The Last Concubine (69 page)

Q:
Will we meet these characters again in a future novel?

We will certainly meet some of them in my next novel.

Q:
Your previous non-fiction books –
Geisha, Madame Sadayakko, On the Narrow Road to the Deep North, The Brothers,
and
Women of the Pleasure Quarters
– have also centred on Japanese culture. Have you considered a book that takes place in a different country?

I’m half Chinese and love China and have often considered writing a book set there. But after thirty years of engaging with Japan, I know it incredibly well. I haven’t yet written everything I want to write about Japan and have a few more books on Japan still in me, I think.

Q:
Was it your time living in Japan that really sparked your interest in its culture?

Japan is the most fascinating and extraordinary place. It was my interest in its culture that took me there in the first place, but I’ve been deepening my fascination with the country ever since.

I spent my first years in Japan in Gifu, a large, very traditional city near Kyoto, where life went on much as it had for centuries and geisha were still part of the landscape. There were few tourists and almost no Westerners. I had been there three months before I was introduced to the only two other non-Japanese in the entire city.

When I lived there, I was single. They all took me under their wing, most particularly the women, who welcomed me into their homes, supposedly eternally closed to outsiders. We used to cook together and went to temples to dine on Buddhist vegetarian cuisine. I studied the womanly arts of tea ceremony, flower arrangement, calligraphy, and brush painting, as well as making pottery and doing aikido, a martial art. Along the way, I learned to carry myself demurely, glide gracefully across tatami mats, slide open a door with straight fingers, and speak in the proper modest tones.

In the years I spent in Japan, I travelled from Shiretoko Peninsula in the far north of Hokkaido to the tropical islands of Okinawa and was privileged to meet many wonderful people – from farmers and geisha to Noh actors, incense ceremony masters, artists, architects, and many others. Japan has been a part of my life ever since I became an adult. I am not at all the person I would have been if I had never gone there.

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS

1. When Sachi is being prepared to visit the shogun’s bed for the first time, her dress is described as “a ceremonial kimono of white silk like a wedding kimono – or a shroud.” Discuss the “death” of Sachi’s innocence as she leaves the village, becomes a concubine, and later, flees the castle.

2. The women’s palace is described as an opulent prison. Do you think the princess and other women of the palace, some of whom have never left its walls, feel confined? How do notions of imprisonment and freedom affect the story?

3. “Her own life, she knew, was of no importance. Women were in this world to obey without questioning or thinking.” Discuss the subordination of women within the book.

4. Shinzaemon’s roughness is painted in sharp contrast to Sachi’s refined persona. Is this a classic beauty-andthe-beast attraction? Or are they kindred spirits?

5. Most of Sachi’s life is defined by duty and obligation. What role can destiny play in this society?

6. The backdrop to Sachi’s personal journey is one of hardship and war. Do you feel war is portrayed as futile or necessary? Or both?

7. For a twenty-first-century reader, there are many instances in the story of racism, classism, and misogyny. How was your experience as a reader affected by this? Which of these injustices do you feel exists the most today?

8. When she returns to her village, Sachi says, “I am not the person I was when I left. In the end I know I have to go back to Edo Castle. That’s where I belong.” How do notions of family and loyalty affect Sachi’s personal journey, as well as that of others in the story?

9. Sachi comes to understand her mother’s feeling of “spiritual starvation” when faced with the idea of not seeing Shinzaemon again, as her mother did with Daisuké. How do you interpret the concept of spiritual starvation?

10. As the new world encroaches upon Japan, foreigners bring with them elements of so-called advancement. Do you feel these instruments of progress have a positive or negative effect on 1800s Japan?

11. Guns are linked to the end of the samurai way and paralleled to cowardice. Do you feel it was cowardly of Shinzaemon to shoot Lord Mizuno?

12. Did Sachi’s feelings for Edwards take away from the reunion with Shinzaemon and how you interpreted their connection?

To access Penguin Group (Canada) Readers Guides online, visit the Penguin Group (Canada) website at
www.penguin.ca
.

Table of Contents

Praise for the Last Concubine

Author Bio

Also by Lesley Downer

Dedication

Contents

Part I The Village