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A Novel
by Katherine Govier
Book Reviewed by:Vivid, daring, and unforgettable, The Printmaker's Daughter shines fresh light on art, loyalty, and the tender and indelible bond between a father and daughter.
Recounting the story of her life, Oei plunges us into the colorful world of nineteenth-century Edo (Tokyo), in which courtesans rub shoulders with poets, warriors consort with actors, and the arts flourish in an unprecedented moment of creative upheaval. Oei and Hokusai live among writers, novelists, tattoo artists, and prostitutes, evading the spies of the repressive shogunate as they work on Hokusai's countless paintings and prints. Wielding her brush, rejecting domesticity in favor of dedication to the arts, Oei defies all expectations of womanhood - all but one. A dutiful daughter to the last, she will obey the will of her eccentric father, the man who
Vivid, daring, and unforgettable, The Printmaker's Daughter shines fresh light on art, loyalty, and the tender and indelible bond between a father and daughter.
First published in Canada as The Ghost Brush
Govier weaves the saga of Oei's life into Japanese customs - such as the parade of courtesans, or the shaved eyebrows that signify a married woman - in a fashion that develops an intimacy between the reader, Oei, and this complex culture. It's a potent combination that results in a mystically engaging story, and though Oei may not think her life is full of incident, her legacy certainly is...continued
Full Review
(582 words)
(Reviewed by Mark James).
entitled Thirty-Six Views of Mount Fuji - and his daughter, Ei.
The character Ei spends much of her early life in the Yoshiwara, or red light district, of Edo (modern day Tokyo) where her father helps pay his bills by producing erotica known as shunga. Ei, or Oei as he calls her, works as her father's apprentice.If you liked The Printmaker's Daughter, try these:
by Brandon W. Jones
Published 2013
This spellbinding debut, reminiscent of Memoirs of a Geisha, depicts, with chilling accuracy, life behind North Korea's iron curtain.
by Catherine Chung
Published 2013
Weaving Korean folklore within a modern narrative of immigration and identity, Forgotten Country is a fierce exploration of the inevitability of loss, the conflict between obligation and freedom, and a family struggling to find its way out of silence and back to one another.
