SOURCE: A review of House of the Sleeping Beauties, in Pacific Affairs, Vol. XLII, No. 4, Winter, 1969–70, p. 573.

In the following review, Sibley asserts that the title story of Kawabata's House of the Sleeping Beauties is "one of the finest works of Kawabata's late career."

There would seem to be a special place in modern Japanese literature for works set "in the autumn of the flesh," as Tanizaki Jun'ichiro once put it, by writers past the prime of life—swan songs (often deliberately premature) steeped in waning sensuality. The title story of this collection is an excellent specimen of the type and one of the finest works of Kawabata's late career. On the recommendation of a friend, "old Eguchi" pays several visits to an establishment where young women lie drugged into oblivion, solely for the discret delectation of a senile clientele. Though proud of his continuing potency, he resists...