Harlequin Butterfly E-Book

Toh EnJoe

• Herausgeber: Pushkin Press
• Kategorie: Gesellschafts- und Liebesromane
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2024

Seitenzahl: 100

Beschreibung

A mind-bending literary mystery about an enigmatic writer who seems able to publish in every language - part of Pushkin's second Japanese Novella series Successful entrepreneur A.A. Abrams is pursuing the enigmatic writer Tomoyuki Tomoyuki, who appears to have the ability to write expertly in the language of any place they go. Abrams sinks endless resources into finding the writer, but Tomoyuki Tomoyuki always manages to stay one step ahead, taking off moments before being pinned down. But how does the elusive author move from one place to the next, from one language to the next? Ingenious and dazzling, Harlequin Butterfly unfurls one puzzle after another, taking us on a mind-bending journey into the imagination.

Leseprobe

3

TOH ENJOE

HARLEQUIN BUTTERFLY

Translated from the Japanese byDAVID BOYD

PUSHKIN PRESS

5

HARLEQUIN BUTTERFLY6

7

First and foremost, for those whose names begin with A, with alpha, with aleph.

Then for those whose names begin with vowels, then B, and C, and down the list.

Through every order and classification, as defined by various rules and patterns—

Where the net lands I cannot say, but could there be any other way?8

Contents

Title PageIIIIIIIVVAbout the AuthorsJapanese Fiction Available and Coming Soon From Pushkin PressCopyright

9

I

WHAT ABOUT A BOOK THAT CAN BE READ ONLY WHEN travelling?

There’s nothing exciting about a book that you can also read when travelling. There’s a right time and place for everything, and anything that claims to work everywhere can only be subpar, some kind of sham.

A book that can be read only when travelling. It could be something like The Book You Finish in Two Minutes while Doing a Headstand.

The full force of the book would be lost on you unless you read it while upside down. You’d be able to follow the words on the page just fine while on your feet, but what you’d get out of it wouldn’t be the same.

The text takes advantage of the rush of blood to your head.

As a variation on the same idea, you could create something like Revelations Best Understood in a Fit of Anger.10

This happens in the air, between Tokyo and Seattle.

In my lap, I have the book I just bought at the airport: Untold Tales for Those with Three Arms. I try to read it, but nothing sticks. It’s a recurring problem of mine. I don’t know if it’s the speed of the plane, but it feels like the words are struggling to hold onto the page, lagging behind and racing to catch up.

All I see on the page is a blur of ink. What’s written there escapes me.

I give up and my mind wanders. I find myself thinking about books that could make use of the way the words move. I can never read when I’m travelling. I’ll pack a couple of books, or maybe even buy a new one during the journey, but I can’t think of a single time that I actually got anywhere with one of them.

I guess the ability to collect stray thoughts like these and turn them into money rather than words is what it takes to succeed in business.

A. A. Abrams might not have made billions, but he managed to amass a substantial fortune—and it all began with the businessman seriously entertaining one such flight of fancy.

This happens in the air, between Tokyo and Seattle.

Abrams is a man who more or less lives on passenger planes—not that he ever has a destination in 11mind. His business is conducted in flight. When circumstances keep him on the ground, he holes up in a hotel near the airport, ready to return to the air as soon as conditions permit. He’s no flight attendant. Not a pilot, either. Just a passenger with nowhere to go.

He stuffs his corpulent frame into an economy-class seat, then waits for the layers of fat to settle into place. Once the plane has reached cruising altitude, fuselage and flesh in proper alignment, Abrams calls an attendant and orders two bottles of wine—one white, one red. Then he slowly removes a small item from the inner pocket of his coat: a bag made of silver thread wound around a glistening stick about the size of a ballpoint pen.

He frees the bag from the stick with his jumbo-sausage fingers. Then, with a motion that seems almost indecent, he opens the mouth of the bag—gently, like he’s stroking the hair of a doll.

As if by magic, a tiny butterfly net appears between his hairy digits. Carefully bringing his index and middle fingers to his thumb, the Brobdingnagian giant pinches the net, making sure to hold it level.

He gives it a graceful wave, as if he were conducting his own humming.

Out of the corner of his eye, Abrams sizes me up in the seat beside him and squints at the book in my lap. 12Certain that my attention is now his for the taking, he launches into a nonsensical spiel in a thick American accent:

“See this? I use this net to go around capturing fresh ideas. That’s my trade. I’ve tried it out in all kinds of places, but nowhere beats a jumbo jet. When you’re flying, all kinds of ideas pop into your head, come loose and drift around the cabin. Now, most of these so-called ideas are flotsam with no real value, but it’s still a whole lot better than trying to squeeze something useful out of a conference room full of dummies in suits. At the end of the day, ideas make the world go round. A business is a living thing, and it takes a steady influx of ideas to keep the thing alive. That’s what I’m doing on this plane. Hunting for ideas.”

As I sit there unable to speak, Abrams takes the net between two fingers and brings it up to my face.

“The net’s made of silver thread. Filigree. It’s got a million spells woven into it, too small to see. It’s one of a kind—handcrafted by an artisan in Afghanistan. Ideas tend to stay away from metal, but organic materials simply won’t do the trick. Believe me, I sank plenty of time and money into net after net before discovering that silver thread is the ideal material for catching ideas. Silver repels evil, as anyone can tell you. That 13means bad ideas steer clear of the net and I don’t have to worry about catching anything I don’t want. Two birds, one stone, so to speak.”

