reading the book is far better than watching the movie , more details of Japan's famous geisha life .

Four stars! I love reading memoirs - I think they're one of the best parts of reading: learning from people you've never met, experiencing a part of the world you never would otherwise, wonder. I've been meaning to read this particular memoir for several years; ever since I read 'Memoirs of a Geisha', which fascinated and enthralled me. And then I did some research and found out it had some very serious inaccuracies, and that Iwasaki (whom the author interviewed) had pressed charges for breach of contract. It was time to read a non-fiction portrayal.

The geisha are presented as artists in every sense of the word - in how they dress, how they portray themselves to others, their artistic and musical abilities. It was really a very fascinating account of a significant part of Japanese culture that developed and preserved itself for such a long time.

I came to really like Iwasaki - she seemed honest about the blessings and shortcomings of life in Gion Kobu. She loves the dance and the culture, but in the end, the rules surrounding behaviour and choice for geisha are too limiting, not to mention the institution's lack of forward thinking and willingness to change.

This is a worthwhile read if only to lose some of the misconceptions of geisha culture as a whole - a culture that is about art and beauty.

Geisha are supposed to be educated. She is the dumbest person I have ever read about. I hated her point of view of things.

The autobiography of Mineko Iwasaki, the most famous geisha in Japan until her sudden retirement at the height of her career. This is written partially in response to Arthur Golden's Memoirs of a Geisha (although it never says so directly); as such, it's made accessible to a foreign audience and does much to explain the controversy surrounding Memoirs, particularly the liberties that book takes with Iwasaki's life story, as well as the way it elides geisha and prostitution. This is also a memoir in its own right. Iwasaki relies heavily on anecdotes; her memory is precise, her language evocative, her personality changeable and occasionally smug. She simultaneously loves and criticizes the hierarchical social structure, restrictiveness, skill, artistry, and effort that contribute to a geisha's craft, particularly as interacts with gender and as it has failed to change with the times; her experience and opinions are fervent and complex. This throughline isn't as solid as it could be--in particular, it wants for a stronger conclusion, perhaps an argument about what she believes the future of geisha should look like. But it's a compelling effort, and especially valuable in a world where Memoirs of a Geisha is such a problematic and popular text.

This book was all over the place. It is extremely dry and often sounds like a recitation of random facts and not so interesting anecdotes.

I always thought the world of the geisha was probably very interesting and fascinating - Mineko Iwasaki proved me wrong. It actually sounds dreadful, unpleasant and dull in her memoir.

All the "good" parts of being a geisha sounded, to me, either boring or creepy (an uneducated 16-year-old girl entertaining old-ass rich men for a living?), and the bad parts were extremely bad. Mineko suffered an attempted rape, several assaults, anorexia nervosa, anxiety and other mental problems, and her health deteriorated so much that she suffered kidney failure and nearly died due to constant overwork and barely any sleep. Her costume weighed more than half her body weight and the complicated hairstyle led to her getting a bald patch. Other geisha clearly had alcoholism problems.

This was difficult to read for other reasons too. Mineko was always putting her heavy-handed view of events and people on page instead of just describing them and allowing the reader to make up their own mind. Yes, obviously this is a memoir, but this goes way beyond that. I always felt like I was getting not merely "one side of the story", but even less than that, as so many things are not explained properly. Like why were other geisha putting out live cigarettes on her hand and arranging for her to be sexually assaulted, all in front of customers? Mineko seems content to think they were just jealous bitches, but it all seemed pretty extreme to me. She also never had any sympathy for other people who did not have the same privileges in life as she did, like her older sister who was sold to the geisha house as a child and hated it. Mineko was clearly of the view that her sister was a whiner.

Also, as a reader I had a problem with the fact that Mineko is just not a pleasant person. She says she doesn't like other people, and well, that's pretty apparent. She clearly thinks she is above everyone and is very vocal about it, she doesn't give a fuck about having a 5-year long relationship with a married man (a huge creep by the way), she never admits to being wrong. The way she described flirting with Prince Philip in front of Queen Elizabeth to get back at her (ostensibly for the Queen not eating her meal - there is a picture of this exact event that clearly shows the Queen eating and even drinking sake - but really for putting Mineko in her place by not speaking to her first) is her typical brattish behaviour.

Well, I learned that to be a geisha the most important things are to be pretty, graceful and a good dancer, all of which Mineko was for sure. But all that about being pleasant and educated doesn't seem to apply to her.

