Narashige koide illus (1 Ergebnisse)

Hardcover. Zustand: Sehr gut. Schutzumschlag. 1. Auflage, Limitierte Ausgabe. First illustrated edition, number 123 of 500 limited copies, signed in calligraphic script and stamped with the author's hanko on the front free endpaper. A finely produced edition of one of Jun'ichirō Tanizaki's most autobiographical novels, first serialised in the Osaka Mainichi Shimbun between 1928 and 1929 and published in book form the same year. Some Prefer Nettles centres on a couple trapped in a passionless marriage that slowly dissolves: the wife, with her husband's tacit consent, takes a lover, while the husband withdraws into an increasingly intense fascination with Bunraku and its aesthetic world. The narrative closely parallels Tanizaki's own domestic circumstances during his first marriage, lending the novel an unusually intimate psychological register. This edition is distinguished by the extensive illustrations of Koide Narashige, whose modern yet restrained visual language complements the novel's tonal complexity. Tanizaki's recurring preoccupations - sensuality and restraint, modernity and nostalgia, and above all the tension between Western influence and Japan's classical arts - are here given particularly concentrated expression. The novel occupies a central position within Tanizaki's wider cultural project, which sought to articulate a Japanese aesthetic in dialogue with the modern West, later most famously expressed in In Praise of Shadows. Tanizaki's importance as a literary mediator is internationally recognised, yet copies signed by him are notably scarce, particularly from the mid‑twentieth century. Japanese authors of the period rarely signed books formally, and when they did it was often for private circulation only. The present copy, bearing both Tanizaki's fluid signature and his personal seal, represents an especially desirable and uncommon example of this key work. Large octavo (22.8 x 15.8 cm). Text in Japanese. Illustrated throughout by Koide Narashige. Original printed paper-covered boards with decorated endpapers; original acetate jacket. Housed in the illustrated publisher's slipcase and card box with printed paper label. Minor abrasions and some staining to boards, the acetate jacket shrinked as ususal. Publisher's card box with some wear especially at the corners. Otherwise a very good signed copy of one of the twentieth century's most important Japanese novels. Signatur des Verfassers.…