Shogun by James Clavell
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Book Reviews of Shogun
Book Review: SHOGUN...AN ABSORBING TALE ABOUT POWER AND THE JAPANESE MIND
Summary: 5 Stars
A lot has been said about the film, but you need to read the book to really appreciate the greatness of this work. James Clavell in Shogun portrays an absorbing picture of the mind and land of the Japanese - conceptualized gardens and elaborate tea ceremonies; poetry and politeness - and all the subtlety beneath; bushido - the way of the warrior, kimonos, sashes and swords; karma - fate; secret messages sent across fiefs by carrier pigeon; and pissing, literarily, on deals to seal them.
The cast Clavell presents is just as engaging - Mariko, the delicate, petite lady who courageously confronts guards outside Osaka castle in a dwell. She's samurai, she's Christian, and she's in love with Blackthorne. But beneath all these seemingly entangled affiliations lies one deep, unswerving devotion - and that is to her liege lord, Toranaga.
Ian Blackthorne...the `barbarian' pilot who happens on the scene with a ship bearing muskets and cannon, vast potential for future warfare in Japan, and telling implications for whichever feudal lord can lay hold of this advantage. Blackthorne has come into a good thing, but as things go in this surreal world of willows, he just doesn't know. He's in love with Mariko. He's even slept with her - he thinks - but then, he can't be sure. He's Toranaga's friend. He's even saved the man's life once. But isn't he no more than just a pawn - valuable but expendable - in the hands of the powerful general?
And there's Toranaga himself, whose favourite pastime is falconry - and manipulating the people around him, studying them and playing them off against each other, like he does with his falcons. The novel is set in 17th Century Japan, but Toranaga looks as if he has already read Machiavelli's The Prince and Robert Greene's 48 Laws of power. The story is largely about his bid to become Shogun - Supreme Military Dictator - ruling by fiat of the Emperor, who then would really be just a puppet.
Japan's current leader, The Taiko, lies on his death-bed and asks Toranaga what can best be done to ensure his little son will grow up to rule after him. The two men, The Taiko and Toranaga, have come a long way and have the greatest regard for each other. Toranaga is the only commander The Taiko has ever lost a battle to, and Toranaga sees The Taiko as the only leader who has ever been worthy of his followership. But now The Taiko is dying and Toranaga tells him, "Let me go outside and commit seppuku" [ceremonial suicide], implying the obvious - that Toranaga himself forms the most apparent threat to The Taiko's son's ascension. The Taiko declines and constitutes a Council of Regents that will handle affairs till his son comes of age. The Council of Regents, Toranaga included, is made of the strangest bed-fellows and has Lord Ishido, Toranaga's arch-enemy, as Commander of the Heir's body guard. The Taiko reckons these people hate each other so much and will continue to disagree and cancel out each other's powers until his son is ready to take over.
In the aftermath of The Taiko's death Toranaga continues to affirm his loyalty. He is passive and acts demure when Lord Ishido (who happens to have fancy ideas of his own) accuses and tries to provoke him. He is indignant when his own aides as much as hint at the begging opportunity for ultimate power. "That is treason", he vehemently chastises them. But Toranaga is a great actor. In his private moments he is astonished that people can be so gullible. He continues to watch - plotting and plotting, weighing his aces, strengthening his position.
And while he's doing this he's not above using any means he considers expedient, even if these means tamper with sacred ways or border on the amoral. He needs to have the foreign ship pilot firmly in hand - so Mariko's husband is ordered to divorce her, then Blackthorne's ship gets razed by unidentified arsonists. Toranaga commiserates and orders the immediate rebuilding of the ship, but reckons privately that the ship might just again get burnt sometime in the future, with yet another building reordered. Also, in the same breath he orders a couple of his grumbling generals outside a conference room to commit seppuku, but when his trusted aide and most senior commander, Hiro-matsu, asks to be accorded the same `privilege' to ease a certain shame, Toranaga tells him, "I don't approve of useless death." Hiro-matsu's grandson-in-law had brought disgrace on his family when he committed an ill-advised breach of court, drawing his sword, unordered, on the Lord Ishido when the latter had insulted Toranaga.
And, as events play themselves out and the hour of decision approaches, Toranaga is on the lookout for treachery, constantly gauging the loyalty of friends, family and associates. Yabu, the daimyo - or feudal lord - of Izu, whose support could really swing things for either side in the coming war, is supposed to be Toranaga's ally. They negotiate, parley and plan towards the event, and in the end Toranaga tells Yabu, "But I don't trust you", and gets him to commit seppuku. Yabu's greatest pride as he composes his death-poem and kneels for the blow, is that he finds himself without fear. Toranaga also tests his son and heir, Sudara, telling him to put to put to death his children, all of whom Toranaga has already hidden beforehand. Sudara passes the test, but Toranaga, looking at him wistfully, feels sorry for his son, knowing that Sudara, who has been bred since he was young for the greatest responsibility, will never know any joy. But I'm different, Toranaga thinks. I love to drink sake and to `pillow'...And yes, I love to win.
