The Cuckoo

, also called Nami-ko in English, is a Japanese novel first published by Kenjirō Tokutomi (under the pen name Rōka Tokutomi) in serialized form between 1898 and 1899. It was republished as a book in 1900 and became a bestseller. Beginning in 1904, it was also widely translated and read in the United States and Europe. The story is a tragic melodrama about the family conflict that ensues when Namiko, a young wife, contracts tuberculosis. Her husband initially resists his mother's pressure to end the marriage, but when he is drafted into the First Sino-Japanese War, his mother dissolves their marriage and Namiko dies. The novel critiques Japanese feudal values, especially the vulnerable social position of women.