I glance at Abrams’s triumphant expression, then at the net in his fingers, then at his face again, buying myself the time necessary to translate what he’s just said. I tinker with his words, rearranging them while waiting patiently for the tiny dictionary in my head to tell me what they mean. Once I believe I’ve got the gist of the giant’s prolix pronouncement, I put on a smile and respond:

“I think I understand. Maybe that’s why it’s so hard for me to read in the air.”

Abrams furrows his brow. He brings his net-swooping to a sudden stop, looks me in the eye, then lifts his log-like arm and rests the silver net on my head.

“Why don’t you tell me about that?”

There’s nothing to tell. Personally, I find it impossible to read when I’m travelling. It’s just the way I’m built. I can’t concentrate. The words don’t stick. But there’s probably something behind that. And if there’s some sort of mechanism at play, maybe a special kind of book could be produced to take advantage of that.

Abrams weighs what I’ve said in stilted English, then replies:14

“Books… You’re saying you can’t read them?”

“That’s what I’m saying.”

“And not because you’re an arm short?” he asks, his glance shifting to the book in my lap.

With the net still on my head, I look down at the book, too. Untold Tales for Those with Three Arms. I grabbed the paperback from a towering stack at the airport shop, where I learnt that the hardcover had been a bestseller, even though its true meaning is apparently lost on anyone unequipped with a tertiary arm—meaning it’s nothing but dead weight to me.

“You don’t read books?” I ask.

“No,” Abrams responds with a proud snort. “First of all, they don’t hold any practical value for me. I haven’t touched a book since I finished high school—not that I was an avid reader back then. I don’t have the time to invest in anything so impractical. If I ever found myself in a pinch and I absolutely needed to read a book, well, I’d hire someone to it for me. Rest assured, I’d never ask them to provide me with a summary of what they’d read. A book report by a third party has no value. As for the book itself, why should it mind who’s doing the reading? So long as it gets read—that’s all it takes for a book to do its job.”

Perhaps deciding he’s collected enough of our 15conversation, Abrams removes the net from my head and goes on:

“Then again, if there’s demand, that’s a different story. Here I had you pegged as a big reader, but you say travel throws you for a loop, huh? So you’re looking for a book that you can read while travelling…”

I nod.

“Moving around like this,” I say, “I can never keep hold of my thoughts. It’s like they fly off. I can’t keep my mind on the book. All I see is ink. Time and place slip away, and I lose track of how it’s all supposed to connect. I can’t remember what came before, and what lies ahead starts looking like it’s hidden in some kind of fog. When I’m on the train to work, I can manage, but I can’t get anywhere if I’m on the shinkansen or the ICE. It’s even worse on a plane, which makes me think it has something to do with speed. Travelling this fast, my thoughts can’t keep up. Well, maybe those loose thoughts are the very ideas you’re going around catching.”

I point at the net that Abrams is once again absentmindedly whisking through the air.

As we go on talking, it starts to click. Considering Abrams’s unusual objective, there really is no better hunting ground than a commercial airliner. Large 16numbers of people strapped to their seats inside a container moving at high velocity, all their formless ideas breaking free and flying around the plane.

“So, how would one go about writing a book to be read when travelling?” Abrams asks as he leans towards me, the bulge of his belly spilling over the armrest between us.

I cock my head in response. If such a thing could be done, wouldn’t someone have done it ages ago? But who knows, maybe the idea’s simply slipped through the cracks. After all, serious readers despise books meant for specific purposes. Books to be given as gifts, books meant for sick friends, books to be read while doing a headstand, books to be read in transit, books for businesspeople. Books that don’t even need to be read. Books that are actually best left unread. There’s something about that degree of function that sucks all the fun out of it.

Just then, a thought tumbles out of my mouth: “It could be a translation.”

“A translation,” Abrams parrots back. “You mean taking a bestseller from some other part of the globe and turning it into your own language?”

“Not exactly. More like translating a book to fit a specific situation. Dostoevsky for people on the move. Pushkin for entrepreneurs…”17

Hearing myself speak, I can tell I’m a little off the mark. I try to correct course: “Whatever it is, it would have to be tailored for that purpose.”

I can see the cogs turning behind Abrams’s large eyes.

“So, the book would have to be written under specific conditions? Say I hire a writer, then have him more or less live on a plane—along the lines of what I’m doing now. You think what that writer puts down on paper would hold up? Could you read something like that on the go?”

“Maybe… I’m not too sure,” I say and leave it at that. The proposition is too absurd, too strange to entertain.

After all, if we start down that path, wouldn’t that imply that a poet on the brink of death could write lines that would lead their audience into the afterlife? Or an impoverished novelist could pen a piece that would drag its readers into destitution? On one hand, that makes some sense to me; on the other, I know it isn’t right. I can’t think it through, though. Probably because we’re flying through the air at high speed.

“Who knows what makes authors write the things they do in the first place…” I say, playing it safe.

“Well, that isn’t very professional, is it?” Abrams said, sitting up in his seat, apparently enraged.18