Feb. 15, 1965, was the first day of Mineko Iwasaki’s life as a geisha. Wrapped in a turquoise-and-orange satin kimono, hair piled atop her head and secured with red silk bands, face covered in a wash of white makeup, the young maiko, or novice geisha, was readyand she wasn’t the only one. When Iwasaki stepped outside her home, she was greeted by applause and congratulations from a swarm of admirers who had come for a glimpse of the young geisha’s debut.
Almost four decades later, Iwasaki is having a new debutand this one has been just as anticipated. Iwasaki was a primary source for Arthur Golden’s hugely successful 1997 novel, Memoirs of a Geisha. Now she has published her storywhich she characterizes as the real memoirs of a geisha. Golden’s glimpse into the mysterious geisha world delighted readers and was bought by Hollywood for big bucks. (At one point, Steven Spielberg planned to direct the film version.) But that bookdespite the “memoirs of” monikerwas fiction. Geisha, a Life, written by Iwasaki with Rande Brown, is supposed to be all that Golden’s book wasn’t: the geisha’s life story, straight from her mouth.
And what a story it is. Born in 1950, Iwasaki says she knew by the age of three that she wanted to become a geisha and, at the age of five, left her family and moved for training into an okiya, or geisha household. Years of schooling in dance, music, pouring sake and performing the tea ceremony followed, and at the age of 15 she turned pro.
The Lure of the Rings
December 2, 2002 Issue
Past Issues Bali Terror Suspects Nov. 25, 2002 —————– Yao Ming Nov. 18, 2002 —————– China Culture Nov. 11, 2002 —————– North Korea Nov. 4, 2002 —————– After Bali Oct. 28, 2002 —————– Tadanobu Asano Oct. 21, 2002 —————– China’s Most Wanted Oct. 14, 2002 —————– Headache Prevention Oct. 7, 2002 —————– Asia’s AIDS Crisis Sep. 30, 2002 —————– China’s New Rich Sep. 23, 2002 —————– Ready for War? Sep. 16, 2002 —————– 9/11 Remembered Sep. 9, 2002 —————– Green Century Sep. 2, 2002 —————– Asian Journey Aug. 19-26, 2002 —————–
Letter from India: The Silent Scream
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Iwasaki became the most famous and sought-after geisha of her day. She worked steadily, refusing to take a single day off for five years, and soon developed a following of customers who paid top dollar for the privilege of seeing her strum the shamisen at lavish parties held at ochaya, or teahouses. In her heyday in the 1960s, she was earning $500,000 a year, and her face adorned everything from posters to shopping bags. Iwasaki entertained world leaders and assorted celebrities, including Prince Charles, who scrawled his nameuninvitedon one of her favorite fans, and fashion designer Aldo Gucci, who spilled soy sauce on her kimono. The memoir details $5,000 costumes, how rice bran is good for softening skin and the difficulty of wearing okobo, or six-inch platform sandals. In his novel, Golden immersed the reader in the geisha world. Iwasaki tells about it, and there’s a difference. Absent here are the lively prose, the vivid characters and the emotions that were all elements of Golden’s book. In their place is an authorial voice that manages to be incredibly detached when detailing a profession that is, at its heart, all about personal connection. The result is a surprisingly mundane account of an existence that seems anything but. Describing a bath, Iwasaki writes how she lowered herself into the tub. Then got out of the tub. Then washed with soap and water. Then rubbed her skin with a net pouch. Then got back into the tub. At times her book isn’t a storyit’s an itinerary. Occasionally Iwasaki’s storytelling cuts loose. She describes an overzealous customer who dared to grope her. Iwasaki wasn’t the delicate blossom that she seemed: she chased the customer around the ochaya and, after catching up with him, whacked him over the head with a wooden block. “The man just happened to go bald soon after that,” she deadpans. Iwasaki has set the record straight on the details of her life. But it’s her ongoing feud with Golden that keeps ruffling kimonos in the literary world. An update: in 2001, Iwasaki sued Golden for breach of contract and a tarnished reputation. The ex-geisha, who now runs a furniture-restoration business, calls the notion that geishas are prostitutes “ridiculous,” and was angered at the sex-for-money in Golden’s novel. She also objected to the fact that Golden credited her as a source in his acknowledgments; she insists he had agreed to keep her identity a secret. The case is still pending. Geisha, a Life almost works as a stand-alone; there’s something alluring about a book that details the day-to-day minutiae of one of the world’s most fascinating, secretive and oldest professions. This Geisha may not be Golden, butgeisha junkies take noteit may just teach you how to strap on a pair of six-inch-high okobo.
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