Geisha, Harlot, Strangler, Star: A Woman, Sex, and Morality in Modern Japan (Asia Perspectives: History, Society, and Culture)
In a smart, compelling examination of the real-life basis of the classic filmIn the Realm of the Senses, Johnston presents Abe Sada, Japan's most notorious female criminal. In 1936, after days spent with her married lover, she strangled him and cut off his genitals--for love, she explained to authorities, and to have and control him forever. The case galvanized the Japanese imagination, for Sada, represented by media as the archetypal "dangerous woman," whose sexuality threatened traditional domestic stability, tapped a current of subconscious social fear. By considering Sada's limited options at the time and the structure of the sex industry, which punished would-be escapees from it by selling their contracts to ever-seedier brothels, Johnston allows us to see Sada as imprisoned by circumstances, which included rape, even more than by her six-year incarceration for the murder-mutilation of the love of her life. Including notes from the police interrogation of Sada, this well-researched, scholarly work is a service to women's studies as well as Asian cultural history.Whitney ScottCopyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved