Praise for A Tale for the Time Being
“Nao’s lively voice, by turns breezy, petulant, funny, sad, and teenage-girl wise, reaches the reader in the pages of her diary, which, as Ruth Ozeki begins to fold and pleat her intricate parable of a novel, washes ashore, safe in a Hello Kitty lunchbox, on a small Canadian island off the coast of British Columbia. . . . Dualities, overlaps, time shifts, and coincidences are the currents that move A Tale for the Time Being along: This is a book that does not give up its multiple meanings easily, gently but insistently instructing the reader to progress slowly in order to contemplate the porous membrane that separates fact from fiction, self from circumstance, past from present.”
—The New York Times
“Plunges us into a tantalizing narration that brandishes mysteries to be solved and ideas to be explored.”
—The Washington Post
“A delightful yet sometimes harrowing novel . . . Many of the elements of Nao’s story—schoolgirl bullying, unemployed suicidal ‘salarymen,’ kamikaze pilots—are among a Western reader’s most familiar images of Japan, but in Nao’s telling, refracted through Ruth’s musings, they become fresh and immediate, occasionally searingly painful. Ozeki takes on big themes . . . all drawn into the stories of two ‘time beings,’ Ruth and Nao, whose own fates are inextricably bound.”
—The New York Times Book Review
“A terrific novel full of breakthroughs both personal and literary . . . Ozeki revels in Tokyo teen culture—this goes far beyond Hello Kitty—and explores quantum physics, military applications of computer video games, Internet bullying, and Marcel Proust, all while creating a vulnerable and unique voice for the sixteen-year-old girl at its center.”
—The Seattle Times
“A fascinating multigenerational tapestry of long ago, recent past, and present . . . The writing resonates with an immediacy and rawness that is believable and touching.”
—The Boston Globe
“A rich and engaging novel . . . A Tale for the Time Being explores many themes, biculturalism, war, manga, depression, suicide clubs, Internet bullying, the slippery qualities of time, and Zen Buddhism. When Nao learns to meditate at Jiko’s temple she says, ‘When you return your mind to zazen, it feels like coming home.’ Ultimately this satisfying novel is about discovering home in the moment, or now, and also home within ourselves.”
—The Oregonian
“Beautifully written, intensely readable, and richly layered . . . Ozeki moves between Ruth’s and Nao’s stories and their very different voices while exploring the elements of time, past, present (whatever that is, in the context of this book), and, perhaps, the future. Nao stays with her Jiko and meets the ghost of her great-uncle Haruki, a kamikaze pilot; Ruth makes a mysterious journey and has an important encounter of her own. The human relationships are deftly explored. . . . A Tale for the Time Being is compelling and memorable, one of the best books of the year.”
—St. Louis Post-Dispatch
“Forget the proverbial message in a bottle: This Tale fractures clichés as it affirms the lifesaving power of words. . . . As Ozeki explores the ties between reader and writer, she offers a lesson in redemption that reinforces the pricelessness of the here and now.”
—Elle
“A powerful yarn of fate and parallel lives.”
—Good Housekeeping
“Ozeki weaves together Nao’s adolescent yearnings with Ruth’s contemplative di – gressions, adding bits of Zen wisdom, as well as questions about agency, creativity, life, death, and human connections along the way. A Tale for the Time Being is a dreamy, spiritual investigation of how to gracefully meet the waves of time, which, in the end, come for us all.”
—The Daily Beast
“As we read Nao’s story and the story of Ozeki’s reading of it, as we go back and forth between the text and the notes, time expands for us. It opens up onto something resembling narrative eternity . . . page after page, slowly unfolding. And what a beautiful effect that is for a novel to create.”
—Alan Cheuse, NPR’s All Things Considered
“A Tale for the Time Being is ambitious, it’s multilayered, and it’s fantastic. . . . Ruth Ozeki creates multiple worlds that are alive and filled with so much sensory details and symbolism and it’s difficult not to resist being completely immersed. Stock your fridge, finish the laundry, and feed the cat because you’ll be busy for a few days.”