And win he does in the end: "That year...the main armies clashed...By late afternoon Toranaga had won the battle and the slaughter began...Ishido was captured alive and Toranaga genially reminded him of the prophecy...Ishido lingered three days and died very old"...Machiavelli and Robert Greene would have been extremely proud of Toranaga.
Book Review: Toranaga and Treachery - This Review Includes Cast Index
Summary: 5 Stars
This a remarkable novel on every account, and a true pleasure to read. Take the opening, which begins with a Dutch trader, the last of his fleet, caught in a storm in uncharted waters. Look at how skillfully Clavell introduces us to each character, weaves in the backstory, and makes us care about Blackthorne. And look at that language - bold and clear with gritty verbs that anchor you to the moment, so you feel every shudder of the keel.
Later on there's two more journeys by sea, including a battle, and it rings totally authentic, taking you in twist by twist. And what adds to the suspense is you don't truly know the intentions of the two captains - everything is shaded in grey, so that they themselves aren't sure just how far they'll take it, or for who they're actually fighting for. The line of friendship tightens and slacks and finally snaps, over and over again.
In just this way, Clavell's characters are never shallow, but always surprising and full of depth. In one part a woman is beaten by her husband, and another character goes to kill the husband, but the twist is how she actually drove her husband to it on purpose. And then there's the further surprise of why. Everything in the novel has such richly rewarding layers of meaning, with espionage, blackmail, sabotage, lust, and betrayal all moving under the surface of this grand epic.
With Blackthorne's fate always at risk to treachery, Shogun reads more as a thriller than historical fiction, and in fact Clavell meant it to be that way, basing the story on Dutch trader Will Adams, but changing much to suit his tale. Politics, religion, and conquest play a dominant role, and the line often blurs between them as each side tries to recover from and capitalize on Blackthorne's arrival. What adds to this is how Clavell knows when to heighten with drama and also when to let off the tension with philosophy and romance. He mixes poetry with swordplay, religious conflict with pissing from a tower to seal a pact.
The twelve-hour miniseries was very well done, and yet there's so much more depth and intrigue in the novel, where you discover just how resourceful these characters are. For one such example, in the miniseries Toranaga's ship is greeted at the fishing village by about fifty faithful samurai. In the book there are three thousand, plus five hundred cavalry, and they're not under his control at all. In fact, he's lucky to escape with his life. Not restricted by time, budget, or censors, Clavell doesn't hold back, including one breath-taking ten-page scene involving Mariko and hundreds of samurai. At the end of it, one of the samurai says, "When I saw the Lady Mariko pick up Yoshinaka's sword, I thought I'd die with pride," and you feel the same.
Toranaga-sama (based on Lord Tokugawa Ieyasu) is one of the most compelling characters you'll ever discover, and if you haven't seen the miniseries, look him up on YouTube ("Shogun: First Meeting with Toranaga") to get an idea of Toshiro Mifune's portrayal. In the novel Toranaga's described as having a pot belly and big nose, which contrasts well with his ruthless military capabilities, but Mifune so inhabited the role, and strove for such authenticity, that it's difficult to see anyone else in the part.
It's a long book, for sure, and yet at the end you'll only wish there was another book to follow it. One of the factors that makes this novel such a rewarding experience is how Clavell seems to know everything about feudal Japan and how effortlessly he fills us in without it ever becoming a history lesson or guidebook. There's a great deal of falconry, as well, for anyone interested in that field, and befitting the culture, there's plenty of sex, so it's not for young readers.
What's amazing is that Clavell could write with such understanding and reverence of the Japanese way of life. During WWII, he was captured in Java and spent three years in the Changi concentration camp in Singapore. This experience became his first novel, King Rat. And yet Clavell later dedicated three years writing to this novel that shows how civilized Japan was over the Europe of its day. As Clavell said, "It's possible to end up admiring an enemy."
In the end there's only two things I didn't like about Shogun. First is that even though there's important journeys by both land and sea, there's no map to clue you in to just where they are, how far they're going, or what lays around them. If anyone knows of a good online map of feudal Japan (1600), please post where to find it (but don't look for Anjiro - the village's name was actually Ajiro). My only other grudge is that Clavell didn't continue the story. I can see why he ended where he did, but I didn't want to leave these characters or the land they so richly inhabit.
