Tales of an Improbable Reality and Its Consequences. Yoko Tawada’s The Emissary
Tales of an Improbable Reality and Its Consequences. Yoko Tawada’s The Emissary

Summary/Abstract: Despite the fact that most technological achievements of the 20th century were received as promises for a better future, the taming of the atom – one of the most extraordinary of them all– proved to have dire consequences for a great number of people. In March 2011 Japan experienced a threefold catastrophe: the Tōhoku earthquake and following tsunami and the meltdown of three reactors at Fukushima nuclear power plant. One month after the earthquake an unprecedented number of people took to the streets of Japan to protest against nuclear power. The writer Yoko Tawada is one of the voices that criticized Japan government’s nuclear politics that prioritized profit over the security of Japan’s people and nature. Her short novel The Emissary (translated by Margaret Mitsutani) imagines a worst case scenario: after an unspecified cataclysm Japan cuts off every connection to the rest of the world, old people seem unable to die while watching the frail young children in their care suffering every minute of their short lives. It is a tale of a generation fraught with guilt over its failure to leave the planet inhabitable for the generations to come.

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