Category: Podcast

Check out Episode 24 of the Read Literature podcast.

Transcript available.

In this episode, we’re talking about Japanese science fiction.

The history of the genre. SF in Japan. Breakthrough feminist sci-fi writer Izumi Suzuki.

Plus loads of SF stories, including Suzuki’s “Night Picnic”.

CW: suicide

Become an RJL supporter for ten minutes of bonus content.

Support this podcast by buying from Bookshop.org.

• Terminal Boredom by Izumi Suzuki
  • Includes the story “Night Picnic” (translated by Sam Bett)

More Writing by Izumi Suzuki:

• Hit Parade of Tears by Izumi Suzuki
• Read Suzuki’s “The Walker” for free (translated by Daniel Joseph)

SF! An RJL Booklist of Japanese Science Fiction in Translation

• Books available to buy on our Bookshop page.

This episode also mentions:

• Arabian Nights (translated by Malcolm C. Lyons)
• The Ark Sakura (translated by Juliet Winters Carpenter)
• Beautiful Star by Yukio Mishima (translated by Stephen Dodd)
• The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer (translated by Nevill Coghill)
• The Epic of Gilgamesh (translated by Andrew George)
• Fast Forward Japan: Stories by the Founding Father of Japanese Science Fiction by Juza Unno (translated by J. D. Wisgo)
• The Emissary by Yoko Tawada (translated by Margaret Mitsutani)
  • Also published as The Last Children of Tokyo
• The Factory by Hiroko Oyamada (translated by David Boyd)
• Frankenstein by Mary Shelley
• *From the Earth to the Moon by Jules Verne (translated by Lowell Beir)
• The Girl Who Leapt through Time by Yasutaka Tsutsui (translated by David Karashima)
• The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood
• Hybrid Child (translated by Jodie Beck)
• Inter Ice Age 4 (translated by Dale Saunders)
• Japan Sinks: A Novel about Earthquakes (translated by Michael Gallagher)
• *Journey to the Center of the Earth by Jules Verne (translated by William Butcher)
• Kappa by Ryunosuke Akutagawa (translated by Allison Markin Powell and Lisa Hofmann-Kuroda)
• *Kindred by Octavia Butler
• *Klara and the Sun by Kazuo Ishiguro
• The Memory Police by Yoko Ogawa (translated by Stephen Snyder)
• Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro
• Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood
• Paprika (translated by Andrew Driver)
• Parable of the Sower by Octavia Butler
• The Ramayana (translated by R. K. Narayan)
• Rashomon and Seventeen Other Stories by Ryunosuke Akutagawa (translated by Ray Rubin)
• Salmonella Men on Planet Porno (translated by Andrew Driver)
• Secret Rendezvous (translated by Juliet Winters Carpenter)
• The Three-Body Problem by Liu Cixin (translated by Ken Liu)
• *A Tale for the Time Being by Ruth Ozeki
• *The Time Machine by H. G. Wells
• *The Three-Body Problem by Cixin Liu (translated by Ken Liu)
• *Twenty-Thousand Leagues Under the Sea by Jules Verne (translated by William Butcher)
• The Undersea Warship: A Fantastic Tale of Island Adventure by Shunro Oshikawa (translated by Shelley Marshall)
• *The War of the Worlds by H. G. Wells
• Virus: The Day of Resurrection (translated by Daniel Huddleston)

*These stories are only mentioned in the extended version of the episode available to Patreon subscribers.

Find Out More

The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction online. “A comprehensive, scholarly, and critical guide to science fiction in all its forms.”

TV Tropes on “Japan Takes Over the World”.

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The story of Urashima Taro.

The official English website of Shinichi Hoshi. Hoshi is one of Japan’s most influential SF writers.

Gajinpot’s “Discovery: 5 Japanese Science Fiction Authors” (2018).

Book Riot’s list of “Speculative Fiction in Translation: Japan” (2017).

Book Scrolling’s list of “The Best Japanese Science Fiction & Fantasy Books” (2018). The list is cross-referenced with other online lists of Japanese science fiction, linked at the bottom of the page.

The Science Fiction & Fantasy Writers Association’s list of “Top Ten Japan All Time Best SF Novels” (2011).

Red Circle on “Japan’s Early Science Fiction” (2017).

Sci-fi translator and critic Omori Nozomi on why Sakyo Komatsu’s work became more popular during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic (2020).

Read an excerpt from Taiyo Fujii’s novel Orbital Cloud via The Verge.

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My review of Suzuki’s Terminal Boredom at Asian Review of Books (2021).

Tokyo Weekender’s “Izumi Suzuki: A Legendary Sci-Fi Writer Rediscovered” (2023).

ArtReview’s “How Izumi Suzuki Broke Science Fiction’s Boys’ Club” (2021). (This is one of my favorite articles.)

LitHub’s “A Writer from the Future: Who Was Sci Fi Iconoclast Izumi Suzuki” (2021).

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Japanese Literature at Facebook

Japanese Literature at Goodreads

Other RJL Episodes of Interest:

• Episode 5: Setsuwa and Medieval Japanese Buddhism. A loose definition of Japanese SF could include many setsuwa—anecdotal stories often tied to medieval Buddhism.
• Episode 7: Kaidan—Japan’s Ghost Stories. A loose definition of Japanese SF could also include kaidan.
• Episode 10: Taisho Magazines and Akutagawa’s Vision of Hell. Some critics include Akutagawa as an early SF writer.
• Episode 15: Translating Japanese Women. Some writing by Sayaka Murata (discussed in episode 15) qualifies as SF. There are also thematic overlaps between her work and the work of Izumi Suzuki.
• Episode 19: Japanese Magical Realism. Most magical realist writing falls under the category of “speculative fiction”.
• Episode 20: The Akutagawa Prize and Kobo Abe. Kobo Abe is a father of Japanese SF. This episode also mentions the Akutagawa Prize several times.

