Naomi

by Jun'ichirō Tanizaki · 1924

Jōji, a sober Tokyo engineer, takes a fifteen-year-old café waitress named Naomi into his home to mould her into the perfect Westernized wife. She grows into a capricious, scornful beauty with a string of dancing-hall lovers, and he ends up her willing slave, grovelling on all fours for her favours.