Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    A Study Guide for Yasnuri Kawabata's "The Jay"
    A Study Guide for Yasnuri Kawabata's "The Jay"
    A Study Guide for Yasnuri Kawabata's "The Jay"
    Ebook36 pages25 minutes

    A Study Guide for Yasnuri Kawabata's "The Jay"

    By Gale and Cengage

    4/5

    ()

    Read preview

    About this ebook

    A Study Guide for Yasnuri Kawabata's "The Jay," excerpted from Gale's acclaimed Short Stories for Students. This concise study guide includes plot summary; character analysis; author biography; study questions; historical context; suggestions for further reading; and much more. For any literature project, trust Short Stories for Students for all of your research needs.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherCengage Learning - Gale
    Release dateJul 27, 2016
    ISBN9781535837590
    A Study Guide for Yasnuri Kawabata's "The Jay"

    Read more from Gale

    Related to A Study Guide for Yasnuri Kawabata's "The Jay"

    Related ebooks

    Teaching Methods & Materials For You

    View More
    View More

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      Women’s Prize For Fiction Shortlist Entirely First-time Nominees

      Apr 28, 2021

      This year’s shortlist for the Women’s prize for fiction is made up of authors who have never been nominated for the award before, with Yaa Gyasi, Susanna Clarke and Patricia Lockwood among those competing for £30,000. The annual award for an “outstan

      2 min read

    • Article

      Favorite First Sentences

      Jan 1, 2021

      Favorite First Sentences
      1 min read

    • Article

      Grandma’s Chocolate Cake

      Feb 5, 2020

      ‘Do I have to wear this?’ I said, tugging at the bow-tie around my neck and pulling the super-tight shorts out of my bottom. ‘I look like a ventriloquist’s dummy.’ ‘You look very smart,’ said Mum. ‘Grandma bought you that outfit. She’ll be excited to

      7 min read

    • Article

      A New Look at Frog and Toad

      May 5, 2023

      A New Look at Frog and Toad
      3 min read

    • Article

      5 over 50

      Oct 10, 2018

      5 over 50
      12 min read

    • Article

      'The World Broke In Two': Four Writers, One Transformational Year

      Jul 25, 2017

      Using excerpts from letters and diaries, historian and critic Bill Goldstein follows writers Virginia Woolf, E. M. Forster, D. H. Lawrence and T. S. Eliot through the tumultuous literary year of 1922.

      3 min read

    • Article

      Julia Alvarez And The Female Book Of Job

      Feb 20, 2020

      The National Medal of Arts recipient reflects on the immigration crisis in Afterlife, her first novel for adults in almost 15 years. The post Julia Alvarez and the Female Book of Job appeared first on The Millions.

      4 min read

    • Article

      Clarence Page: The Age-old Trick Of ‘Passing’: Fiction Writer The Latest To Be Disgraced By Lies About Heritage

      Mar 20, 2023

      I have never known a man who faked his own death, but I have known a man who faked his own life, then sadly failed to live long enough for us to talk about it. I’m talking about the late Hache Carrillo, a rising, award-winning literary talent whose r

      3 min read

    • Article

      Fourteen First and Last Sentence Novels

      Apr 22, 2022

      I think of this as a new literary form, a type of novelistic prose poem, a hybrid, a chimera, whose main currency is delight, wonder, and mystery. The post Fourteen First and Last Sentence Novels appeared first on The Millions.

      13 min read

    • Article

      Tuesday New Release Day: Starring Sedaris, Adelmann, Cross-Smith, and More

      May 31, 2022

      Here’s a quick look at some notable books—new titles from David Sedaris, Maria Adelmann, Leesa Cross-Smith, and more—that are publishing this week. Want to learn more about upcoming titles? Then go read our most recent book preview. Want to help The

      5 min read

    Related categories

    Reviews for A Study Guide for Yasnuri Kawabata's "The Jay"

    4/5

    3 ratings0 reviews

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

      Book preview

      A Study Guide for Yasnuri Kawabata's "The Jay" - Gale

      13

      The Jay

      Yasunari Kawabata

      1949

      Introduction

      Yasunari Kawabata was a renowned Japanese author of short stories and novels, but his favorite form of storytelling was one of his own invention. He called this form of writing palm-of-the-hand storytelling. Like poetry, his palm-of-the-hand stories are brief and dense in imagery. Stylistically, they resemble a prose version of Japanese haiku, an ancient form of poetry revered for its simplicity and beauty. Kawabata's very short fiction relies on succinct, subtle writing that often tells a story much larger than appears on the page. The Jay, originally published in 1949, is an excellent example of this type of story, describing the teenage girl Yoshiko's life at home as she worries about a jay in her garden who has lost her chick. As the jay sings, frantically searching for her chick, Yoshiko prepares to meet the mother of her fiancé—a marriage her father has arranged. The Jay appears in Kawabata's Palm-of-the Hand Stories (1988), translated by Lane Dunlop and J. Martin Holman.

      Author Biography

      Kawabata was born in Osaka, Japan, on June 14, 1899, to a prominent Buddhist family. He experienced terrible loss as a child, as his father, mother, grandmother, only sister (named Yoshiko), and, finally, his beloved blind grandfather died—leaving him orphaned before he turned fifteen. He attended First High School in Tokyo, living in the dormitories and founding a literary club. His early compositions drew the admiration of his teachers and classmates. In 1920, he enrolled at Tokyo Imperial University, where he began to publish in literary magazines, the cornerstone of the Japanese literary scene. In 1924, he graduated with a degree in Japanese literature, and in 1925, he met his future wife, Matsubayashi Hideko—just as his writing career took off. The publication of his short story The Izu Dancer in 1926 was his first major success. This story of a quiet schoolboy who joins a group of traveling performers is much beloved in Japan and has been adapted into film regularly since its publication.

      Thoroughly shaped by the tragic deaths in his family, Kawabata was nicknamed Master of Funerals for his

      Enjoying the preview?
      Page 1 of 1