—Hyphen
“A multilayered postmodern fantasia with a heart of gold.”
—Ellis Avery, Public Books
“In A Tale for the Time Being, Ruth Ozeki pulls out all the stops with her new cast of beautiful, batty, and sad characters. . . . It’s such a romp—so unafraid of the disasters of life, so full of delight—that it’s well worth the read. Forget the easy escape route of quantum mechanics; the novel more than supplies enough old-fashioned reading magic.”
—Shambhala Sun
“Ozeki is a fantastic novelist.”
—The Sunday Times (London)
“A deep and illuminating piece of work.”
—The Guardian (London)
“A huge, compassionate, and cleverly wrought novel . . . Ozeki beautifully captures Nao’s teenage voice, with its conflicting harmonies of bathos and intensity, stoicism and optimism. . . . As the novel draws to a close, with an extended riff on quantum mechanics, Schrödinger’s cat, and the influence of perception on physical reality, the readers shares with Ruth a series of revelations about the human need for resolution and the impossibility of getting it.”
—The Times Literary Supplement (London)
“Links have been made between Buddhism and modern quantum physics before, but seldom can they have been intertwined with such emotive power and linguistic grace as Ruth Ozeki manages in this funny, heartbreaking, moving, and profound novel. . . . The warmth, compassion, wisdom, and insight with which Ozeki pieces all these stories together will have the reader linked in a similarly profound way to this fantastic novel.”
—The Independent (London)
“Japanese pop culture, fiction, and nonfiction all mash up in this genius novel about hope and friendship.”
—Chatelaine
“Dazzling . . . In its shift to a novel of ideas, through a carefully wrought yet seemingly reckless narrative explosion, the novel shines. It is not only a storytelling tour de force (and rest assured, Ozeki doesn’t abandon either the richness of her characterizations nor the expanding force of the paired story lines in favor of the deeper searching; everything resolves, though not in a manner that anyone would expect), but a rich, thought-provoking, paradigm-disturbing experience of a novel. Like a Zen koan, A Tale for the Time Being defies simple answers or explanations even as it reveals all. You will carry it with you.”
—The Vancouver Sun
“A magical narrative that dances in all worlds at once . . . However many paradoxes Ozeki throws into the mix, Nao and Ruth—at once united and separated by time and place—ultimately create their own magic, at least for the time being.”
—Toronto Star
“Exudes an infectious sense of warmth and wonder . . . Nao is an irresistible character: inquisitive, funny, and world-weary but heartbreakingly vulnerable. . . . A Tale for the Time Being achieves an impressive balancing act.”
—The Australian
“One of those exquisitely rare books in which you’re still wondering what else it holds until the very last page . . . Ozeki’s maximalist style puts her in the realms of David Foster Wallace or early David Mitchell but, unlike almost any other postmodern author for whom concepts frequently trump character, Ozeki can pluck at the heartstrings like a samisen, offering moments that bring hand to mouth in both horror and joy.”
—The Sydney Morning Herald (Australia)
“Ruth Ozeki’s parallel narratives stretch the reader to appreciate them fully. You are never going to get anything less than profoundly interesting. . . . Her real skill, though, is in blending concept and story so beautifully. The result is a novel that is clever on many levels but also immensely readable.”
—The New Zealand Herald
“A quietly amazing achievement . . . a good read that reverberates in thought long after the final page . . . Many sentences or phrases had this reader stopping and rereading, savoring the beauty of Ozeki’s words.”
—The Japan Times
“Ruth Ozeki takes readers on a journey of laughter, sorrow, and enlightenment. . . . Ambitious and engrossing, Nao’s narrative will grab readers’ hearts as easily as Ruth’s. . . . Do not miss this beautiful, intricate world or the characters who inhabit it.”