***Click below on Comments for the full Cast Index and Japanese phrases.***
Book Review: On the whole a wonderful book
Summary: 5 Stars
I've never had any particular desire to read anything by James Clavell. But one day I was in the bookstore, I decided it had been a long time since I had read a lengthy epic novel, and figured what the heck. The reputation "Shogun" carries certainly didn't hurt.
By and large, the reputation is deserved. "Shogun" is on the whole a wonderful book. Clavell, while perhaps not a "great" writer, is an extremely good one. He has a strong sense for description, dialogue, and characterization, which make the 1152 pages go by quite quickly and enjoyably.
John Blackthorne, an English sailor, manages to bring his ship to 1600 AD Japan. Almost immediately, Blackthorne finds himself in conflict with the precarious Japanese government, the alien Japanese society, and the jealously influential Portugese traders and mercenaries who have staked a claim. In order to survive, Blackthorne must adopt elements of Japanese culture, while making himself valuable to Toranaga, the most powerful daiymo of Japan.
While Clavell took the plot of his novel from history, he also fictionalized quite a bit. Nearly every major character in the novel is based on a historical person. Toranaga is in fact Tokugawa, whose family took control of the shogunate, and with it control of Japan, for nearly 300 years. Blackthorne is loosely based on William Adams, who helped open up Japan to greater foreign trade. I'm not sure why Clavell took this approach, and for a little while, it's a bit of a distraction.
Clavell's greatest strength is examining the various political games the protagonists play. Toranaga knows early on he is going to be a war with various rivals among the Council of Regents, and Blackthorne's arrival becomes an immediate benefit to Torananga's plans. Blackthorne finds himself raging at the xenophobic elements of Japanese society that view him as a barbarian, while fending off the Portuguese attempts to capture or kill him. He also falls in love with Mariko, a woman who is descended from an honorable samurai family, but who is also a Christian convert. Mariko herself is torn between her duty to her country and her liege lord, Toranaga, and her newly adopted faith, while reciprocating Blackthorne's love.
Blackthorne's transformation from English "barbarian" into a "civilized" samurai is one of the most interesting and realistic progressions in fiction. The change in the Anjin-san (as Blackthorne is called) is a gradual thing, as Blackthorne struggles with the language barrier and customs, coming to accept the better elements of the Japanese society, while becoming more disenchanted with his own heritage. But at the same time he clings to the possibility of returning to England, covered in gold and glory for opening the door to the east for his native land. He never quite realizes that only one route is truly open to him.
My only complaint is that I never felt completely connected to the characters. While I did like them, I was surprised that upon the deaths of a few major characters, I was not as emotionally impacted as in other fictional works (Larry McMurtry's "Lonesome Dove" was always heartbreaking, for example). There were also times that I wondered if every conversation about scheming and political maneuvering was necessary. I was also irritated by Clavell's occasional use of minor characters as a means of moving the plot forward. For example, the wife of the villainous Yabu figures out very quickly certain hows and whys of Toranaga's plans. She never appears after this Lady Macbeth-moment, and really, the book only moves forward marginally. Also, I have to say, I would have liked to see the war proper. Clavell actually recounts this entire event in a couple of paragraphs on the last page of the book. Considering the whole novel has been leading up to this war, I felt a little frustrated.
However, none of these complaints really overshadowed my enjoyment of this novel, or my rating. I will certainly be reading the rest of Clavell's "Asian Saga", though not right away.
Book Review: Fantasy, Not History, But Still A Great NOVEL
Summary: 5 Stars
When I first read Shogun in 1994, a Japanese girl who went to my school saw me with the novel and asked how I liked it. I told her I liked it a lot. She said that's fine but keep in mind it has about as much validity in relation to Japanese history as the tales of King Arthur do to Britain of that era.
Point taken.
The basic premise is this: In the year 1600, an English ship's pilot named Blackthorne, while leading his privateering vessel across the Pacific in search of the Spanish treasure fleet, crash-lands on the shores of the great island kingdom of Japan. Blackthorne and his crew are catpured by the cruel Japanese samurai and held captive---sometimes under torture. Japan is at this time barely a generation removed from first contact with Europeans, and has a delicate alliance of sorts with the Spanish, with whom they trade to mutual (though self-serving) advantage. Blackthorne and his crew find themselves confronted by Spanish religious figures who seek to convince the Japanese of the danger the "heathen" English present to this island of the gods. However, Blackthrone interests one of the island's two principal warlords, who interrogates Blackthorne and finds interest in him. Blackthorne is reprieved from a certain sentence of death and is given opportunity to learn Japanese customs and the Japanese language. He becomes embroiled in the seething politics of the island, then on the brink of a potentially terrible civil war between rival factions. Blackthorne at first desires only to return home to England, preferably with many riches in tow, but gradually he comes to feel the native way of life is superior to that of his own people. He falls in love with a beautiful noblewoman, serves the warlord who has elevated him in status to that of samurai, and then becomes part of the intricate, dangerous struggle for survival and dominance underway around him in a hostile, gloriously unique island empire.
