This is powerful stuff, and dwarfs the narrow technocratic instincts of Mrs. Clinton, whose schoolgirl approach to the campaign has justly earned her defeat after defeat in the primaries.

While traveling at night on a sleeper train to Yamagata, she begins to recall memories of herself as a schoolgirl in 1966, and her intense desire to go on holiday like her classmates, all of whom have family outside of the big city.