—Shelf Awareness
“Wildly imaginative, ambitious, and brilliant . . . Ozeki expresses our universal desire to connect with others through words and stories. Her characters speak to us across time and across continents and beckon us to follow them to unknown worlds. Equal parts sobering and inspiring, the novel is wholly inventive from the first page to the last. . . . A Tale for the Time Being is destined to become a modern classic.”
—Book Magnet
“An enthralling, beautiful novel about relationships, time, history, and culture. Right from the beginning it draws you in, slowly unfolding and, just when you think it can’t, pulling you in ever further. . . . A standout book.”
—Curled Up with a Good Book and a Cup of Tea
“Superb . . . A Tale for the Time Being is both disarming and likely to leave readers feeling its emotional impact for a long time to come.”
—BookPage
“Magnificent . . . The novel’s seamless web of language, metaphor, and meaning can’t be disentangled from its powerful emotional impact: These are characters we care for deeply, imparting vital life lessons through the magic of storytelling. A masterpiece, pure and simple.”
—Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
“An intriguing, even beautiful narrative remarkable for its unusual but attentively structured plot. . . . We go from one story line to the other, back and forth across the Pacific, but the reader never loses place or interest.”
—Booklist (starred review)
“Ozeki’s absorbing novel is an extended meditation on writing, time, and people in time. . . . The characters’ lives are finely drawn, from Ruth’s rustic lifestyle to the Yasutani family’s straitened existence after moving from Sunnyvale, California, to Tokyo. Nao’s winsome voice contrasts with Ruth’s intellectual ponderings to make up a lyrical disquisition on writing’s power to transcend time and place. This tale from Ozeki, a Zen Buddhist priest, is sure to please anyone who values a good story broadened with intellectual vigor.”
—Publishers Weekly
“An extraordinary novel about a courageous young woman, riven by loneliness, by time, and (ultimately) by tsunami. Nao is an inspired narrator and her quest to tell her great grandmother’s story, to connect with her past and with the larger world is both aching and true. Ozeki is one of my favorite novelists and here she is at her absolute best—bewitching, intelligent, hilarious, and heartbreaking, often on the same page.”
—Junot Díaz, Pulitzer Prize–winning author of This Is How You Lose Her
“A Tale for the Time Being is a timeless story. Ruth Ozeki beautifully renders not only the devastation of the collision between man and the natural world, but also its often miraculous results.”
—Alice Sebold, bestselling author of The Lovely Bones
“Ingenious and touching . . . I read it with great pleasure.”
—Philip Pullman, award-winning author of The Golden Compass
“A beautifully interwoven novel about magic and loss and the incomprehensible threads that connect our lives. I loved it.”
—Elizabeth Gilbert, bestselling author of Eat, Pray, Love and The Signature of All Things
“One of the most deeply moving and thought-provoking novels I have read in a long time. In precise and luminous prose, Ozeki captures both the sweep and detail of our shared humanity. The result is gripping, fearless, inspiring, and true.”
—Madeline Miller, Orange Prize–winning author of The Song of Achilles
“A Tale for the Time Being is equal parts mystery and meditation. The mystery is a compulsive, gritty page-turner. The meditation—on time and memory, on the oceanic movement of history, on impermanence and uncertainty, but also resilience and bravery—is deep and gorgeous and wise. A completely satisfying, continually surprising, wholly remarkable achievement.”
—Karen Joy Fowler, bestselling author of The Jane Austen Book Club and We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves
“A great achievement, and the work of a writer at the height of her powers. Ruth Ozeki has not only reinvigorated the novel itself, the form, but she’s given us the tried and true, deep and essential pleasure of characters we love and who matter.”
—Jane Hamilton, bestselling author of A Map of the World
“Profoundly original, with authentic, touching characters and grand, encompassing themes, Ruth Ozeki’s novel proves that truly great stories—like this one—can both deepen our understanding of self and remind us of our shared humanity.”
—Deborah Harkness, bestselling author of A Discovery of Witches and Shadow of Night
“A wise and wonderfully inventive story that will resonate through time.”
