A captivating work from start to finish, a jagged masterpiece. This is the story of a boxer. Anonymously and alone, the boxer peers through his cut-out eye holes and observes the world behind his four cardboard walls. Initially repulsed by the strange phenomenon of people who have chosen to leave society and live in boxes on the streets of Tokyo, he becomes increasingly drawn to the anonymity and voyeurism of their lives. As he becomes obsessed with spying on a young nurse, his identity slips away in Kobo Abe's eerie, disorienting, and seductive masterpiece of unease. Funny, sad, and destructive, it gnaws at the reader and is a remarkable addition to the literature of eccentricity.