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a young Takamine Hideko and Takarada Akira eat cakes and look inquisitively at one anotheralr

A Wanderer’s Notebook
(Horo-ki)

Screening on Film
Directed by Naruse Mikio.
With Takamine Hideko, Takarada Akira, Kato Daisuke.
Japan, 1962, 35mm, black & white, 123 min.
Japanese with English subtitles.
Print source: The Japan Foundation

The last of Naruse Mikio's six Hayashi Fumiko adaptations, A Wanderer's Notebook takes as its subject the author herself, as portrayed by Takamine Hideko in a spritely performance full of surprises. Rejecting her destiny as the daughter of poor merchants, Fumiko endures terrible jobs and lovers as she charges towards her dream of becoming a writer. Naruse foregrounds Fumiko's prose by placing her at a distance as voiceover narration and onscreen text transmute her dreary room into meditations on mortality, money and love. The many grumblings about whether her frank writing about poverty languishes too much in dreary details may have struck a chord with Naruse, who faced similar criticisms for his tearful vision of lower-middle-class life. – Kelley Dong


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Image: ©Toho Co., Ltd.

Part of film series

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a group of people, including Tanaka Kinuyo, look despondently at a misshapen hat

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