Fifty Sounds
Polly Barton
I just finished reading the third and final Fitzcarraldo Editions book that I bought in London last year (after The Observable Universe and Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead). I really like the minimalist cover design and the quality of the paper that they use. The books have heft in my hand, and the pages are sturdy and satisfying to turn. I (and most readers, I’m guessing) don’t normally pay much attention to the physical “style” of a given publisher, so kudos to them for creating such a distinctive ethos.
Fifty Sounds is a memoir by Polly Barton about her experiences as an Englishwoman living in Japan. She’s now known for translating Japanese literature to English, which implies that she’s mastered the language, but as she tells it in this book, there’s a gap that’s essentially impossible to cross for a non-native speaker.
The title refers to a feature of Japanese called mimetics, i.e. words that represent some abstract idea through a sound. An admittedly awkward example in English might be “They came in to paint the house, bang-bang, real quick and they were done.” This type of speech is apparently much more common in Japanese. Each of the fifty chapters in the book recounts Barton’s experiences while connecting to the feeling or concept that one of these mimetics evokes.
I enjoyed her writing style, which is witty and somewhat formal. The most compelling parts for me dealt with relationships that she had with people that she met in Japan. For example, she had a romantic relationship with a man when she was still new to the country and the language, which was fraught with complications, including the obvious language and cultural barriers, but also the confusing question of whether she was conflating her falling in love with a new place with her feelings for the person.
My main criticism of the book is its repetitiveness. She often hits the same note of feeling out of place and not fitting in, which is of course natural for a newcomer to any country, but for her, is also a reflection of her anxious personality and low self-esteem. She reveals her flaws honestly and effectively, which is always commendable in a memoir, but I would have gotten the idea without it being brought up quite so many times. Perhaps the title was too catchy to discard… Forty Sounds or even Thirty-Five Sounds might have been enough, but doesn’t roll off the tongue as easily.