Dnfing.

1) Iwasaki wrote this as a refutation of Memoirs of a Geisha, saying the selling of virginity and abuse was false. This memoir is framed around that - it's defensive and oddly feels like it puts the Flower and Willow industry on a pedestal, washing any criticism or sins from it. Now, certainly there is much room for criticism of a white man writing about a part of Japanese women's culture, but that also doesn't mean we can't criticize Iwasaki. Her memoir is odd and at times very unbelievable - she boasts she has a perfect memory and can recall exact conversations from when she was 3 and that she knew she wanted to be a Geisha....at 3. Now, I wanted to be a unicorn princess puppy witch when I was 3 but my parents never sent me off to unicorn princess puppy witch school (this is a lie, because I don't remember shit about being 3.) She is unlikeable (which is odd for a person whose career is built around being likeable); she frames herself as a perfect person who doesn't fart (yep), is loved by everyone around her. What comes across is a spoiled child who gets what she wants at the suffering of others. HOWEVER I also wonder how much of that is face, is covering of whatever true abuse or coersion happened. She insists it was her choice to become a Geisha at age 3 and was sent to train at age 5....what loving parents would do that? It's possible this memoir is the story Iwasaki has told herself, in order to cope with the trauma she experienced.

2) A former meiko (geisha in training) came out in the past few years of the sexual harassment (groping, flirting, etc.) that she received as a minor and watched other minors receive in their geisha school. Teen girls are forced to drink underage, forced to be in intimate situations they do not want to be in with adult men. She also confirmed the house mother was going to sell her virginity (https://www.vice.com/en/article/93adb...). The geisha world has remained silent but several retired geisha have spoken up in support. I think it's important to listen and believe a woman or child when they speak of being abused, not question them.

Soooo... I am left feeling there is much unreliable storytelling in this memoir. This has been on my TBR since I read Memoirs of a Geisha as a teen, I wanted the true story of what being a Geisha is like...and I disappointingly got another story.

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I have wanted to read GEISHA, A LIFE, for a while. Mineko Iwasaki was one of Arthur Golden's sources for his book, MEMOIRS OF A GEISHA, where he then proceeded to get everything wrong, apparently, to the point where Iwasaki even tried to sue him. She then wrote this spite memoir to tell her own story, in her own words. Good for her. I think we can all agree that this is a level of pettiness that is truly aspirational in nature. Living well isn't the best revenge unless you also write a fuck-you memoir about it, too.



I can 100% see why Golden's story pissed Iwasaki off. The virginity auctions and child grooming were not at all what happened in Iwasaki's life. She was brought to the okiya at a young age, but not to be prepped for work as an escort. The owners of the okiya wanted her to be the successor, so everything she was taught was all business. There were no virginity auctions and when she came of age, she was free to sleep with whomever she liked. Mizuage actually refers to (1) the total of a geisha's profits or (2) their non-sexual coming of age ceremony. The mizuage that is one of the climaxes of MEMOIRS is actually something the oiran, or prostitutes, did. Not the geisha. Whoops.



For the most part, GEISHA, A LIFE, is very slow-paced. but there were some moments I found very interesting/amusing. For example, when King Charles visited in the 70s, he asked to borrow her fan and then autographed it without her permission because, I guess, he figured she'd fangirl over him. She made no secret of her distaste and immediately had it tossed into the trash afterwards. Then, a few years later, she got pissed off that his mother, Queen Elizabeth, wouldn't eat the food at an event she was hosting, so she decided to flirt with her husband in front of her just to fuck with her. She also dated the actor Shintaro Katsu, but he wouldn't leave his wife for her, so she cut up his wife's fur coat with scissors and leaves it on the bed of the hotel she was supposed to meet him at. Bad-ass.



Smashed in between the who's-who in 1960s Japan and endless recounts of virtually any facet of geisha life you would want to know (or not know), we get a little window into some of the in-fighting and cattiness that happened in such a competitive industry. Again, it wasn't nearly as bad as what happened in Golden's book. It actually reminded me of Holly Madison's memoir about living in the Playboy Mansion, where there's jealousy over resources, looks, and attention. I feel like both geisha and the Playboy Bunnies occupy this grayspace that isn't quite sex work but feels like maybe it because of how everybody fetishizes them, even when things are technically above board.



