At first glance, Hiromi Kawakami’s “The Third Love” reads like a romance novel that utilizes a “fated mates” trope that our modern sensibilities would consider outdated at best, predatory at worst.
The narrator, a 40-something Tokyoite named Riko, begins the novel by explaining how she met her husband, Naruya Harada, before she was 2 years old — and was instantly smitten. From toddling after him as a child (he’s 10 years older and accepted her devotion with amusement) to breathlessly sneaking out of the house to meet him as a teenager, Riko’s love for “Naa-chan,” as she calls him, is simply kismet.
Trust Kawakami, however, to never let things be so simple. A winner of numerous accolades, including the Akutagawa, Tanizaki and Yomiuri literary prizes, and known for her off-beat, intellectual writing, Kawakami instead challenges readers with an intertextual and complex consideration of love. Kawakami’s rumination is more similar to how Plato considers love in “The Symposium,” a Socratic dialogue presenting various perspectives, than to any romance novel, although erotic love for Kawakami is certainly one of its main contemplations.
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