Cover Photo By David Miranda
Cover Photo By David Miranda.

Standing in the wings for “The Woman in the Purple Skirt”


Everyone is not as they seem.


By Isabel Adolor | Thursday, 13 January 2022

Short, gripping, and the winner of Japan's prestigious Akutagawa Prize, The Woman in the Purple Skirt is a subtle psychological thriller that covers the reality of breaking out of a solitary existence to make oneself known in society. Much credit goes to its translator, Lucy North, for relaying Imamura’s unnerving Japanese prose to an English-speaking audience.

 

“I want to become friends with the Woman in the Purple Skirt. But how?”

 

Set in modern-day Japan, the reader meets the Woman in the Purple Skirt through the eyes of the Woman in the Yellow Cardigan. Always watching from afar, the socially inept Yellow Cardigan gives unsolicited details of Purple Skirt’s day-to-day life, from her habit of sitting in the park with a cream bun to the various jobs that she has taken. All the Woman in the Yellow Cardigan wants is to be friends with the Woman in the Purple Skirt. Without uttering a word to her, Yellow Cardigan leads Purple Skirt to work at the same hotel where the latter becomes a beloved housekeeper. 

 

But as nothing is ever so simple in this novel, the narrative spirals downward when the Woman in the Purple Skirt has an affair with the hotel’s director.          

 

Telling it as it is

A quintessential characteristic of most Japanese writers is their use of simple and straightforward language. Imamura’s style is no exception as she—or rather the Woman in the Yellow Cardigan—communicates Purple Skirt’s excursions in a deadpan manner. Discomfort creeps up on the reader the more Yellow Cardigan tells her story, as if we are expected to think that there is nothing wrong with her knowing intimate details about Purple Skirt’s life. However, it is because of this straightforward delivery that the most disturbing moments of the story pounce on the reader without warning; making them do double-takes until the very last chapter. 

 

An inside perspective on contemporary Japanese living

Contemporary Japan is a cultural paradox. Hidden beneath the neon-lit quirkiness is the sinister reality of internal discrimination, the pressure to maintain a strict social order, and the destruction of one’s reputation to workplace powerplay. Imamura’s novel is such a snapshot of her country. Issues of unemployment and unfair treatment towards different individuals are starkly weaved into the story, but, as with Japan’s reality, the reader must take a closer look to truly understand its gravity. 

 

“I’ve been here all along.”

 

The story leaves much to interpretation, with details dropped at random for the reader to piece together and gain a clearer picture of the Woman in the Yellow Cardigan’s motives. However, setting aside its obsessive undertones, the novel presents how it is possible for an individual to not be the main character of their own life. This is undoubtedly a precarious mindset, masked by one’s excuse that this acts as a “needed escapism” from being the functioning individual that they must portray in the real world. While such escapism provides one with moments to breathe, Imamura exposes how shallow the individual becomes when they are stuck in their own subjective perception of things. 

 

Whether we choose to wear a yellow cardigan or a purple skirt, the story asks all of us the same questions: Are we truly the main character of our lives? Or are we just cheap reproductions of characters we wish to become?


The Woman in the Purple Skirt by Natusko Imamura with translation by Lucy North is available on the Fully Booked website, as well as Lazada and Shopee.