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May 01, 2026
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Katie Kitamura on the Books That Shaped Her Writing Journey

AI Summary
In a candid Guardian interview, novelist Katie Kitamura reflects on the books and authors that have guided her from childhood to her current projects, highlighting works from *Dangerous Liaisons* to *The Good Soldier*. Her insights reveal how literature can both mirror and reshape personal experience, offering clues to her future writing direction.

Katie Kitamura opens up about the titles that have defined her literary sensibility, from the scandalous allure of Dangerous Liaisons* to the social urgency of The Jungle. The interview maps a personal reading timeline that informs her own fiction and hints at the themes she may explore next.

Childhood Spark: Discovering Scandal in *Dangerous Liaisons*

  • At age 10‑11, Kitamura took Pierre Choderlos de Laclos's *Dangerous Liaisons* off the shelf, describing the experience as “scandalised and excited”.
  • The novel’s moral complexity planted an early fascination with narrative power.

Teenage Revelation: How *The Jungle* Taught Story as Social Action

  • Reading Upton Sinclair's *The Jungle* at 12 reshaped her view of the novel as a tool for social change.
  • She cites the book as the first moment she grasped literature’s capacity to enact reform.

Mid‑Life Turning Point: *A Personal Matter* and the Birth of a Writer

  • In her mid‑20s, while caring for a dying father, Kitamura encountered Kenzaburō Ōe's *A Personal Matter*.
  • The work demonstrated how fiction can sit alongside ordinary life while offering a “perch” for understanding it.

Enduring Voices: Kawabata, James, and Spark as Lifelong Companions

  • Yasunari Kawabata: Initially “tonally erratic”, now read as “minor miracles”.
  • Henry James: *The Portrait of a Lady* reread for its shifting meanings.
  • Muriel Spark: Discovered in her early 20s; works like *The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie* and *The Driver’s Seat* remain “astonishing”.

Current Projects and Future Outlook: Revisiting Classics While Crafting New Narratives

  • Currently rereading Ford Madox Ford's *The Good Soldier* and Graham Greene's *The End of the Affair*.
  • Kitamura suggests that the act of rereading fuels her upcoming novel, promising a blend of classic structural rigor with contemporary thematic concerns.