Anyone read "The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet"?

gurujeet · #1

It is by David Mitchell and my sister has recommended it to me saying Go games figure quite prominently.

dfan · #2

There is a Go game in it but I wouldn't read it for that reason. Mitchell clearly doesn't have more than a passing knowledge of the game itself.

It is a really excellent historical novel, though, conventional and unconventional in all the right ways. David Mitchell is one of my favorite novelists, and although I like Ghostwritten and Cloud Atlas even more than this, it's still pretty great.

chiwito · #3

Hadn't heard of that one. Now I have to get it. Looking forward to reading it. Thanks for the good info.

quantumf · #4

It's an excellent book. It's set in 18th and 19th century Japan, so the Go is a good touch, but as dfan point out, it plays at best an extremely peripheral role.

chiwito · #5

quantumf wrote:

It's an excellent book. It's set in 18th and 19th century Japan, so the Go is a good touch, but as dfan point out, it plays at best an extremely peripheral role.

True, but to keep my collection complete if a novel has Any mention of go at all then I need a copy of the first edition and ideally all other editions as well as any translations in western languages.

chiwito

gurujeet · #6

Just finished and it was a good read. I thought the role of Go in the ending was more than peripheral and the description of the game did display some actual knowledge of the game. Enjoyed it!

quantumf · #7

gurujeet wrote:

Just finished and it was a good read. I thought the role of Go in the ending was more than peripheral and the description of the game did display some actual knowledge of the game. Enjoyed it!

Heh, I posted my comments just before reading the last bit

What amused was the score estimate - one player thought he was 6 points behind, the other player thought he 6.5 ahead

willemien · #8

Can somebody add the book to Literature
from what I read here it is a good candidate. mybe even for Go-centric Fiction or Containing Major References to Go

fromwhat i read on amazon .co.uk it is not yet published (In the uk) so I cannot do it

dfan · #9

It was published in the UK in May. Amazon link

ethanb · **#10**

quantumf wrote:

gurujeet wrote:

Just finished and it was a good read. I thought the role of Go in the ending was more than peripheral and the description of the game did display some actual knowledge of the game. Enjoyed it!

Heh, I posted my comments just before reading the last bit

What amused was the score estimate - one player thought he was 6 points behind, the other player thought he 6.5 ahead

Ouch, anachronism. Can't have a half point in a game before komi was invented.

Haven't read the book though - maybe he's counting endgame moves or something, but it would be unusual to translate fractional points from deiri counting into the estimated full-board score.

chiwito · **#11**

willemien wrote:

Can somebody add the book to Literature
from what I read here it is a good candidate.

I've addedit to my list of go ficiton on www.goodreads.com, which I think is the most complete list of go fiction in English on the web. Once I obtain a copy, I'll add a review.

chiwito

Anyone read "The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet"?

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