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 The
Music of Light : The Extraordinary Story of Hikari and Kenzaburo
Oe by Lindsley Cameron
In
The Music of Light, Lindsley Cameron chronicles the Japanese
writer Kenzaburo Oe's remarkable relationship with his son Hikari.
Although Hikari was born with a severe brain deformity that resulted
in retardation, autism, near-blindness, and poor coordination, he
has become an accomplished composer of classical music. Kenzaburo
Oe, the winner of the 1994 Nobel Prize for Literature, has written
much about Hikari and the rest of his family over the years. Cameron
studies the intersections between Oe's life and work in this volume.
She also discusses the nature of creativity, the scientific theories
about brain injuries, and the history of musical savants.
Oe's close
relationship with his son is unusual, especially in Japanese society,
where men do not usually get very involved with raising their
children. While helping Hikari deal with his health problems,
the Oe family struggled to cope with their culture's severe discrimination
against disabled people. Cameron describes Hikari's musical development
and his amazing ability to memorize songs. Hikari's life story
is an inherently fascinating one--a man who cannot express himself
very well verbally somehow figured out how to do something most
people cannot do: make up songs... --Jill Marquis (Amazon.com)
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