Bangiku (short story)

[1] The story describes an ageing ex-geisha who makes preparations to meet a former lover while reflecting on her past life.

56-year-old ex-geisha Kin receives a phone call from her former lover Tabe, with whom she had a passionate affair before he was drafted as an officer into the Pacific War.

Fleeing from an abusive acquaintance of her adoptive parents, she became a geisha, whose portrait was even printed on magazine covers and postcards, and based her relationships with men mainly on materialistic terms.

Kin survived the war as an owner of a house and now makes her income as a money lender and by speculating in the real estate business.

[5] Bangiku was adapted into a film in 1954, Late Chrysanthemums, scripted by Sumie Tanaka and directed by Mikio Naruse.