- East and West, Trading posts, Fiction, History
The year is 1799, the place Dejima in Nagasaki Harbor, the “high-walled, fan-shaped artificial island” that is the Japanese Empire’s single port and sole window onto the world, designed to keep the West at bay; the farthest outpost of the war-ravaged Dutch East Indies Company; and a de facto prison for the dozen foreigners permitted to live and work there. To this place of devious merchants, deceitful interpreters, costly courtesans, earthquakes, and typhoons comes Jacob de Zoet, a devout and resourceful young clerk who has five years in the East to earn a fortune of sufficient size to win the hand of his wealthy fiancée back in Holland. But Jacob’s original intentions are eclipsed after a chance encounter with Orito Aibagawa, the disfigured daughter of a samurai doctor and midwife to the city’s powerful magistrate. The borders between propriety, profit, and pleasure blur until Jacob finds his vision clouded, one rash promise made and then fatefully broken. The consequences will extend beyond Jacob’s worst imaginings. As one cynical colleague asks, “Who ain’t a gambler in the glorious Orient, with his very life?” ([source][1]) [1]: http://www.davidmitchellbooks.com/book/the-thousand-autumns-of-jacob-de-zoet/
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Character
Classical in form, grave, earnest and meticulous.
- classical in formformally daring
- gravecomic
- earnestironic
- rawmeticulous
- contemporarynostalgic
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About the book
- Author
- David Mitchell
- First published
- 2010
- Pages
- 480
- Publisher
- Recorded Books, Inc. and Blackstone Publishing, AudioGo, RANDOM HOUSE.
- Editions
- 27
- Language
- English, French, Dutch
- ISBN
- 9780812982336
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On Open Library, 22 have read it and 37 want to.
David Stephen Mitchell (born 12 January 1969) is an English novelist, television writer, and screenwriter. He has written nine novels, two of which, *number9dream* (2001) and *Cloud Atlas* (2004), were shortlisted for the Booker Prize. He has also written articles for several newspapers, most notably for *The Guardian*, and translated books about autism from Japanese to English. **Source**: <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Mitchell_(author)" target="blanck">David Mithchell</a> on Wikipedia
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