Sources

Abe Kobo. “Two Essays on Science Fiction.” Translated by Christopher Bolton and Thomas Schnellbächer in Science Fiction Studies, 2002.

Bolton, Christopher. “Editorial Introduction: The Borders of Japanese Science Fiction” in Science Fiction Studies, 2002.

–. “Introduction to ‘Two Essays on Science Fiction’ by Abe Kobo” in Science Fiction Studies, 2002.

Bolton, Christopher, et al. “Introduction” in Robot Ghosts and Wired Dreams: Japanese Science Fiction from Origins to Anime. Edited by Christopher Bolton, Istvan Csicery-Ronay, Jr., and Takayuki Tatsumi. U of MI, 2007.

Cheng, John. “Asians and Asian Americans in Early Science Fiction” at The Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Research, 2019. (free)

Fincher, Alison. “‘Terminal Boredom’ by Izumi Suzuki” at Asian Review of Books, 2021. (free)

Gunn, James. “Science Fiction around the World” in World Literature Today, 2010.

Keene, Donald. “The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter” in Monumenta Nipponica, 1956.

Harada, Kazue. Japanese Women’s Science Fiction: Posthuman Bodies and the Representation of Gender. PhD Dissertation, 2015. (free)

Harrison, Genie. “Izumi Suzuki: A Legendary Sci-Fi Writer Rediscovered” in Tokyo Weekender, 2023. (free)

Joseph, Daniel. “How Izumi Suzuki Broke Science Fiction’s Boys’ Club” at ArtReview, 2021. (free)

Nagasawa Tadashi. “The Reception of American Science Fiction in Japan” at Oxford Encyclopedias, Literature, 2016. (free)

Nathan, Richard. “Ahead of Time: Japan’s Early Science Fiction” at RedCircleAuthors.com, 2017. (free)

Oziewicz, Marek. “Speculative Fiction” at The Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Research, 2017. (free)

Ridker, Andrew. “A Writer from the the Future: Who Was Sci Fi Iconoclast Izumi Suzuki?” at LitHub, 2021. (free)

Suvin, Darko. “Preliminary Note to ‘Japanese SF, Its Originality and Orientation’ by Koichi Yamano (1969).” Translated by Kazuko Behrens. Edited by Darko Suvin and Takayuki Tatsumi in Science Fiction Studies, 1994.

Takayuki Tatsumi. “Generations and Controversies: An Overview of Japanese Science Fiction, 1957-1997” in Science Fiction Studies, 2000.

Yamano Koichi. “Japanese SF, Its Originality and Orientation (1969).” Translated by Kazuko Behrens. Edited by Darko Suvin and Takayuki Tatsumi in Science Fiction Studies, 1994.

Check out Episode 23 of the Read Literature podcast.

Transcript available.

In this episode, we’re talking about writing from Okinawa.

The history of the Ryukyu Islands, especially the Battle of Okinawa. The evolution of writing from Okinawa. And the life and work of author and activist Shun Medoruma, especially his Akutagawa-winning story “Droplets”.

CW: forced suicide (historical), violence (historical and fictional), historical rape

Correction: This episode claims Hokkaido is Japan’s largest island. I know better and misspoke. My apologies. Honshu is Japan’s largest island. Thank you to Dory Rand for bringing the mistake to my attention.

Become an RJL supporter for ten minutes of bonus content.

Support this podcast by buying from Bookshop.org.

• Southern Exposure: Modern Japanese Literature from Okinawa edited by Michael Molasky and Steve Rabon
  • includes “Droplets” by Shun Medoruma (translated by Michael Molasky)
• “From the Deep Forests and Seas of Yambaru: Against the US Military Presence in Japan” (translated by Lisa Hofmann-Kuroda) in The Baffler

More Writing from Okinawa:

• A Brief History of Early Okinawa Based on the Omoro Soshi by Mitsugu Sakihara
• The Girl with the White Flag by Tomiko Higa
• In the Woods of Memory (translated by Takuma Sminkey)
• Islands of Protest: Japanese Literature from Okinawa edited by Davinder L. Bhowmilk and Steve Rabson
• Southern Exposure: Modern Japanese Literature from Okinawa edited by Michael Molasky and Steve Rabon
• Typhoon of Steel: An Okinawan Schoolboy’s Quest for Martyrdom in the Battle of Okinawa by Akira Yoshimura (trans. Mark Ealey)

More Writing by Shun Medoruma:

• In the Woods of Memory (translated by Takuma Sminkey)

• “Glass” (translated by Sam Malissa; read for free at Words without Borders)
• “Hope” (translated by Steve Rabson; read for free at The Asia-Pacific Journal)
• Rainbow Bird (excerpt) (translated by Sam Malissa; read for free at Words without Borders)

“Stories from the Streets of Koza” (translated by Sam Malissa; read for free at Words without Borders)

Find Out More

Isaac Meyer’s History of Japan Podcast on Japan and Okinawa, parts one (20 minutes) and two (twenty minutes). Episode two in particular is pretty grim because it digs into the history of the Battle of Okinawa.

Meyer covers Okinawa in several other episodes you might find useful:

• “All in the Family” parts one (26 minutes), two (31 minutes), and three (27 minutes). The Satsuma Clan invaded the Ryukyu Islands during Japan’s Warring States Period.
• “The American Outpost” (part one; 36 minutes) and “The American Interlude” (part two; 38 minutes)
• “Fist of Legend”, parts one (26 minutes), two (29 minutes), three (28 minutes), and four (29 minutes). As Meyer discusses in this series, karate originates in the Ryukyu Islands.

