Battling the Time Thieves

Translated into Japanese in 1976, Momo: The Mysterious Story of the Time Thieves and the Girl who Brought the Stolen Time Back to the People brought to life an idealized world that resounded deeply with the dissatisfactions and yearnings of its many readers. Michael Ende’s bestselling children’s book, popular among readers of all ages, enshrined the yutori so desired—the relaxation and leisure pursued in the second half of the 1980s, and the truly free time sought in the 1990s and 2000s. Through Momo, readers grappled with questions about what constituted wasteful time, how to think about value outside the framework of productivity and efficiency, and how assumptions about capitalism, progress, modernity, materialism, and consumption operated. To examine Momo and its popularity is thus to appreciate how the longing for an affluence of the heart has transcended economic booms and busts to endure from the 1980s into the twenty-first century.