TOKYO SYMPATHY TOWER

This is how the book starts, winner of the Akutagawa Prize 2024, the most prestigious Japanese literary award. In an alternative near future, the young architect, Makina Sara, has won the project for a prison tower that will rise in front of Zaha Hadid's Olympic stadium. The inmates will be welcomed with every care, so that their status as Homo miserabilis, reached as victims of a hostile environment, is redeemed by a widespread social empathy. A reversal that is linked to that imposed by contemporary language, tending towards euphemism and the emptying of meaning. The meeting with the beloved Tōjō Takuto, 15 years younger, will help Sara focus on her work and navigate the future Tokyo. A short novel between utopia and dystopia, which fascinates and questions the reader about the power of language, the role of beauty, and the boundaries of communal living.