The Ryukyu-Okinawa History and Culture Website. This site includes a document archive of useful primary sources like the Nimiz Proclamation that declared Okinawa under American control in the aftermath of WWII and the 1955 Melvin Price Report to the US Congress.

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“Shattering Jewels: 110,000 Okinawans Protest Japanese State Censorship of Compulsory Group Suicides” by Kamata Satoshi in The Asia-Pacific Journal, 2008.

“Compulsory Mass Suicide, the Battle of Okinawa, and Japan’s Textbook Controversy” by Aniya Masaaki in The Asia-Pacific Journal, 2008.

A Ryukyu Shimpo obituary for Tatsuhio Oshiro, Okinawa’s first Akutagawa Prize winning author, 2020.

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“We Cannot Allow Governor Nakaima to Falsify the History of the Battle of Okinawa” by Medoruma Shun in The Asia-Pacific Journal, 2012. Translated by Rumi Sakamoto and Matthew Allen.

An introduction to Medoruma’s novel In the Woods of Memory, including the first chapter, translated by Takuma Sminkey via The Asia-Pacific Journal.

Medoruma talks about his activism in “From the Deep Forests and Seas of Yambaru” at The Baffler. Translated by Lisa Hofmann-Kuroda.

Science on the US military base and the Okinawa dugong.

Japan’s Asahi Shimbun on Okinawa’s loss before Japan’s Supreme Court in December 2022.

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Japanese Literature at Facebook

Japanese Literature at Goodreads

Other RJL Episodes of Interest:

• Episode 11: The I-Novel, Osamu Dazai, and No Longer Human. This episode covers the blurred line between fiction and non-fiction in Japanese literature, as well as Japan’s literati, the bundan.
• Episode 12: Japanese Literature in WWII. The Battle of Okinawa is a part of Japan’s WWII story.
• Episode 19: Japanese Magical Realism. “Droplets” is an example of magical realist writing.
• Episode 20: The Akutagawa Prize and Kobo Abe. Few Okinawan writers have won the Akutagawa Prize. Medoruma won for “Droplets” in 1997.

Sources

Bhowmik, Davinder L. and Steve Rabson. “Introduction” in Islands of Protest: Japanese Literature from Okinawa. U of HI, 2016.

Bouterey, Susan. “Okinawa’s Fictional Landscapes: A Reading of Medoruma Shun’s ‘Suiteki’ (Droplets)” presented at Overseas Symposium 2016 in Otago, 2016. (free)

Faris, Wendy B. “The Question of Other: Cultural Critiques of Magical Realism” in Ordinary Enchantments: Magical Realism and the Remystification of Narrative. Vanderbilt UP, 2004.

–. “Scheherazade’s Children: Magical Realism and Postmodern Fiction” in Magical Realism: Theory, History, Community. Edited by Lois Parkinson Zamora and Wendy B. Faris, Duke UP, 1995.

Ikeda, Kyle. “Writing and Remembering the Battle of Okinawa: War Memory and Literature” in Routledge Handbook of Modern Japanese Literature, ed. Rachael Hutchinson and Leith Morton, 2016. 

“Japan’s Population Drops in Every Prefecture Except Okinawa” at Nippon.com, 2022. (free)

Kamerer, Tamara. “Fantastic Realities: Magical Realism in Contemporary Okinawan Fiction” in Vienna Journal of East Asian Studies, 2014.

Medoruma Shun. “Even Cats Are Disgusted by the Media’s Support-the-Emperor Broadcasts, Refusing to Be Moved by Its Brainwashing Propaganda”. Translated by Steve Rabson. Appears in the article “Reflections on the Remaking of the Imperial Image in the Reiwa Era and Japanese Democracy” in The Asia-Pacific Journal, 2019. (free) 

• (Medoruma’s Japanese language blog post, with original cat photo)

–. “From the Deep Forest and Seas of Yambaru” Against the US Military Presence in Japan”. Translated by Lisa Hofmann-Kuroda at The Baffler, 2023. (free)

–. “We Cannot Allow Governor Nakaima to Falsify the History of the Battle of Okinawa”. Translated by Rumi Sakamoto and Matthew Allen at The Asia-Pacific Journal, 2012. (free)

Molasky, Michael and Steve Rabson. “Introduction” in Southern Exposure: Modern Japanese Literature from Okinawa. U of HI, 2000.

Muñoz, Jordi Serrano. “Droplets, by Medoruma Shun: Personal Guilt as Collective Responsibility” in Stanford Journal of East Asian Affairs, 2015. (free) 

Wang, Xiaoyu. “Constructing of the Image of Okinawa in Literature” (graduate paper posted by PhD candidate) at Academia.edu. (free)

Check out Episode 22 of the Read Literature podcast.

Transcript available.

On March 11, 2011, at 2:46pm, one tectonic plate forced its way on top of another 45 miles (or 72 km) off the Eastern coast of Japan. It caused a 9.0 magnitude megathrust earthquake that lasted about six minutes.

The Great East Japan Earthquake triggered a tsunami—a great wave—that may have reached heights up to 133 feet (more than 40 meters). 

The earthquake and tsunami also disabled the reactor cooling systems at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant, causing several reactors to meltdown.

The government of Tokyo released official death numbers around the tenth anniversary of 3/11 in 2021. It reported 19,759 deaths. 6,242 injuries. And 2,553 missing. Most of the missing are presumed dead.

Hundreds of thousands of people who evacuated the area still haven’t returned home—many never will.

