Shōgun : A Novel of Japan - The Asian Saga - Book 1

James Clavell

DELL

1979

1210 páginas

1d 16h 20m

ISBN-10: 0440178002

A saga of Japan in the 1600s featuring a love triangle composed of the English adventurer John Blackthorne, a Japanese warlord, and a woman caught between two cultures.
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https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Asian_Saga
"(...) The name Asian Saga was first applied to the series after Shōgun had been published. The purpose of the Asian Saga was, according to Clavell—descendant of a family long in service to the British Empire, and who was a prisoner of war of the Japanese during the Second World War—to tell "the story of the Anglo-Saxon in Asia.". Four of the six books—Tai-Pan, Gai-Jin, Noble House, and Whirlwind—follow the dealings of the great trading company Struan's, the Noble House of Asia (based on Jardine Matheson Holdings Limited), its founder Dirk Struan, and his various descendants. Gai-Jin provides the major link between the Shōgun and Struan's storylines. . .
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(*) The Asian Saga ordered by internal chronology:
• Shōgun: set in feudal Japan, 1600.
• Tai-Pan: set in Hong Kong, 1841.
• Gai-Jin: set in Japan, 1862.
• King Rat: set in a Japanese POW camp, Singapore, 1945.
• Noble House (novel): set in Hong Kong, 1963.
• Whirlwind: set in Iran, 1979.
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Here is the world-famous novel of Japan that is the earliest book in James Clavell’s masterly Asian saga. Set in the year 1600, it tells the story of a bold English pilot whose ship was blown ashore in Japan, where he encountered two people who were to change his life: a warlord with his own quest for power, and a beautiful interpreter torn between two ways of life and two ways of love.

The principal figures are John Blackthorne, whose dream it is to be the first Englishman to circumnavigate the globe, to wrest control of the trade between Japan and China from Portuguese, and to return home a man of wealth and position; Toranaga, the most powerful feudal lord in Japan, who strives and schemes to seize ultimate power by becoming Shogun—the Supreme Military Dictator—and to unite the warring samurai fiefdoms under his own masterly and farsighted leadership; and the Lady Mariko, a Catholic convert whose conflicting loyalties to the Church and her country are compounded when she falls in love with Blackthorne, the barbarian intruder.

In dramatizing how a Westerner, the representative man of his time, comes to be altered by his exposure to an alien culture, Mr. Clavell provides a spellbinding depiction of a nation seething with violence and intrigue as it moves from the medieval world to the modern.

[Praise for Shogun]: “I can’t remember when a novel has seized my mind like this one. . . . It’s not only something you read—you live it.”—New York Times Book Review.

“Adventure and action, the suspense of danger, shocking touching human relationships . . . a climactic human story.”—Los Angeles Times.

“A tale surging with action, intrigue and love . . . a huge cast . . . vast and dramatic . . . stunning . . . savage . . . beautiful . . . an extraordinary performance.”—Publishers Weekly.

“Exciting, totally absorbing...be prepared for late nights, meals unlasting, buisness unattended.”—Philadelphia Inquirer.

Resenhas (26)

4 (Muito bom)

Para conhecer a cultura japonesa samurai

Indico muito a leitura pra quem tem interesse em conhecer a cultura japonesa por volta do século XVII (em especial a samurai)!
Acho muito interessante refletir, depois da leitura, sobre como a religião está intrinsecamente ligada à moral de uma sociedade, e como isso influencia no comportamento das pessoas. Ou ainda sobre situações atuais que tem fortes influências da mentalidade militarista japonesa.
Agora, vou falar sobre os pontos negativos da obra. Primeiro, os capítulos são bem longos e não terminam com algum "gancho" pro próximo. Ademais, no geral, a história não tem um bom ritmo, e por esses motivos eu demorei bastante pra ler o livro, ele não me "viciou", não fiquei curiosa pra ver como iam se desenrolar os acontecimentos. Apesar disso, em certos momentos, eu ficava encantada com a história, achava realmente sensacional. Enfim, foi meio uma montanha russa de emoções durante a leitura.
Um último detalhe é sobre os diálogos, eu fiquei extremamente confusa sobre quem estava falando o que, mas isso também pode ter sido um problema da versão digital do livro que eu li.
Enfim, pra complementar, recomendo muito o documentário "A Guerra dos Samurais" da Netflix. Os eventos narrados lá se passam antes dos eventos do Xógum, mas não dão nenhum spoiler.