The Floating Boat

The Floating Boat is a full-length novel by the Japanese writer Naoki Watanabe, originally published in Japanese as Night Sets Sail. The heroine, Seiko, is young and inexperienced when she meets the writer Takamasa, whose aloof, proud bearing draws her deeply; she chooses to live with him without title or promise. Even after Takamasa loses a leg in a car accident, she stays faithfully at his side. Their quiet life is disrupted by the appearance of Kakurai Shuzo, a publishing-company president of forty-three who pursues Seiko with open, ardent determination. Caught between her attachment to Takamasa and her growing feelings for Kakurai, Seiko drifts like a leaf on the water. Takamasa's sensitivity, his forbearance, and his world-weary indulgence, together with Kakurai's bluntness and passion, push her to a crossroads of the heart. The novel names its chapters after seasons and skies, from Light, Cumulonimbus, Blazing Sun to White Autumn, White Moonlight, Winter Rain, Ice Flowers, Drifting Clouds, and Wilderness, and finally to Dawn, moving at a calm pace while keeping the emotional tension tight. Naoki Watanabe writes with a fine touch of people's hesitation, longing, and self-reproach in love, and also captures the spirit of the reclusive Showa-era literati and the everyday scenery of Tokyo. It is a grown-up love story about desire and guilt.