In this episode:

• Tohoku and its place in Japan’s history and culture
• The response by Japanese writers to the 3/11 disaster
• Hiromi Kawakami’s life and work—especially her stories “God Bless You” and “God Bless You, 2011”

Donate to support Tohoku:

• Soso Volunteer (Japanese)
• Support Our Kids (Japanese)
• The Taylor Anderson Memorial Fund (English)

Become an RJL supporter for ten minutes of bonus content.

Support this podcast by buying from Bookshop.org.

• “God Bless You” and “God Bless You, 2011” by Hiromi Kawakami (translated by Ted Goossen and Motoyuki Shibata)
  • In March Was Made of Yarn: Reflections on the Japanese Earthquake, Tsunami, and Nuclear Meltdown
  • You can also read “God Bless You, 2011” for free via Granta.

More by Hiromi Kawakami:

• Manazuru (translated by Michael Emmerich)
  • Read more about Manazuru from RJL.
• The Nakano Thrift Shop (translated by Allison Markin Powell)
• Parade (translated by Allison Markin Powell)
• People from My Neighborhood (translated by Ted Goossen)
  • Read my review of People from My Neighborhood at Asian Review of Books.
• Record of a Night Too Brief (translated by Lucy North)
• Strange Weather in Tokyo (translated by Allison Markin Powell)
  • Also published as The Briefcase
  • Read a free excerpt at Granta.
• The Ten Loves of Nishino (translated by Allison Markin Powell)
  • Also published as The Ten Loves of Mr. Nishino
  • Read a free excerpt at Granta.

• “The Dragon Palace” (translated by Ted Goossen) in Monkey Business, vol. 3
• “God Bless You” and “God Bless You, 2011” in (translated by Ted Goossen and Motoyuki Shibata) in March Was Made of Yarn: Reflections on the Japanese Earthquake, Tsunami, and Nuclear Meltdown
• “Hazuki and Me”(translated by Ted Goossen) in Monkey Business, vol. 5
• “I Won’t Let You Go” (translated by Allison Markin Powell; read for free at Granta)
• “Mogera Wogura” (translated by Michael Emmerich) in The Paris Review
• “Mysterious Deaths, the Formula, Electricians, Prohibitions” (translated by Ted Goossen) in Monkey, vol. 3
• “Seahorse” (translated by Ted Goossen) in Monkey, vol. 2
• “Simone + Reminiscing” (translated by Ted Goossen) in Monkey, vol. 1
• “The Hut on the Roof” (translated by Lucy Fraser) in The Book of the City of Tokyo
• “Mogera Wogura” in (translated by Michael Emmerich) New Penguin Parallel Text: Short Stories in Japanese
• “Kamisama” (translated for Japanese language learners by Michael Emmerich) in Read Real Japanese Fiction: Short Stories by Contemporary Writers

This episode also mentions:

• The Emissary by Yoko Tawada (translated by Margaret Mitsutani)
  • also published in English as The Last Children of Tokyo
• Horses, Horses, in the End the Light Remains Pure by Hideo Furukawa (translated by Akiko Takenaka and Doug Slaymaker)
  • Read excerpts for free at Words without Borders.
    • Part 1
    • Part 2
• *Lady Joker by Kaoru Takamura (translated by Allison Markin Powell and Marie Iida)
• *The Legends of Tono by Kunio Yanagita (translated by Ronald A. Morse)
• The Narrow Road to the Deep North and Other Travel Sketches by Matsuo Basho (translated by Noboyuki Yuasa)
• Since Fukushima by Ryoichi Wago (translated by Ayako Takahashi and Judy Halebsky)
• A Tale for the Time Being by Ruth Ozeki (English language)
• *Tono Monogatari by Shigeru Mizuki (translated by Zach Davisson)
  • Read my review of Tono Monogatari in Asian Review of Books.
• *The Woman in the Dunes by Kobo Abe (translated by Dale Saunders)

*These books come up for discussion in the bonus content available to Patreon supporters.

More Fukushima Fiction:

• 2:46: Aftershocks—Stories from the Japan Earthquake (free copy available at Quakebook.org)
• The Boy and the Dog by Seishu Hase (translated by Alison Watts)
  • Read my review of The Boy and the Dog at Asian Review of Books.
• The Emissary by Yoko Tawada (translated by Margaret Mitsutani)
  • also published in English as The Last Children of Tokyo
• Horses, Horses, in the End the Light Remains Pure by Hideo Furukawa (translated by Akiko Takenaka and Doug Slaymaker)
  • Read excerpts for free at Words without Borders.
    • Part 1
    • Part 2
• March Was Made of Yarn: Reflections on the Japanese Earthquake, Tsunami, and Nuclear Meltdown (edited by David Karashima and Elmer Luke)
• The Phone Booth at the Edge of the World by Laura Imai Messina (translated from the Italian by Lucy Rand) 
• Sacred Cesium Ground and Isa’s Deluge: Two Novellas of Japan’s 3/11 Disaster by Yusuke Kimura (translated by Doug Slaymaker)
  • Read more about Sacred Cesium Ground from RJL.
• A Tale for the Time Being by Ruth Ozeki (English language)
• Tokyo Ueno Station by Yu Miri (translated by Morgan Giles)
  • Learn more about Yu Miri and Tokyo Ueno Station with the RJL podcast.
• Trinity, Trinity, Trinity by Erika Kobayashi (translated by Brian Bergstrom)
  • Read my review of Trinity, Trinity, Trinity at Asian Review of Books.

Find a list of Fukushima fiction available in English at Bookshop.org.

Find Out More

“Quake Moves Japan Closer to U.S. and Alter’s Earth’s Spin” in The New York Times” (March 13, 2011).