If you enjoyed-- or didn't enjoy-- MEMOIRS OF A GEISHA, you should read this book.



3 stars

What an interesting story.

Mineko is a geisha in modern day Kyoto, Japan. She wasn´t born Mineko but when she joined the okiya (place where geisha lived) as a young girl, she was adopted by the Iwasaki family and her name became Mineko. This is her story of her training to be a dancer, which is why she wanted to become a geisha, and her other training as well. For a few years, she was the number one geisha based on her salary. She retired from the profession because whe was disillusioned with the karykai system restrictions. She often complained to the geisha authorities but they never listened.

I was surprised by some facts that she presented. I´ve always pictured geisha as very poised and shy women. However, some of the geisha bad-mouth, smoke, get drunk, and are vicious to each other even while entertaining guests. So un-geisha like. Also, they are not courtesans or prostitutes. Their job is mainly entertaining at banquets and dance performances.

She once asked one of her clients, a professor of aesthetics if beauty is in the eye of the beholder. He answered "beauty is universal... it is constant and immutable which gives rise to unversal values like beauty and morality". Mineko believed that self discipline is the key to beauty.

Good and easy read.

The author of this book might just be the most unpleasant, shallow, conceited and spoiled person I ever had the misfortune of reading about.

Her life was extraordinary, but she lacks the ability to make her retelling tolerable, let alone entertaining. Most of the book consists of anedoctes about her beheaving in an appalling way towards other people and then wondering why her peers seem to strongly dislike her (envy, she decides).

Judging by how disjointed and poorly edited the book is, the people at her publishing house must have felt very envious as well.

This is how the author describes the eventual fate of her much older sister, who — reading between the lines — was justifiably traumatized and bitter about being sold by her parents in early childhood:

"In recent years Yaeko developed Alzheimer’s disease and became more impossible than ever. None of my six remaining siblings or I am in communication with her any longer. I’m not even sure where she is living. It’s a sad situation, but I can’t help feeling that she is merely getting what she deserves.”

Much of this book sounded familiar and I wonder if it wasn't used as research for the book Memoirs of a Geisha. I found the book interesting but not overly engaging.

The book, Memoirs of a Geisha by Arthur Golden was based around interviews with Mineko Iwasaki. She was unhappy with the misuse of her words and wrote this, her autobiography after having sued him for not using her interview as background information but basing his entire book on her life story.

This book is Mineko's autobiography and details her life as a geisha from childhood up until her retirement at age 29 as a protest against the lack of education and the oppressive working life of a geisha. Some 70 other geishas followed her into retirement as a protest.

Since the age of 16 she had been the most famous, most talented and highest paid geisha (actually maiko, until she got the title of geisha at 21) of her generation, entertaining even the Queen and Prince Charles. Which shows that neither royalty nor the Foreign Office that sent them there actually care about the people of the country they are visiting, but happily take the official line.

In the West, at least, 'geisha' has always been thought of as a euphemism for a high-priced whore, but as the book shows, the women earn far more as geishas than they could ever hope to do on their backs. The world of a geisha is one where women run things and make lots of money whilst all the time looking like the epitome of sweet, submissive feminity. When they retire, that money enables them to become businessmen as the author did, despite their lack of any formal education.

For some reason that reminds me of Simone Biles, who spent her entire childhood and young adulthood working non-stop in gymnastics and got only the minimum education that the government mandates. But the money she earned, mostly endorsements, has enabled her, like Mineko, to set up businesses.

Today there are only about 1,000 geishas left in Japan. Some of them earn tens of thousands of dollars a month and not by sleeping with their clients as is popularly supposed in the West. Geishas are cultural performers who are deeply respected and prostitution is illegal in Japan. (But as common as everywhere else, see Sunshine: The Diary of a Lap Dancer where Sunshine went as a stripper to a club in Japan that recruited foreign girls, and was forced into prostitution). They aren't allowed to get married but do have babies, but there is no ban on boyfriends

I recently skimmed through the book again, hence the rewrite 11 March 2023. It is still as fascinating as it was the first time I read it in January 2004.

burn your copy of memoirs of a geisha and read this instead. Memoirs of a Geisha was wholesale ripped off from Mineko’s life story (and attributed to her without her permission) and is completely lacking in the nuance and strong voice that her actual memoir has. 10/10 peek into a very unique, opaque world