I now know where Murakami got his groove.

And Abe got his from Kafka.

There is an important scene early on in The Ark Sakura. Mole is at a swap meet, or the Japanese equivalence, and he spots a dealer selling strange insects. The eupcaccia, or clockbug, is an insect that has no feet. It revolves to face the sun and is therefore useful as a form of clock. It spins around but goes nowhere. Mole becomes fond of this insect and sees it as an analogy to his own life.

It's a clever analogy and holds promise for the rest of the novel. In the first half Mole meets the other protagonists of this tale and things go along well. But as we get to Mole's so called Ark, his plan to survive the coming nuclear holocaust, the novel take a downward turn. Absurdism quickly degenerates into silliness. In other words, his Kafka becomes Ionesco. This strange and interesting tale just goes off into too many corners and one too many monologues. In one bizarre segment it literally goes down the toilet. I enjoyed the strangeness of Abe's writings but this is nowhere near the brilliance of his Woman in the Dunes. To borrow from a popular food book series; Don't read this, read that.

I just love books by this author and reading a new one is a definite treat. So far none of his books have disappointed me and that says a lot. They are just so unique and generally include some bizarre situation. And this one was loads of fun! I was very absorbed in this underground tale set in a quarry in Japan. No actual year is given but the main character is a bit strange and is prepping for an imminent nuclear disaster. He thinks hiding underground in this huge old mine is the answer - but he wants others to share in his madness.

And so he invites a few people over... Well he actually invites one but a few others are rude uninvited guests!

And then his problems start!

Truthfully reading his books always surprise me! And the totally insane situation at the end of this one (it appears maybe about 3/4 of the way through) is the most crazy thing I have seen in a book! It's also hilarious but very, very UNfunny for the main character! This is the kind of thing that makes you think "Is that even possible? Who thinks of such a thing?!" Obviously Abe did, with great results! Just sitting here thinking about it has me laughing! So stupid but funny!

And this story has many other side plots in here as well. And they all work out perfectly! The story moves along at a great pace and it is never boring at all. I can guarantee you never read anything like this before! And that is why I love his books.

Oh a big part of the plot is the animosity between the main character and his father. The two do not get along at all.

This cover is like blah but the story is just fantastic! In many ways the main character thinks he is smart and clever but he is not as clever as he thinks he is. Everyone else is way ahead of him. He calls himself Mole... But Mole and the others definitely bring this story alive! No flat characters in here.

An amusing story that blends surrealism with a vital humour that keeps the nonsensical narrative from steering into a ditch. Its perhaps 50 pages too long give or take, but the lively dialogue and tongue-in-cheek ending made it a pleasurable, if peculiar, experience.

It's like a strange combination of Doctor Strangelove and Terry Southern but set in an abandoned mine in Japan. Kōbō Abe's The Ark Sakura is about an ungainly character named Mole (or sometimes Pig) who occupies the mine, stocks it to survive a nuclear Armageddon, and looks around for people to occupy it with him as their Captain of an immovable ark, so to speak. In Japanese, a Sakura is a shill; for it seems the three people he finds are all shills of various sorts.

As Mole himself admits, "Things never go the way you plan them. excerpt in fantasies." And it seems that for all his advance planning, he runs into a series of unexpected contretemps.

Kobo Abe's works are always fun to read, and this novel is no exception.

why so grotesque?? (obese man get stuck in giant toilet and gropes unnamed woman character for morale etc) & not even in an interesting rabelaisian way ? deeply unfunny. sorry to kafka that this is ever compared to his work. i was woefully underprepared for the overanundance of scatology and misogyny in The Ark sakura.

i believe this to be a poor introduction to kobo abe, this book should remain obscure, i will try something else of his later. random af novel

I expected this to have a payoff but basically nothing happens. Wouldn't recommend it, it's all just a bit weird and reads as if it's been translated badly

This book is kind of like if Dwight Shrewt had a slightly less capable cousin in Japan, and you got to read about it.

Kobo Abe, often called the Japanese Kafka-- writes a book in a cyberpunk society which revolves around the trading of robotic bugs. This book is about the grotesquely failed attempt of one man to get a new future. A pretty nutso work of fiction about attempted migration to a Utopia.

Do not read if you are not ok with a little what-the-fuck.

Abe's influence on the director Miike is clear.

By no stretch of imagination can this book be categorized as SF. What a disappointment!!

The last third really lost me. I expect that when I try to recall this book in the future the only sense i'll have is of a disconnected jumble of activities in a cave with little purpose. Maybe that was the point, I'm not sure.

I hadn't read anything by Kōbō Abe before but was intrigued by The Ark Sakura when I saw it on the library sci-fi shelf. This new Penguin Classic Science Fiction edition is lovely; I really like the Escher-ish cover image. The novel was first published in 1984 and the threat of nuclear war hangs heavily over it. The protagonist is a man nicknamed Mole who lives in a gigantic underground bunker that used to be a quarry. He has stocked this labyrinthine underground structure with supplies to prepare for a nuclear apocalypse. At the start of the novel he is pondering who is worthy to receive a ticket to live with him in the bunker. After meeting several people at an odd bazaar, he finds that he may have less control than he expected over who survives with him.

Most of the novel takes place within the bunker, which has a suitably creepy and ominous atmosphere. Nonetheless, I primarily experienced the narrative as a farce. Mole spends a good third of the book with his leg stuck down a giant toilet:

"Want me to take your picture?"
"What for?"
"You look just like a human potted plant. It's so unusual - and then you'd have something to remember it all by. If the slate really does get wiped clean, and I get a chance to start over, I'm going to give up being a woman for a living, and take up photography."

The book struck me as a deadpan thought experiment about a bunch of shifty losers attempting to survive a theoretical nuclear apocalypse. There's some odd and interesting stuff about coprophagic beetles, toxic waste disposal, and a militia of elderly people (who reminded me of the Canadian terrorists in Infinite Jest). Abe appears pessimistic about women being treated as people in this scenario - the sole female character constantly gets her arse slapped. The power struggles between the characters are petty and ridiculous, yet can also turn deadly. Abe certainly creates a distinctive atmosphere by combining mundane bodily functions and foolish bickering with apocalyptic dread. The bunker itself is probably the main character and dominates the narrative. The characters and their minor machinations had less impact for me; none had a distinctive presence and their doings made the plot rather fragmentary. The end was powerful and haunting, though.

naja? ich weiß nich, denke war nicht das richtige Buch zum Einstieg für Kobo Abe,, aber werde definitiv anderen Büchern eine Chance geben. das muss jetzt nicht wirklich sein