“Tsunami, Earthquake, Nuclear Crisis—Now Japan Faces Power Cuts” in The Guardian (March 13, 2011).

“Japan Damage Could Reach $235 Billion, World Bank Estimates” in The LA Times (March 21, 2011).

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Tokyo Weekender’s list of books from every prefecture in Japan. Six of Japan’s 47 prefectures fall in the Tōhoku region: Akita, Aomori, Fukushima, Iwate, Miyagi, and Yamagata.

A video of Shinzo Abe’s appearance at the 2016 Summer Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

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“A Wave of Imagination Followed Japan’s Meltdown” by Susan Wyndham in The Sydney Herald.

Poetry by Ryoichi Wago available at Poetry Northwest. Translated by Ayoko Takahasi and Judy Halebsky.

“Speaking as an Unrealistic Dreamer”. Haruki Murakami’s International Catalunya Acceptance Speech in July 2011.

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Tokyo Ueno Station author Yu Miri talks with translator Morgan Giles in 2021. Their conversation includes Miri’s reflections on Tōhoku, where she has lived since 2015.

“Fukushima During Coronavirus: Life in Double Isolation” by Yu Miri (translated by Morgan Giles).

RJL on the Fukushima novel Sacred Cesium Ground.

The Books and Boba podcast on Ruth Ozeki’s A Tale for the Time Being. 1 hour, 17 minutes.

My review of Erika Kobayashi’s Trinity, Trinity, Trinity in Asian Review of Books.

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Tokyo Ueno Station author Yu Miri talks with translator Morgan Giles in 2021. Their conversation includes Miri’s reflections on Tōhoku, where she has lived since 2015.

“Fukushima During Coronavirus: Life in Double Isolation” by Yu Miri (translated by Morgan Giles).

RJL on the Fukushima novel Sacred Cesium Ground.

The Books and Boba podcast on Ruth Ozeki’s A Tale for the Time Being. 1 hour, 17 minutes.

My review of Erika Kobayashi’s Trinity, Trinity, Trinity in Asian Review of Books.

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Anne Meadows interviews Hiromi Kawakami for Granta Magazine. 15 minutes. Kawakami discusses her response to 3/11 beginning around the 9-minute mark.

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“Worldwide Responses to the 20 Millisievert Controversy” in The Asia-Pacific Journal” (2012). As discussed in the episode, Japan raised the recommended limit on exposure to radiation from 1 to 20 mSv in April 2011. This page links a number of responses from various media organizations and NGOs inside and outside of Japan.

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“Strong Women, Soft Power.” Both Lucy North and Allison Markin Powell have translated Kawakami’s work.

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Japanese Literature at Facebook

Japanese Literature at Goodreads

Other RJL Episodes of Interest:

• Episode 14: Banana and the Bubble. The 1980s were a high point for nihonjinron or “theories of Japanese-ness”. These ideas were part of a lot of the Japanese government’s rhetoric after 3/11.
• Episode 15: Translating Japanese Women. Strong Women, Soft Power translators Lucy North and Allison Markin Powell have both translated work by Hiromi Kawakami. 
• Episode 16: Writing about Japan’s “Have-Nots”. The protagonist of Tokyo Ueno Station is a man from the Tohoku region. He and the other homeless residents of Ueno Park have suffered in the aftermath of 3/11. Yu Miri is a vocal spokesperson for the Tohoku region.
• Episode 19: Japanese Magical Realism. Hiromi Kawakami is a prominent contemporary magical realist writer. This episode opens with her story “Weightless”.
• Episode 20: The Akutagawa Prize and Kobo Abe. Kawakami won the Akutagawa Prize for “A Snake Stepped On” in 1996. (“A Snake Stepped On” appears in the English-language collection Record of a Night Too Brief, translated by Lucy North.) The Woman in the Dunes takes place in Yamagata Prefecture of the Tohoku region.

Sources

Ardou, Deibito. “Japan Needs Less Ganbatte, More Genuine Action” at The Japan Times, 2011.

DiNitto, Rachel. Fukushima Fiction: The Literary Landscape of Japan’s Triple Disaster. U of HI, 2019.

Fincher, Alison. “‘Trinity, Trinity, Trinity’ by Erika Kobayashi” at Asian Review of Books, 2022. (free)

Gebhart, Lisette. “Post-3/11 Literature: The Localisation of Pain—Internal Negotiations and Global Consciousness” in Literature and Art after ‘Fukushima’: Four Approaches. Ed. Lisette Gebhart and Yuki Masami, Eb-Verlag, 2014.

Gebhart, Lisette and Yuki Masami, eds. Literature and Art after ‘Fukushima’: Four Approaches. Eb-Verlag, 2014.

Hopson, Nathan. Ennobling Japan’s Savage Northeast: Tōhoku as Japanese Postwar Thought, 1945-2011. Harvard U Asia Center, 2017. 

–. “Systems of Irresponsibility and Japan’s Internal Colony” in The Asia Pacific Journal, 2013. (free).

Ichikawa Makoto. “The Mire and a Shovel” (translated by Christopher Lowy) in Shinsai to fikushon no ‘kyori’: Ruptured Fiction(s) of the Earthquake. Edited by Yoshikawa Yasuhisa, Waseda, 2012.

Kimoto Takeshi. “Post-3/11 Literature: Two Writers from Fukushima” in World Literature Today, 2012.

Luke, Elmer and David Karashima, eds. March Was Made of Yarn: Reflections on the Japanese Earthquake, Tsunami, and Nuclear Meltdown. Vintage, 2012.