—Gail Tsukiyama, bestselling author of The Samurai’s Garden
“A Tale for the Time Being is that rare book that effortlessly applies a lively novelist’s skill to profound exploration of Dharma. . . . You will fall in love with these characters (especially grandma Jiko, the 104-year-old Zen nun)!”
—Norman Fischer, author of Training in Compassion: Zen Teachings on the Practice of Lojong
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Ruth Ozeki is a novelist, filmmaker, and Zen Buddhist priest. She is the award-winning author of three novels, My Year of Meats, All Over Creation, and A Tale for the Time Being. Her critically acclaimed independent films, including Halving the Bones, have been screened at Sundance and aired on PBS. She is affiliated with the Brooklyn Zen Center and the Everyday Zen Foundation. She lives in British Columbia and New York City.
PRAISE FOR A TALE FOR THE TIME BEING
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
TITLE PAGE
COPYRIGHT
DEDICATION
Part I
Nao
Ruth
Nao
Ruth
Nao
Ruth
Nao
Ruth
Nao
Part II
Ruth
Nao
Ruth
Nao
Ruth
Nao
Ruth
Nao
Ruth
Nao
Ruth
Nao
Haruki #1’s Letters
Part III
Nao
Ruth
Nao
Ruth
Nao
Ruth
Haruki #1’s Secret French Diary
Ruth
Nao
Ruth
Part IV
Nao
Ruth
Nao
Ruth
Epilogue
APPENDIX A: ZEN MOMENTS
APPENDIX B: QUANTUM MECHANICS
APPENDIX C: RAMBLING THOUGHTS
APPENDIX D: TEMPLE NAMES
APPENDIX E: SCHRÖDINGER’S CAT
APPENDIX F: HUGH EVERETT
BIBLIOGRAPHY
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Part I
An ancient buddha once said:
For the time being, standing on the tallest mountaintop,
For the time being, moving on the deepest ocean floor,
For the time being, a demon with three heads and eight arms,
For the time being, the golden sixteen-foot body of a buddha,
For the time being, a monk’s staff or a master’s fly-swatter,1
For the time being, a pillar or a lantern,
For the time being, any Dick or Jane,2
For the time being, the entire earth and the boundless sky.
—Dgen Zenji, “For the Time Being”3
Nao
1.
Hi!
My name is Nao, and I am a time being. Do you know what a time being is? Well, if you give me a moment, I will tell you.
A time being is someone who lives in time, and that means you, and me, and every one of us who is, or was, or ever will be. As for me, right now I am sitting in a French maid café in Akiba Electricity Town, listening to a sad chanson that is playing sometime in your past, which is also my present, writing this and wondering about you, somewhere in my future. And if you’re reading this, then maybe by now you’re wondering about me, too.
You wonder about me.
I wonder about you.
Who are you and what are you doing?
Are you in a New York subway car hanging from a strap, or soaking in your hot tub in Sunnyvale?
Are you sunbathing on a sandy beach in Phuket, or having your toenails buffed in Abu Dhabi?
Are you a male or a female or somewhere in between?
Is your girlfriend cooking you a yummy dinner, or are you eating cold Chinese noodles from a box?
Are you curled up with your back turned coldly toward your snoring wife, or are you eagerly waiting for your beautiful lover to finish his bath so you can make passionate love to him?
Do you have a cat and is she sitting on your lap? Does her forehead smell like cedar trees and fresh sweet air?
Actually, it doesn’t matter very much, because by the time you read this, everything will be different, and you will be nowhere in particular, flipping idly through the pages of this book, which happens to be the diary of my last days on earth, wondering if you should keep on reading.
And if you decide not to read any more, hey, no problem, because you’re not the one I was waiting for anyway. But if you do decide to read on, then guess what? You’re my kind of time being and together we’ll make magic!
2.
Ugh. That was dumb. I’ll have to do better. I bet you’re wondering what kind of stupid girl would write words like that.