Shogun has a highly entertaining story with many released human emotions, enough action to keep it from ever getting boring, and in its details on Japanese culture and the religious/political clashes boiling over among the competing European nations who are visiting Japan for the first time, it is still, fantasy aside, the kind of novel to vanish inside for a couple of wonderful weeks.
I really loved the people inside Shogun and found its story excellent in virtually every detail. The villainous Lord Yabu has to be one of historical fiction's mightiest examples of a figure one loves to hate. He went a long way toward stealing the story with his tireless ambition and unabashedly evil heart. The east-west love story that found its way into the center of this story meant less to me than details of the coming civil war, and I almost thought it at times got in the way of other parts of the plot I was more interested in and wanted to see move forward.
I think it's fair to say that in Shogun, as in the other Clavell novel I read, "getting there is half the fun". By that I mean the events as described form the basis of what makes up Shogun, and ultimately there IS no final act here. All through the novel I kept waiting for war to come. I kept expecting that so much of what I was reading was preparation to the conflict for supremacy that was the soul of the novel. But not so. Shogun ends before the long-expected war unfolds, and that was slightly unanticipated.
This is a complex, interwoven novel of races and civilizations meeting for the first time, of events macrocosmic and microcosmic, and of mutual culture shock in a foreign time and place where a number of remarkable people are cast head-first into events much larger than they are, and for which their pasts provide them with little preparation.
Book Review: Epic Masterpiece -- Must Read!
Summary: 5 Stars
"Shogun" is one of my absolute favorite novels. James Clavell masterfully weaves a tale of gigantic scope -- the clash of the Orient versus the West, civil war, religious strife, forbidden love, and the rise of Lord Toranaga to the position of Shogun. To even attempt to tell such a tale is an astounding feat, and yet Clavell tells the story with such intimacy and power that the reader can't help but be swept away.John Blackthorne, English pilot of a Dutch merchant ship, accidentally finds Japan after a storm blows his scurvy-ridden ship ashore. He awakes to find himself in a beautiful, alien land -- a tall, blonde, blue-eyed European, he could not appear more out of place than among the short, delicate-yet-deadly Japanese. Language is just one of the many barriers to be crossed. While Blackthorne is horrified by Japanese brutality -- a samurai viciously beheads a peasant who fails to bow -- Blackthorne is also introduced to the wonders of Japan, such as the simple pleasure of a hot bath.
Much of the story revolves around Blackthorne's "education," and how he learns to become Japanese. While Blackthorne is one heck of a capable guy, Clavell wisely shows Blackthorne repeatedly struggling with the transition -- his difficulty learning the language is a nice touch.
Along the way, Blackthorne meets and falls in love with the beautiful Mariko, who bears the burden not only of a tormented bull of a husband (the warrior Buntaro), but also the curse of her family caused by a treacherous ancestor. Blackthorne also meets the wily, sadistic Yabu, who boils one of Blackthorne's crew members alive for his pleasure and is one of the most unreliable allies one could wish for.
Blackthorne also finds himself a major player in Lord Toranaga's undeclared civil war. Clavell repeatedly throws Blackthorne and Toranaga from danger to peril, and their escapes are alternately achieved by daring, physical prowess, and intelligence.
Further complicating matters are the Jesuits, who already have a strong foothold in Japan and have even converted some of the leading samurai . . . as well as Mariko. Clavell's handing of the struggle between the militant Japanese spirit and the seemingly contradictory Christian ideals is particularly sensitive. Like many of us, the Japanese fight to adopt Jesus' teachings into their world, in which the practicalities of life and death (as well as commitment to Japanese traditions) makes Christianity more than a bit burdensome. Mariko's spirituality is particularly moving.
Rich in detail, "Shogun" spends as much time on a major battle between ninja and samurai as it does a slow tryst between Blackthorne and Mariko as they travel to Osaka. Buntaro's perfect tea ceremony, an offer of reconciliation with Mariko, is heartbreaking in its sincerity. Blackthorne, with a great eye for detail, is forever marking the exquisite details of this foreign land, and the reader feels as if he has tramped the hills of Izu, strode the halls of Osaka castle, and sailed the Japanese coast by the time the book is over.
Perhaps Clavell's greatest creation is Lord Toranaga, the ultimate puppet master in this epic. Through Toranaga's humanity as well as his genius, we appreciate why so many are willing to fight and die for him . . . and through him we see the true worth of the other characters.
All in all, a wonderful masterpiece that you won't want to end.