Naname no Yugure by Masayasu Wakabayashi is a book that will land hard if you have ever felt slightly out of place in a group—and will probably disappoint you if you want upbeat self-help or easy comedy.
Wakabayashi is one half of the Japanese comedy duo Audrey, and this essay collection is the closing volume of his long “searching for myself” arc. It came three years after his previous book, collecting a serial column from the magazine Da Vinci plus new writing, and was published by Bungeishunju in August 2018.
This review is not a list of funny bits or quotable lines. It is written to help you decide whether this book is for you, along three axes: the voice, how it handles its theme, and what it leaves behind emotionally.
Sponsored
Book details
| Title | ナナメの夕暮れ (Naname no Yugure) |
|---|---|
| Author | Masayasu Wakabayashi (Audrey) |
| Publisher | Bungeishunju |
| Hardcover | 30 August 2018, 224 pages |
| Paperback | Bunshun Bunko, 7 December 2021 |
| Genre | Essay |
| First published | Serialized in Da Vinci, with additional new writing |
If you are buying it now, get the Bunshun Bunko paperback. It includes roughly 17,000 additional characters of new writing, “Ashita no Naname no Yugure,” which is not in the hardcover. Note that the book is currently available in Japanese only.
The voice: it refuses to reach a conclusion
The first thing that struck me is how careful the narration is, and how it never rushes to a resolution. It is an essay collection, but almost nothing lands on “think about it this way and you will feel better.”
When he writes about social situations, what you get is the thinking still in progress, at its original temperature:
- Why he could not behave normally in that particular room
- How trying to fix the discomfort only made him more tired
- And how, even so, he cannot quite say that he was the one in the wrong
To me this voice reads as genuinely unwilling to escape. He does not rephrase it into something positive or land a punchline. He hands you the unresolved state while it is still unresolved.
The prose is easy to read, but it is not the kind of writing that leaves you feeling clean afterwards. What it does instead is pull your own thinking forward: “I might have been thinking the same way.”
Sponsored
The theme: being “at an angle” is neither celebrated nor condemned
What the book returns to again and again is the feeling of standing slightly off from the mainstream. Crucially, it never elevates that into “individuality” or “talent.”
What stayed with me is that these episodes are laid out without a verdict attached:
- Trying to fit in, and the discomfort growing instead
- Knowing that reading the room is the correct answer, and still not accepting it
- The effort of “being normal” quietly wearing him down
I did not read this book as saying “being at an angle is wonderful.” It felt more like showing, plainly, that being at an angle comes with this specific inconvenience and this specific loneliness.
And yet what remains afterwards is neither denial nor despair, but a faint margin: maybe you can live without forcing yourself to stand front and center.
That ambiguity will read as kindness to some people and as insufficient to others.
The emotional effect: recognition rather than empathy
What happened repeatedly while reading was not “I relate to this” but “come to think of it, I had a moment like that too.”
Rather than the specific events, what surfaces through the prose is:
- Discomfort you could not put into words at the time
- Feelings you let pass because you could not explain them
- The residue that, looking back now, is clearly still there
On the other hand, there are no scenes designed to move you and no dramatic turns. The tone stays flat throughout, so if you come expecting emotional immersion, you may feel let down.
For me, that flatness is exactly why it worked. It felt less like being told something and more like thinking alongside someone.
Sponsored
Where it sits among his other books
This is positioned as the conclusion of the arc that began with his earlier essay collection, written three years later. You do not need the earlier book to follow this one, but reading it first adds a sense of elapsed time.
My take on reading order:
- Starting here is fine. Each essay stands alone and assumes nothing
- If it lands, go back to the earlier book, which covers the same territory from a younger vantage point
- His Cuba travelogue shares the themes but is a completely different format
Who this book is for
It will probably work for you if
- You have always felt slightly displaced inside groups
- You would rather read the process of thinking than a positive answer
- You do not want your own discomfort forcibly affirmed or denied
It probably will not if
- You want a clear conclusion or a lesson
- You expect quick comedy or a legible success story
- You need to feel lighter after finishing a book
The framing “an essay by a comedian” sets an expectation this book does not meet. It is worth knowing that going in.
Summary: quiet, and it stays with the right reader
Naname no Yugure is not a book I would recommend to everyone. But for someone who carried “never quite blending in” into adulthood, it can become a book you keep remembering at odd moments long after finishing it.
It never told me I was not wrong, and it never told me how to live.
Even so, it left me with the sense that the feelings I had been carrying could be left as they were, without correction—and for that, I am glad I read it.
Get the Bunshun Bunko paperback (December 2021) for the additional essay. Whether it suits you will split cleanly, but if the title or the theme catches on something in you, it is worth trying.
