A Tale for the Time Being

After I thoroughly enjoyed Ruth Ozeki’s The Book of Form and Emptiness, my special lady friend suggested that I would also like this novel, based on a phrase from Master Dōgen’ Shōbōgenzō. They’re both so good that it’s hard to pick a favorite between these two. A Tale for the Time Being is perhaps a bit more philosophical in tone, but the action is equally imaginative, even if most of it is told in epistolary form as the author-narrator reads through the lost diaries of a Japanese teenager. One of Ozeki’s “supapowas” is her ability to make these ordinary marginal characters come alive for us, to make us feel the sufferings and joys of everyday life as worthy topics for fiction. Frequently, this produces some pretty uncomfortable moments. We are forced to confront the first noble truth of those thousand papercut shames that make up human existence. Girls start menstrating at awkward times. Beloved housecats get into fights. The power goes out. We quarrel with our mates. But, for me, these quotidian stories are what makes Ozeki’s novels so special, so warm, so … Buddhist. It goes beyond the direct references to Dogen and the old nun grandmother Jiko. She has a way of giving us a compelling story that is also a teaching in itself, which is perhaps the next best thing to experiencing the insight ourselves. We just need to live for a while in her narrative of impermanence and transition.