Snow Country

Yasunari Kawabata

★★★★★

Finished 30 May 2026

Thoughts

As the summary mentions, the story is told in the POV of rich old man Shimamura as he visits his once every year geisha lover in the mountains.

This feels like I’m back in school, I can’t grasp what is happening, other than what seems to be love between Komako and Shimamura that is not meant to be, and them doing a “lalala i cant see it” while continuing their companionship (it was never explicitly mentioned in the novel if they did it or not but cmon fa sho)

On a side note, it is indeed very refreshing to read an adult novel that omits the erotic aspects, but still able to depict the intense feelings they have for each other.

After finishing the novel, I went to read the shortened version “gleanings from snow country” which is an extremely shortened version that shows the initial train scene, where Shimamura observes Yoko via the reflection of the train window , and some scenes of Komako and Shimamura larping as a married couple.

This book has been in reading-list-hell for maybe 5 years of my life? To me its a story that relies heavily on descriptions of the surroundings and reading closely to Characters Komako

Komako to me is the most interesting character, 20 years old? learning the ways of the geisha, an avid book reader, keeping a daily journal and very introspective. She is definitely more into Shimamura than he is into him. I can feel that she genuinely is interested in his character, and him as a person. Noting on the things he says, and always returning to him even when she was inebriated.

She knows the relationship will never work out, continuously stating how he will never return, and she is right

One of the more interesting things in the story was towards the end, when they were drinking some sake, Shimamura calls Komako a “good girl”, and Komako asked how so, after feeling her “woman’s warmth”, he let it slip that she is a “good woman”, which made Komako do a double take, and got super mad at that fact.

Is this the moment she realises he just viewed her as a means to a lustful end, as a Woman instead of as a Girl? Or is it something lost in translation. I guess I will never know

After reading reviews on this book, good woman is bluntly sexual in nature in Japanese, and its a man’s appraisal of her body’s competence, not her person.

This broke Komako, who was hoping for something real, and Shimamura did not reciprocate that. Shimamura

I feel that this old fuck does love Komako, but its not in the same way that she loves him. It does seem to be more towards her youth? And her potential? And definitely her physical features. He is definitely past his prime, and does not have the same sense of urgency or growth as a person, as compared to Komako. Yoko

I regret to admit I was not paying full attention to her characterization. She was just another character who Komako knew, and had a tragic end. After reading Closing thoughts

I might revisit this novel, closely seeing what each and every metaphor of the snow country relates to the relationship between the characters ( The moth thing being one of them, and also Shimamura climbing a mountain and giving up, laughing as he reliases he is too old for that shit ). Overall it is a book where one must read carefully, and cannot breeze through. I feel it is kind of like an ore you must use a pickaxe to mine in order to truly get at the essence of the story.