Shunsuke, an ageing novelist, hits on a brilliant plan to avenge himself on womankind who, he believes, have blighted his life.
He bribes a beautiful homosexual student, Yuichi, to marry. The plan works. Yuichi's wife is made miserable.
And Shunsuke gets Yuichi to compromise two of his past tormentors, the blackmailing Mrs Kaburagj and Kyoko, a dizzy socialite.
But Yuichi, now the toast of Tokyo's 'gay people' and free of all moral restraint, refuses to be farther manipulated. Soon the old writer sees his protege, his creation, turn into a monster dangerously out of control.
George Mikes
The Land of the Rising Yen
The Japanese are human bongs like the rest of us, but they will strongly resent this insinuation. They are determined to be puzzling, quaint, unfathomable and inscrutable.'
Everyone writes about the tea ceremony in Japan, but who, except George Mikes, notices the way rubbish is thrown out ? Everyone reports his own reaction to the Japanese sense of tradition; but who else spots the reaction of the Japanese to their own sense of tradition?
Whether he is describing morals or manners, George Mikes looks at the Japanese as he looks at the rest of mankind: with his own inimitable blend of curiosity, respect, affection and irreverence.
Yasunari Kawabata