I wasn't particularly interested in Murata Sayaka until last week, when I read this New Yorker profile on her that spends a good deal of time positioning her work in relation to the super-genre of science fiction. Previously I'd assumed that she was just another Quirky Alienated Japanese Woman (something that I think even Murata plays with, titling her stories things like “Breastfeeding” and “Boyfriends”) that the Anglophone litfic establishment seems to enjoy so much; but Batuman paints a picture of someone far more interesting and far more deranged.
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