Passover [Inscribed and Signed]

Kometani, Foumiko. Passover [Inscribed and Signed]. New York: Carroll & Graf Publishers, Inc., 1989. First edition. Octavo. [8], 148pp. Original illustrated dust-jacket over cloth spine and paper covered boards. Gold lettering on spine. Free front endpaper inscribed and signed by the author. These two linked novellas concern Michi, a Japanese woman with a brain-damaged son, Ken, and her husband Al, a Jewish writer. and mother of a brain-damaged son, Ken. In the title story, bitterly narrated by Michi, she relates how she, Al and their elder son Jon come to New York for their first vacation in fourteen years, an occasion Al ruins by insisting they attend a Passover seder at his sister’s home. In the second, “A Guest from Afar,” told in the third person, Al ruins Ken’s first visit home from his residential treatment center by shouting at Michi. Both stories read more like polemic than fiction. Michi rails against all the circumstances of her life; she condemns Jews (in particular her sister-in-law) for intolerance, Americans for insensitivity and prejudice, Japan for conventionality, her husband for his family, his Americanism, his personality. She detests women, including herself, for the way they look. Kometani authentically renders the pervasive influence of an acutely handicapped child who, even in his absence, continues to dominate his parents’ relationship. Dust-jacket, binding and interior in overall very good condition. vg. Hardcover. (33512) $45