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Stupeur et tremblements

Stupeur et tremblements

Literary FictionMemoir
Pages
176
Published
2001
Language
English

Synopsis

In 1990, twenty-two-year-old Amélie joins the Tokyo offices of Yumimoto, a Japanese corporation, hoping to put her childhood love of Japan to professional use. Within weeks, the gap between her expectations and the reality of Japanese corporate hierarchy has become a chasm. She is demoted — then demoted again — each infraction smaller than the last, each punishment more humiliating than the previous one. Her tormentor is Fubuki Mori, her immediate superior: beautiful, impeccably composed, and relentlessly engaged in Amélie's systematic reduction. By the end of her year-long contract, Amélie has descended from the executive floor to cleaning the company bathrooms. The novel reads as a black comedy about cultural incomprehension and the violence of institutional hierarchy — but it is also an account of a strange mutual fascination between Amélie and Fubuki. Winner of the Grand Prix du roman de l'Académie française 1999. The title, 'fear and trembling,' refers to the extreme deference historically owed to the Japanese Emperor.

Prose complexity
2/10

Vibe

DarkFunnySatiricalThought-Provoking
Coming of AgeFish Out of WaterMorally Grey

Genres

Literary Fiction Memoir

About the author

A
Amélie Nothomb

Born in Etterbeek, Brussels, in 1966, Amélie Nothomb spent her childhood moving across continents — Japan, China, the United States, Bangladesh, Burma, Laos — as the daughter of a Belgian diplomat. Japan was the country that marked her most deeply: she has called it the paradise she was expelled from when her family left. She began writing at age twelve, producing manuscripts she has described as unspeakably bad, and completed seventeen novels before publishing a single one. Her debut, Hygiène...

Characters

Amélie NothombProtagonist

The narrator; a young Belgian woman whose love of Japan collides with the realities of its corporate hierarchy.

Fubuki MoriAntagonist

Amélie's immediate Japanese superior: beautiful, composed, and the architect of a systematic campaign to eliminate her from the company's upper floors.

Monsieur OmochiSupporting

The vice-president; obese, terrifying, and the figure whose approval or rage determines the shape of Amélie's working life.

All characters in Stupeur et tremblements

Frequently asked questions

  • What does the title 'Stupeur et tremblements' mean?

    It refers to 'fear and trembling' — the extreme prostration historically owed to the Japanese Emperor, in whose presence even senior courtiers were required to tremble. Nothomb uses it to describe the totalizing deference demanded by Japanese corporate hierarchy.

  • Did Stupeur et tremblements win a major prize?

    Yes — it won the Grand Prix du roman de l'Académie française in 1999. It remains Nothomb's most decorated novel and her best-known work internationally.

  • Is the novel autobiographical?

    Yes. Nothomb worked at a Japanese company in Tokyo in 1990–1991 after studying Japanese and returning to the country she loved from childhood. The experience is recounted in the first person with Nothomb as narrator and protagonist.

  • Why does Fubuki keep demoting Amélie?

    The novel gives several layers of explanation: Amélie violates Japanese corporate protocol by exceeding her role; her competence and visibility humiliate Fubuki; and the two women's mutual fascination takes the only form available within the hierarchy. The relationship is one of Nothomb's strangest and most analyzed.

  • Is Stupeur et tremblements connected to Ni d'Ève ni d'Adam?

    Yes — they are companion novels covering the same period in Tokyo (roughly 1989–1991) from different angles. Stupeur covers her working life; Ni d'Ève ni d'Adam covers her romantic life with Rinri, a Japanese man she tutored before joining Yumimoto.

  • Should I read this before or after Ni d'Ève ni d'Adam?

    Either order works, but most readers encounter Stupeur first as it is the more famous of the two. Reading Ni d'Ève ni d'Adam afterward reveals an entirely different dimension of the same year in Tokyo.

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