind to "map" the world are repeated themes in Abe's work, and they are fleshed out here to good effect.
This book was a delightful bit of déjà vu, written in such a way as to bring the angst of the protagonist to the reader. If you've ever had a bought of existential angst, this book will feel oh so familiar.
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All the confusion, mystery, menace, and violence of the modern urban landscape, but it leaves the reader without any sympathy for (or any interest in) any of the characters or their stories. I liked the heroic but futile struggle of "A Woman in the Dunes" and the alientation of "The Box Man." I even fell under the spell of the nightmarish bureaucracy of the hospital in "Secret Rendezvous." But I struggled to finish "The Ruined Map." No wonder this one rested untouched for so long on my bookshelf...more
A bizarre, existentialist mystery novel that consistently confounds readers, slipping away right at the moment on thinks one has it all figured out. Amazing!
One of my favorite book covers. I started reading Kobo Abe when I ran out of Haruki Murakami. Abe is less approachable, but not in a bad way.
The Ruined Map is a tough call. As a labyrinthine mystery book, the book presents the job of a private detective looking for a woman's lost husband; here, Kobo Abe demonstrates his ability to write well yet another genre of books. As a carrier of the internal anguish of the modern man, this same book becomes often impenetrable; here, the author has failed to make his language fully comprehensible. To conclude, an interesting but difficult read.
this is good, but the cultural references are intense and the translation's a bit sloppy (eg. when the client answers what time it is towards the end, she should say "Five after." not "After five.")
Not really recommended.
Not really recommended.
kind of meandering and mysterious with no payoff, but nicely unsettling
A detective hired to find a missing person ends up losing himself.
| topics | posts | views | last activity | |
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| I need more discussion. | 2 | 14 | Jun 20, 2008 11:26am |
Kōbō Abe, pseudonym of Kimifusa Abe, was a Japanese writer, playwright, photographer and inventor.
He was the son of a doctor and studied medicine at Tokyo University. He never practised however, giving it up to join a literary group that aimed to apply surrealist techniques to Marxist ideology.
Abe has been often compared to Franz Kafka and Alberto Moravia for his surreal, often nightmarish explora...more
More about Kōbō Abe...
He was the son of a doctor and studied medicine at Tokyo University. He never practised however, giving it up to join a literary group that aimed to apply surrealist techniques to Marxist ideology.
Abe has been often compared to Franz Kafka and Alberto Moravia for his surreal, often nightmarish explora...more
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“And again, the dark street. The dark, dark street. The women out shopping for the evening meal of course, and baby carriage and the silver bicycle were already painted out by the darkness; most of the commuters too were already in place in their filing-drawer houses. A half-forsaken chasm of time .... ”
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