Kenzaburō Ōe [is] the most talented writer to emerge in Japan after World War II. Like his previous publications (A Personal Matter, 1968,… and The Silent Cry, 1975), [Teach Us to Outgrow Our Madness] is certain to surprise some Western readers who have come to expect delicate prose and exquisite imagery from a Japanese novelist. Having learned his craft from postwar American authors such as Norman Mailer and French existentialists such as Jean-Paul Sartre, rather than from The Tale of Genji, Ōe writes fiction that is more brutal and savage than exquisite or quaint….

"Prize Stock" [one of four novellas that compose the collection] is a tightly knit tale of a black American flier's captivity in a mountain village during the War. Ōe referred to it as a "pastoral." But what a pastoral! Ōe superimposes a mythic, primeval society on the village and reveals the nature of man and conditions...