Well, I would.
Nao would.
Nao is me, Naoko Yasutani, which is my full name, but you can call me Nao because everyone else does. And I better tell you a little more about myself if we’re going to keep on meeting like this . . . !
Actually, not much has changed. I’m still sitting in this French maid café in Akiba Electricity Town, and Edith Pilaf is singing another sad chanson, and Babette just brought me a coffee and I’ve taken a sip. Babette is my maid and also my new friend, and my coffee is Blue Mountain and I drink it black, which is unusual for a teenage girl, but it’s definitely the way good coffee should be drunk if you have any respect for the bitter bean.
I have pulled up my sock and scratched behind my knee.
I have straightened my pleats so that they line up neatly on the tops of my thighs.
I have tucked my shoulder-length hair behind my right ear, which is pierced with five holes, but now I’m letting it fall modestly across my face again because the otaku4 salaryman who’s sitting at the table next to me is staring, and it’s creeping me out even though I find it amusing, too. I’m wearing my junior high school uniform and I can tell by the way he’s looking at my body that he’s got a major schoolgirl fetish, and if that’s the case, then how come he’s hanging out in a French maid café? I mean, what a dope!
But you can never tell. Everything changes, and anything is possible, so maybe I’ll change my mind about him, too. Maybe in the next few minutes, he will lean awkwardly in my direction and say something surprisingly beautiful to me, and I will be overcome with a fondness for him in spite of his greasy hair and bad complexion, and I’ll actually condescend to converse with him a little bit, and eventually he will invite me to go shopping, and if he can convince me that he’s madly in love with me, I’ll go to a department store with him and let him buy me a cute cardigan sweater or a keitai5 or handbag, even though he obviously doesn’t have a lot of money. Then after, maybe we’ll go to a club and drink some cocktails, and zip into a love hotel with a big Jacuzzi, and after we bathe, just as I begin to feel comfortable with him, suddenly his true inner nature will emerge, and he’ll tie me up and put the plastic shopping bag from my new cardigan over my head and rape me, and hours later the police will find my lifeless naked body bent at odd angles on the floor, next to the big round zebra-skin bed.
Or maybe he will just ask me to strangle him a little with my panties while he gets off on their beautiful aroma.
Or maybe none of these things will happen except in my mind and yours, because, like I told you, together we’re making magic, at least for the time being.
3.
Are you still there? I just reread what I wrote about the otaku salaryman, and I want to apologize. That was nasty. That was not a nice way to start.
I don’t want to give you the wrong impression. I’m not a stupid girl. I know Edith Pilaf’s name isn’t really Pilaf. And I’m not a nasty girl or a hentai,6 either. I’m actually not a big fan of hentai, so if you are one, then please just put this book down immediately and don’t read any further, okay? You will only be disappointed and wasting your time, because this book is not going to be some kinky girl’s secret diary, filled with pink fantasies and nasty fetishes. It’s not what you think, since my purpose for writing it before I die is to tell someone the fascinating life story of my hundred-and-four-year-old great-grandmother, who is a Zen Buddhist nun.
You probably don’t think nuns are all that fascinating, but my great-grandmother is, and not in a kinky way at all. I am sure there are lots of kinky nuns out there . . . well, maybe not so many kinky nuns, but kinky priests, for sure, kinky priests are everywhere . . . but my diary will not concern itself with them or their freaky behaviors.
This diary will tell the real life story of my great-grandmother Yasutani Jiko. She was a nun and a novelist and New Woman7 of the Taisho era.8 She was also an anarchist and a feminist who had plenty of lovers, both males and females, but she was never kinky or nasty. And even though I may end up mentioning some of her love affairs, everything I write will be historically true and empowering to women, and not a lot of foolish geisha crap. So if kinky nasty things are your pleasure, please close this book and give it to your wife or co-worker and save yourself a lot of time and trouble.
4.
