A friend wrote today to say, “I read your new book finally. It’s very wabi-sabi.” And more, of course. But if she’d said nothing else but that it was very wabi-sabi, I would have been elated. It’s the descriptor that I feel captures The Love We Share Without Knowing, and in a more American way, even One for Sorrow. I hadn’t come across the term before I moved to Japan in 2004. When I did encounter this word, though, and learned about its aesthetic system and meaning, it felt like I’d finally found a name for the way I look at the world, I think, which comes through, of course, in my stories.
No clue what Wabi-sabi means? Go here. It’s a decent background.
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