Mihic, Tamaki. Re-Imagining Japan after Fukushima. Australian National University Press, 2020. (free via Australian National University)

Miyazawa Kaoru. “Becoming an Insider and an Outsider in Post-Disaster Fukushima” in Harvard Educational Review, 2018. (free)

Murakami Haruki. “Speaking as an Unrealistic Dreamer” (translated by Emanuel Pastreich) at The Asia-Pacific Journal, 2011. (free)

Norimatsu Satoko. “Worldwide Responses to the 20 Millisievert Controversy” in The Asia-Pacific Journal (2012). (free)

Pepi, Ronalds. “The Ruptures of Rhetoric: Cool Japan, Tokyo 2020 and Post 3.11 Tohoku” in New Voices in Japanese Studies, 2019. (free via Japan Foundation)

Pilling, David. Bending Adversity: Japan and the Art of Survival. Penguin, 2015.

USA Today. “U.S. Donations Not Rushing to Japan” at 11 Alive Atlanta, 2011. (via Archive.Today)

Yoshikawa Yasuhisa, ed. Shinsai to fikushon no ‘kyori’: Ruptured Fiction(s) of the Earthquake. Waseda, 2012.

Check out Episode 21 of the Read Literature podcast.

Transcript available.

This episode is marked mature.

Today we’ll explore two trends in contemporary Japanese fiction:

• Protagonists who don’t want to have sex
• And women who want to have babies anyway.

To take a closer look at these trends, we’re going to ask a couple of questions about contemporary Japan:

• What is “celibacy syndrome”? Does it even exist?
• What role does motherhood play in a shrinking society?
• And how do sexlessness and motherhood play out in 21st-century Japanese fiction?

We’ll end with a closer look at Mieko Kawakami’s best-selling novel, Breasts and Eggs.

(CW: domestic violence in a novel)

Become an RJL supporter for more than ten minutes of bonus content.

Support this podcast by buying from Bookshop.org.

• Breasts and Eggs by Mieko Kawakami (translated by Sam Bett and David Boyd)
  • You can also read passages from Chichi to Ran Eggs translated into Manchester dialect by Louise Heal Kawai for free at Words without Borders.
• “A Clean Marriage” by Sayaka Murata (translated by Ginny Tapley Takemori) (read for free via Granta)
  • “A Clean Marriage” also appears in editions of Murata’s Life Ceremony published by Granta Press.

More by Mieko Kawakami:

• All the Lovers in the Night (translated by Sam Bett and David Boyd)
  • Read my review of All the Lovers in the Night.
• “Dreams of Love, etc.” (translated by Hitomi Yoshio) featured in The Penguin Book of Japanese Short Stories
  • “Dreams of Love, etc.” also appears in Monkey Business: New Writing from Japan 3
• Heaven (translated by Sam Bett and David Boyd)
  • Read my review of Heaven.
• “The Little Girl Blows Up Her Pee Anxiety, My Heart Races” (translated by Hitomi Yoshio) in Monkey Business: New Writing from Japan 4
• “March Yarn” (translated by Michael Emmerich) in March Was Made of Yarn: Reflections on the Japanese Earthquake, Tsunami, and Nuclear Meltdown
• Ms Ice Sandwich (translated by Louise Heal Kawai)
• “My Baby” (translated by Hitomi Yoshio) in Monkey Business: New Writing from Japan 6
• “The Thirteenth Month” (translated by Hitomi Yoshio) in Monkey Business: New Writing from Japan 5

Read Mieko Kawakami for free:

• “About Her and the Memories That Belong to Her” (translated by Hitomi Yoshio) (read for free via Granta)
• “The Flowers Look More Beautiful Now Than Ever” (translated by Hitomi Yoshio) (read for free via Granta)
• “Golden Slumbers” (translated by Sam Bett and David Boyd) (read for free via The New York Times; article limit)
• “How Much Heart” (translated by David Boyd) (read for free via Granta)
• “Shame” (translated by Louise Heal Kawai and Hitomi Yoshio) (read for free via Granta)
• “Where Have All the Sundays Gone?” (translated by Hitomi Yoshi) (read for free via Words without Borders)
• “Wisteria” (translated by Hitomi Yoshio) (read for free via Astra)

This episode also mentions:

• Convenience Store Woman by Sayaka Murata (translated by Ginny Tapley Takemori)
• Diary of a Void by Emi Yagi (translated by David Boyd and Lucy North)
  • Read my review of Diary of a Void.
• Earthlings by Sayaka Murata (translated by Ginny Tapley Takemori)
• Hit Parade of Tears by Izumi Suzuki (various translators; expected spring 2023)
• ME by Tomoyuki Hoshino (translated by Charles de Wolf)
• Terminal Boredom by Izumi Suzuki (various translators)
  • Read my review of Terminal Boredom.
• “Smartening Up” in Where the Wild Ladies Are by Aoko Matsuda (translated by Polly Barton)
  • Read “Smartening Up” for free via Granta.
  • Read my review of Where the Wild Ladies Are.
• Territory of Light by Yuko Tsushima (translated by Geraldine Harcourt)
• Twinkle Twinkle by Kaori Ekuni (translated by Emi Shimokawa)
• Woman Running in the Mountains by Yuko Tsushima (translated by Geraldine Harcourt)
  • Read my review of Woman Running in the Mountains.
• Nipponia Nippon by Kazushige Abe (translated by Kerim Yasar) is the 1st novel to be translated into English by Mieko Kawakami’s husband. As of February 2023, the anticipated release date for Europe is in late summer 2023. The anticipated release date in the US is fall 2023.
  • See a full list of 2023 upcoming Japanese fiction releases.

Find Out More

More on Japan’s perceived sexlessness. NSFW. This article includes links to most other English-language articles on the same topic when it was on many people’s minds in the mid 2010s.