I think it’s important to have clearly defined goals in life, don’t you? Especially if you don’t have a lot of life left. Because if you don’t have clear goals, you might run out of time, and when the day comes, you’ll find yourself standing on the parapet of a tall building, or sitting on your bed with a bottle of pills in your hand, thinking, Shit! I blew it. If only I’d set clearer goals for myself!
I’m telling you this because I’m actually not going to be around for long, and you might as well know this up front so you don’t make assumptions. Assumptions suck. They’re like expectations. Assumptions and expectations will kill any relationship, so let’s you and me not go there, okay?
The truth is that very soon I’m going to graduate from time, or maybe I shouldn’t say graduate because that makes it sound as if I’ve actually met my goals and deserve to move on, when the fact is that I just turned sixteen and I’ve accomplished nothing at all. Zilch. Nada. Do I sound pathetic? I don’t mean to. I just want to be accurate. Maybe instead of graduate, I should say I’m going to drop out of time. Drop out. Time out. Exit my existence. I’m counting the moments.
One . . .
Two . . .
Three . . .
Four . . .
Hey, I know! Let’s count the moments together!9
Ruth
1.
A tiny sparkle caught Ruth’s eye, a small glint of refracted sunlight angling out from beneath a massive tangle of drying bull kelp, which the sea had heaved up onto the sand at full tide. She mistook it for the sheen of a dying jellyfish and almost walked right by it. The beaches were overrun with jellyfish these days, the monstrous red stinging kind that looked like wounds along the shoreline.
But something made her stop. She leaned over and nudged the heap of kelp with the toe of her sneaker then poked it with a stick. Untangling the whiplike fronds, she dislodged enough to see that what glistened underneath was not a dying sea jelly, but something plastic, a bag. Not surprising. The ocean was full of plastic. She dug a bit more, until she could lift the bag up by its corner. It was heavier than she expected, a scarred plastic freezer bag, encrusted with barnacles that spread across its surface like a rash. It must have been in the ocean for a long time, she thought. Inside the bag, she could see a hint of something red, someone’s garbage, no doubt, tossed overboard or left behind after a picnic or a rave. The sea was always heaving things up and hurling them back: fishing lines, floats, beer cans, plastic toys, tampons, Nike sneakers. A few years earlier it was severed feet. People were finding them up and down Vancouver Island, washed up on the sand. One had been found on this very beach. No one could explain what had happened to the rest of the bodies. Ruth didn’t want to think about what might be rotting inside the bag. She flung it farther up the beach. She would finish her walk and then pick it up on the way back, take it home, and throw it out.
2.
“What’s this?” her husband called from the mud room.
Ruth was cooking dinner, chopping carrots and concentrating.
“This,” Oliver repeated when she didn’t answer.
She looked up. He was standing in the doorway of the kitchen, dangling the large scarred freezer bag in his fingers. She’d left it out on the porch, intending to deposit it in the trash, but she’d gotten distracted.
“Oh, leave it,” she said. “It’s garbage. Something I picked up on the beach. Please don’t bring it in the house.” Why did she have to explain?
“But there’s something in it,” he said. “Don’t you want to know what’s inside?”
“No,” she said. “Dinner’s almost ready.”
He brought it in anyway and laid it on the kitchen table, scattering sand. He couldn’t help it. It was his nature to need to know, to take things apart and sometimes put them back together. Their freezer was filled with plastic shrouds containing the tiny carcasses of birds, shrews, and other small animals that their cat had brought in, waiting to be dissected and stuffed.
“It’s not just one bag,” he reported, carefully unzipping the first and laying it aside. “It’s bags within bags.”
The cat, attracted by all the activity, jumped up onto the table to help. He wasn’t allowed on the table. The cat had a name, Schrödinger, but they never used it. Oliver called him the Pest, which sometimes morphed into Pesto. He was always doing bad things, disemboweling squirrels in the middle of the kitchen, leaving small shiny organs, kidneys and intestine
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