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This is an excerpt from the novel published in Japanese as Shishosetsu from left to right (私小説 from left to right) The unusual title, a mixture of Japanese and English, neatly represents the novel’s content and form The novel is narrated by a Japanese young woman who, like the author, grew up in the United States in a bilingual environment ‘Shishosetsu’ refers to a genre of autobiographical novel that characterises much modern Japanese literature Since English words and phrases are woven into the text, the novel was written horizontally, from left to right, unlike other Japanese novels, which are written vertically on the page and read from right to left —J W C   *   The telephone rang at 9:45 this morning   As white morning sunlight poked through the cracks in the blind, I inserted the cord into the telephone jack, digesting the usual sick realisation that another day had begun No sooner was the telephone plugged in than the ringing gave me a start   Sudden fear shot through me It might be the French Department Office   Is this Minae Mizumura?   Yes it is   What on earth are you doing?   What on earth was I doing? If they asked me, what could I say? I could not explain it even to myself I was afraid that somehow the way I was living—holed up in this apartment that remained dim even in the daytime, fearful of the dawning of each new day, for all the world like a snail coiled tightly in its shell—might become shamefully and unmistakably exposed to the light of day   As hopes of an international call from Tono gradually faded, I fell into the habit of unplugging my telephone every night; apart from the practical desire to avoid being awakened by my sister, the main reason was this very fear   It is of course a neurotic fear Every department has one or two delinquent graduate students on its rolls, and there is no reason why the department should care if I put off my orals indefinitely on the pretext that my advisor is in and out of the hospital It’s not only the department—in the whole huge United States, apart from