RJL on sexlessness in contemporary Japanese fiction. NSFW. Includes reflections on the work of Mieko Kawakami and Sayaka Murata. (spoilers)

RJL on ME and Earthlings. (spoilers)

6 Facts about Gender Equality in Japan from Unseen Japan.

More on maternity harassment in Japan.

–

Translator Daniel Joseph on Izumi Suzuki.

My review of Emi Yagi’s Diary of a Void in Asian Review of Books.

Isaac Meyer’s The History of Japan podcast on the history of marriage in Japan. 37 minutes.

–

“Japanese Generations: Boom Bubble, and Ice Age” at Nippon.com. Nippon.com has translated this article from Japanese into English.

“Osaka vs. Tokyo People: Are They Really That Different” at TheTrueJapan.com. The author is a long-time Tokyo resident.

A quick explanation about the differences between “standard Japanese” and Kansai-ben (Osaka-ben).

–

Mieko Kawakami’s official website. English.

Mieko Kawakami at Granta. This page also includes links to some stories by Kawakami you can read online for free.

Mieko Kawakami in conversation with David McNeill of The Guardian in 2020.

Mieko Kawakami in conversation with Makenna Goodman of BOMB Magazine in 2021.

Haruki Murakami praises Chichi to Ran.

Mieko Kawakami discusses female characters with Haruki Murakami.

A recent (February 2023) profile of Mieko Kawakami in The New York Times Magazine.

–

Glynne Walley provides an English-language review of 2008’s Chichi to ran. Walley is a professor of Japanese literature at the University of Oregon.

The Independent responds to Kawakami’s Akutagawa win in 2008.

Mieko Kawakami explains Breasts and Eggs on Twitter in 2020.

Sam Bett and David Boyd talk about translating Breasts and Eggs. This conversation is especially interesting as a look at co-translation.

The New Yorker explains the development and appeal of Japan’s “cell phone novels”.

–

“Literature” at Japanese Wiki Corpus

Japanese Literature at Facebook

Japanese Literature at Goodreads

Other RJL Episodes of Interest:

• Episode 1: The Kojiki. The Kojiki includes one of Japanese literature’s first depictions of pregnancy.
• Episode 9: The Women Writers of Meiji Japan. This episode talks about the development of women’s fiction from the 1870s-1910s. Mieko Kawakami finds special inspiration in the work of Ichiyo Higuchi.
• Episode 14: Banana and the Bubble. Protagonists in shojo stories rarely think about pregnancy.
• Episode 15: Translating Japanese Women. This episode talks about the development of women’s fiction, especially from the 1920s-2010s.
• Episode 17: The Smile of the Mountain Witch. Many yama-uba stories explore pregnancy and mother. Minako Oba wrote these themes in her fiction.
• Episode 20: The Akutagawa Prize and Kobo Abe. Mieko Kawakami won the Akutagawa for Chichi to Ran in 2008.

Sources

Alzate, Juliana Buriticá. “Embodiment and Its Violence in Kawakami Mieko’s Chichi to Ran” in Japanese Language and Literature, 2020.

Bullock, Julia. The Other Women’s Lib: Gender and Body in Japanese Women’s Fiction. U of HI Press, 2010. (free via Open Access)

Bullock, Julia, et al. Rethinking Japanese Feminisms. U of HI Press, 2018. (free via Open Access)  

Shirai Chiaki. “The History of ‘Artificial Insemination’ in Japan During 1890-1948: Issues Concerning Insemination and Donor Sperm” at Shizuoka University Repository, 2017. (free)

Copeland, Rebecca and Melek Ortabasi, eds. The Modern Murasaki: Writing by Women of Meiji Japan, Columbia UP, 2006.

Fincher, Alison. “Cannibalism in Two Contemporary Japanese Novels” at ReadJapaneseLiterature.com, 2020. (free)

–. “Diary of a Void” in Asian Review of Books, 2022. (free)

–. “Sexlessness in the Work of Mieko Kawakami and Sayaka Murata” at ReadJapaneseLiterature.com, 2020. (free)

Frisby, Naomi. “Spotlight on: Mieko Kawakami. The Author You Need to Know” at PanMacMillan.com, 2021. (free)

Harney, Alexandra. “The Herbivore’s Dilemma” in Slate, 2009. (free)

Haworth, Abigail. “Why Have Young People in Japan Stopped Having Sex?” in The Observer, 2013. (free)

Hay, Mark. “Why Aren’t the Japanese Fucking?” in Vice, 2015. (free)

Hernon, Matthew. “Award-Winning Japanese Author Mieko Kawakami: “I Have a Problem with the Patriarchal System in This Country” in Tokyo Weekender, 2020. (free)

Hunt, Joshua. “‘Breasts and Eggs’ Made Her a Feminist Icon. She Has Other Ambitions” in The New York Times Magazine, 2023. (free)

Kagemaya Yuri. “Writer Blogs Her Way to Top Literary Prize” in The Japan Times, 2008.

Kawakami Mieko. “from Breasts and Eggs.” Translated by Louise Heal Kawai at Words without Borders, 2012. (free)

–. “Mieko Kawakami: ‘Women Are no Longer Content to Shut Up.” Interview with David McNeill in The Guardian, 2020. (free)

–. “Strong Lights and Dark Shadows: Mieko Kawakami Interviewed by Makenna Goodman.” Translated by Hitomi Yoshio at BOMB Magazine, 2021. (free)

Kazdin, Cole. “For Women in Japan, Maternity Harassment Is the Mother of All Problems” in Vice, 2016. (free)

Keating, Joshua. “No, Japanese People Haven’t Given Up on Sex” in Slate, 2013. (free)

Kobayashi Jun. “Have Japanese People Become Asexual? Love in Japan” in International Journal of Japanese Sociology, 2017.

