The Old Capital (Nobel Prize for Literature)

The Old Capital (in Japanese 古都) is a novel by Japanese author Yasunari Kawabata originally published in 1962. The Old Capital was one of the three novels cited by the Nobel Committee in awarding the 1968 Prize for Literature to Kawabata (the other two were Snow Country and Thousand Cranes).

In the The Old Capital, Chieko Sada is the daughter of Takichiro and Shige, who operate a kimono wholesale business in Kyoto. Now twenty, Chieko has known for years that she was a foundling adopted by Takichiro and Shige. Soon after a chance encounter at Yasaka Shrine, Chieko learns of a twin sister Naeko, who had remained in her home village in Kitayama working in the mountain forests north of the city. The identical looks of Chieko and Naeko confuse Hideo, a traditional weaver, who is a potential suitor of Chieko. The novel, one of the last that Kawabata completed before his death, examines themes common to much of his literature: the gulf between the sexes and the anxiety its recognition brings.

The novel was adapted in 1963 into a Japanese feature film known in English under the title Twin Sisters of Kyoto. Directed by Noboru Nakamura, it was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film. A second film adaptation was made in 1980 by director Kon Ichikawa. The movie was the last in which actress Momoe Yamaguchi appeared before she retired to marry her co-star, Tomokazu Miura [1].


[1] Wikipedia