" It was certainly real food, the wholesome humane meal which we were never able to get during our long spell in the reformatory, during our evacuation marches and during our time as children on our own. It was rice rolled by the hands of village women who lived free in the fields, meadows and streets, and soup which had been tasted by the tongues of ordinary housewives, not the cold mechanical meals cut off from affection and ordinary life. My comrades mulishly turned their backs on me as they devoured it, clearly feeling shame towards me. But I myself was ashamed of the saliva flowing in my mouth, my contracting stomach and the hunger which madr my blood run dry through my whole body. "

― Kenzaburō Ōe , Nip the Buds, Shoot the Kids