The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet, by David Mitchell

The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet
By David Mitchell
Random House
Five Stars
Reviewed by Jessica Gribble

A mysterious title. A graphic and compelling first scene. And then what would properly be called a literary novel. Or maybe a historical novel. Or just a really darn good novel. David Mitchell is known for writing brilliant concept novels, but The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet doesn’t fit that bill. It’s set in the early 1800s, when foreigners weren’t allowed into Japan. Instead, the Japanese had built an island on which they traded with the Dutch, who essentially had an exclusive license. The novel follows a young Dutch clerk, Jacob de Zoet, who is quite different from his fellow sailors. Jacob learns Japanese, befriends a surly Dutch doctor, and falls in love with a Japanese midwife who is training under his doctor friend. The other sailors are more concerned with getting rich through graft than with interacting with the Japanese. But it is their lot to stay on Dejima until a Dutch ship returns for them.

We discover the graft along with Jacob, who is tasked with going through the company’s records. And then, along with Jacob, we learn about a terrible secret that compels him to act, partly to save the life of the woman he has come to love, and partly to save the lives of the other women that are affected. One of Jacob’s friends is grievously harmed. It’s a salacious secret and we read about it with the slightly tawdry feeling of watching an accident. Through a series of events that involves a British ship sailing into port and trying to destroy Dejima, Jacob becomes the leader of the small group of Dutch sailors and is therefore put in contact with powerful Japanese. The fate of Dejima rests on his shoulders, and he comports himself well under these circumstances.

Although the plot is interesting, it’s not what makes this novel so incredible. Mitchell obviously did a copious amount of research about Japan in the early 1800s. But none of his historical details feel like they’re there just because he knew them. The story reads as though it had been discovered in a period journal. The characters are so unique and memorable that they stick in your head. You start wondering how Captain Penhaligon’s gouty foot is feeling and what will become of Doctor Marinus’s harpsichord. You wonder if Jacob will ever be happy and if the sailors will ever make it home. And if they’ll become too foreign to ever feel at home again. But it’s not just the historical research or the characters that compel; it’s the writing, which is incredible. The dialogue feels perfect and no one is ever out of character. Among the vivid details of a fascinating plot lie gems of language more poetic than novelistic. “Night insects trill, tick, bore, ring; drill, prick, saw, sting.” “…but an Oriental typhoon possess a sentience and menace. Daylight is bruised; woods thrash on the prematurely twilit mountains; the black bay is crazed by choppy surf; gobbets of sea-spray spatter Dejima’s roofs; timber grunts and sighs.” “I prefer a fibbing underling, Penhaligon worries, to fib consistently.”

This book sweeps you up. It’s hard to put down. Jacob de Zoet is both a heroic protagonist and a very real man, caught up in circumstances and feelings out of his control. The sailors are crude, the Japanese are sometimes inscrutable, and Jacob is compelled to understand and manipulate both sides. The mystery is enticing and the language lush and gorgeous. I expect that David Mitchell will quickly be offered a prize or two and hailed as a novelist who does just fine without a “concept.”