How long does it take to read Factory?
Factory by Hiroko Oyamada, David Boyd takes about 2 hours 21 minutes to read at 250 words a minute.
About 2 hours 21 minutes
An evening's read
First published 2019. 128 pages, about 35,200 words.
5 days at 30 minutes a day
Estimate based on 275 words per page.
At other speeds
| Slow, 150 words a minute | 3 hours 55 minutes |
| Average, 250 words a minute | 2 hours 21 minutes |
| Fast, 400 words a minute | 1 hour 28 minutes |
The page count is the median across 4 editions, so your copy may differ. How we calculate.
About the book
In an unnamed Japanese city, three seemingly normal and unrelated characters find work at a sprawling industrial factory. They each focus intently on their specific jobs: one studies moss, one shreds paper, and the other proofreads incomprehensible documents. Life in the factory has its own logic and momentum, and, eventually, the factory slowly expands and begins to take over everything, enveloping these poor workers. The very margins of reality seem to be dissolving: all forms of life capriciously evolve, strange creatures begin to appear. After a while, it could be weeks or years, the workers don't even have the ability to ask themselves: where does the factory end and the rest of the world begin? Told in three alternating first-person narratives, The Factory casts a vivid--if sometimes surreal--portrait of the absurdity and meaninglessness of modern life. With hints of Kafka and unexpected moments of creeping humor, Hiroko Oyamada is one of the boldest writers of her generation.
Subjects: Factories, Fiction, Employees, Industrial relations, Hallucinations and illusions
