Way back in October of 2010 I wrote about the illustrations of Machi Abe included in her husband Kobo Abe’s novel “The Woman In The Dunes”. There is not a whole lot of information out there with regard to Ms. Abe’s oeuvre, and I included a halfhearted plea for additional info that someone with more knowledge might be kind enough to share. Well – a year and a half later, a complete stranger proved that the internet is not (as George Costanza more or less summarized) just for “porn and stock quotes”.
A kind woman whose Flickr handle is Ray Gun Betty sent me an email a couple weeks ago with her discovery of Machi Abe’s woodcut illustrations for Kobo Abe’s novel “Inter Ice Age 4”. She is scanning her grandfather’s science fiction book collection for posterity’s sake, and happened to stumble upon my Woman In The Dunes post. I’m still trying to decide if I’m more astounded by Machi’s illustrations or the randomness of having them presented to me a year and a half after my curiosity was piqued for them (forgive me – I grew up in a pre-internet age).
I was previously unfamiliar with the novel “Inter Ice Age 4”, but it is now on my must-read list. Here are the incredible images:
