Yoro Shizue was a female doctor who came born in 1899 and passed away in 1995. It's said she was very popular in Kamakura as everybody living in Kamakura had known her. In 1937, she gave birth to Yoro Takeshi, a Japanese most popular anatomist. "Can't Live Alone" is the memoirs of Yoro Shizue.
In 1992, her first memoirs book "Spiderworts" was published. From 1993 to 1995, she had written a sequel to the Spiderworts. But she was (as mentioned above) gone soon in 1995. Gathering all she had written in her life, they released the complete memoirs of Yoro Shizue in 2000. It was "Can't Live Alone." In 2016, the pocket edition was released by Shiei-sha.
Of course, the explanatory notes of the memoirs were written by Yoro Takeshi. Who could do it other than him?
Was she so different from others in Kamakura? No, I suppose she had earthy common sense enough as long as I read the memoirs. She tried to live as a person, not as a member of the world. That might be rare. In Japan, most Japanese people live as a member of the society, adjusting themselves to the society. They believe it is not unnatural. Without hesitation, they mostly regard the society's sense of value as more important than each sense of value. Then foreigners sometimes guess Japanese people seldom live.
Yoro Shizue didn't do so. She tried to live with her love and will, and actually did it. She was always there as grounded on her own sense of value. I guess some women must look up to her after reading the memoirs. Me? I am deeply in deference to Yoro Takeshi, and I think I am kind of difficult to coolly read the memoirs of his mother.