What makes this odd, but utterly fascinating, novel particularly unusual is the fact that two of the "nails" trying to avoid being "hammered down" are prostitutes. A woman's own desires present obstacles for men and are best ignored." To be happy and successful in this world, a woman needs to be cooperative, working hard for the good of her family, school, or workplace, while remaining submissive to parents, school administrators, and employers, nearly all of them men. A daughter belongs to her father, a wife to her husband.
And among those rules is the one specifying that women are merely commodities for men to possess. With little sense of self-worth, all are unhappy and frustrated- and more than a little neurotic.įor the women, there's an additional barrier to personal happiness, described by one of the speakers: "Men live by rules they've made for themselves. The four speakers of the novel, three of them women and one of them a foreign-born man, are all "nails" that "stick up" in Tokyo, people who have a great need to be recognized for who they are but who have failed to find even minimal success in the culture in which they live and work. The Japanese describe their own culture by saying, "The nail that sticks up gets hammered down," and that aphorism forms the underpinning of this consummately Japanese novel. I want people to say, What an awesome employee Kazue Sato is." I want to be someone whom everyone notices.
(Reviewed by Mary Whipple JUN 28, 2007) "I want to be number one.
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