Lacking any kind of introduction to set out the incredibly interesting historical and social context of Suzuki’s life, the collection tantalisingly hints at Suzuki’s tumultuous life and the stories’ wider contexts in the blurb and author information, only to leave an incomplete picture. As the only English document of Suzuki’s work, however, it’s frustratingly incomplete. As an introduction to an incredible, powerful and unique voice in speculative fiction, one that we in the English speaking world have been unaware of for too long, Verso’s new collection of Suzuki’s stories Terminal Boredom is nothing short of essential.
Her stark and disturbing stories, in which reality and hallucination frequently mesh, is reminiscent of Philip K. Suzuki’s writing is angry, bleak and outspokenly feminist, echoing many of the contemporary concerns of New Wave writers such as Lisa Tuttle or James Tiptree, Jr in the US. Terminal Boredom is the first collection of her short stories to be translated into English, and is a timely introduction to Suzuki’s powerful work. An actress and model who participated in the Japanese avant garde cinema of Shuji Terayama in the 1970s, she wrote sharp, incisive social SF that explores ideas around gender, alienation and drug use before committing suicide in 1986. Izumi Suzuki was a unique figure in Japanese speculative fiction.
It’s like the boundary between them breks down, like you’re living in a dream.” Reality feels like a TV show, and TV shows feel like reality. You can just tack on an illogical ending to the story, like a deus ex machina for life. Like, you realize that there’s a simple way of dealing with everything that’s been weighing on you up til now.
“All the shitty stuff stops bothering you. Izumi Suzuki – Terminal Boredom (2021, translated by Polly Barton, Sam Bett, David Boyd, Daniel Joseph, Aiko Masubuchi, and Helen O’Horan)
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