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3.89 AVERAGE
3.89 AVERAGE
A real life account of the life of a Geisha. Very interesting reading.
I hesitate to call it dishonest as a whole, but there are a lot of anecdotes and details that just don't ring true, or are contradictory. Still, it definitely achieves its goal of correcting the inaccuracies in Memoirs of a Geisha.
I found it pretty hard going at times. Really dry and hard to follow made worse by the fact Mineko is so in to herself i found i really disliked her after the first few chapters.
En momentos me pareció estar leyendo nada más que la historia de una chica engreída, pero supongo que de eso se trata, el orgullo del artista consagrado. Iwasaki narra varios aspectos interesantes sobre el mundo de las geishas, aunque me hubiera gustado que estuviera más detallado, es una perspectiva genial después de todo.
If you're looking for the idea of 'Memoirs of a Geisha' from the perspective of an actual geisha, here's your book.
I’ve been living in Japan for about 4 months now and learning about geisha. This book was a required read for my class on geisha. This book really helped to set things into perspective about the way a geisha lives. It also helped me to understand the Kyoto dialect that the maiko I met at the Gion Odori.
informative
inspiring
reflective
fast-paced
emotional
informative
reflective
slow-paced
This is such an insightful book, the Japanese society before WWII is beautifully written by Mineko Iwasaki. I really like how she became all independent and went outside the world of Geishas. It also tells you how women are treated in a very patriarchal society, Geishas were subjugated to being mistresses. This provides a first hand account on what it takes to be a Geisha.
This took me forever to finish but I finally did and am now even more excited to travel to Kyoto later this year! Mineko Iwasaki told her story after Memoirs of a Geisha since she felt it didn't do the profession of geiko justice (she was one of the geiko interviewed for Memoirs). This book was an interesting read and probably historically more correct than Memoirs but it rotated a bit too much around how easy and lovely Iwasaki's life was (a striking contrast to that of fictional Sayuri Nitta of Memoirs). Having an easy life doesn't sadly tell as good story as a harder life and this memoir is an example of that. It's a collection of memories and stories and facts about the lifes of maiko and geiko but in the end it wasn't very interesting. Three stars because Iwasaki was a bad ass who didn't let men treat her badly and she more or less always did what she wanted.