Kosaka, Kris. “‘Breasts and Eggs’: Not Just Some Elevated Piece of Literary Chick-Lit” in The Japan Times, 2020.

Montgomery, Hanako. “Japan Won’t Let Them Have Kids, So They Turn to the Black Market for Sperm Instead” in Vice, 2021. (free)

Murakami Haruki. “A Feminist Critique of Murakami Novels, with Murakami Himself: Mieko Kawakami Interviews the Author of Killing Commendatore.” Translated by Sam Bett and David Boyd at Literary Hub, 2020. (free)

–. “Haruki Murakami on His Favorite Young Novelist: Mieko Kawakami.” Translated by Philip Gabriel at LitHib.com, 2017. (free)

Nonomiya, Lily, Marika Katanyma and Yuko Takeo. “Japan, in Need of More Babies, Is Helping Pay for Costly IVF” in The Japan Times, 2022.

Kosaka, Kris. “Breasts and Eggs: Not Just Some Elevated Piece of Literary Chick-Lit” in The Japan Times, 2020. (free)

Lim, Louisa. “In Japan, ‘Herbivore’ Boys Subvert Ideas of Manhood” at NPR Morning Edition, 2009. (free)

McCurry, Justin. “Record Number of Young People in Japan Rejecting Marriage, Survey Shows” in The Guardian, 2022. (free)

McNeill, David. “Young Commuter Bloggers Snatch Japan’s Literary Laurels” in The Independent, 2008. (free)

Newcomb, Amelia. “Mieko Kawakami: From Blogger to Global Novelist” in The Christian Science Monitor, 2008. (free)

O no Yasumaro. The Kojiki. Translated by Gustav Heldt, Columbia UP, 2014.

Schawlow, Paul Gordon and Janet A. Walker, eds. The Woman’s Hand: Gender and Theory in Japanese Women’s Writing, Stanford, 1996.

Seaman, Amanda C. Writing Pregnancy in Low-Fertility Japan. U HI Press, 2017.

Siripala, Thisanka. “Japan’s Population Crisis Nears Point of No Return” at The Diplomat, 2023. (free)

“Yanagisawa Calls Women Child-Bearing Machines” in Japan Times, 2007.

Check out Episode 20 of the Read Literature podcast.

The Akutagawa Prize is probably Japan’s most celebrated literary award.

To better understand the Akutagawa Prize and its place in modern Japanese literature, we’ll start with an introduction to the history of “literary” fiction in Japan.

Then we’ll move on to the history of the Akutagawa Prize itself, from its creation in 1935 through its most recent winners.

And then we’ll finish with a look at the life and career of Kobo Abe including his most famous book, The Woman in the Dunes.

(CW: suicide, attempted rape in a novel)

Become an RJL supporter for five minutes of bonus content.

Support this podcast by buying from Bookshop.org.

• Beyond the Curve (translated by Juliet Winters Carpenter)
  • includes a partial translation of “The Crime of S. Karma”
• The Woman in the Dunes (translated by Dale Saunders)

More by Kobo Abe:

• The Ark Sakura (translated by Juliet Winters Carpenter)
• Beasts Head for Home (translated by Richard Calichman)
• The Box Man (translated by Dale Saunders)
• The Face of Another (translated by Dale Saunders)
• Kangaroo Notebook (translated by Maryellen Toman Mori)
• The Ruined Map (translated by Dale Saunders)
• Secret Rendezvous (translated by Juliet Winters Carpenter)
• Three Plays by Kōbō Abe (translated by Donald Keene)

This episode also mentions:

• Convenience Store Woman by Sayaka Murata (translated by Ginny Tapley Takemori)
• From the Fatherland, with Love by Ryū Murakami (translated by Ralph McCarthy, Charles De Wolf, and Ginny Tapley Takemori)
• Hear the Wind Sing and Pinball by Haruki Murakami (translated by Ted Goossen)
• In the Miso Soup by Ryu Murakami (translated by Ralph McCarthy)
• People from My Neighborhood by Hiromi Kawakami (translated by Ted Goossen)

Purchase Akutagawa winners from our Bookshop.

Find Out More

A GoodReads list of Akutagawa-winning stories. Works that have been translated into English are usually included with their titles in English.

RJL’s list of Akutagawa Prize Winners in English. The list includes non-winning works available from Akutagawa-winner authors.

Glynne Walley’s write-ups of Akutagawa-winning stories since 2000. Walley is a professor of Japanese literature at the University of Oregon.

–

Li Kotomi’s Akutagawa acceptance speech. Kotomi was the first Tawainese-born Akutagawa winner when she won in 2021.

A profile of Gregory Kherzrnejat, an American nominated for the 2023 Akutagawa Prize, in the Japan Times. If Kherznejat had won, he would have been the first native English speaker and first American Akutagawa winner.

–

Comments about Kobo Abe and “The Crime of S. Karma” by the Akutagawa Selection Committee. Note that the link is to the Google Translate version of a Japanese website.

A review of Karin Yamaguchi’s memoir, Kobo Abe and Me. Abe’s mistress’s memoir hasn’t been translated into English, but this is a thorough review.

An interview with Kobo Abe’s daughter Neri.

The Internet Movie Database entry for 1964’s The Woman in the Dunes. The entry includes a film trailer.

Kobo Abe’s obituary in The New York Times.

–

“Literature” at Japanese Wiki Corpus

Japanese Literature at Facebook

Japanese Literature at Goodreads

Other RJL Episodes of Interest:

• Episode 6: High and Low Literature in Edo Japan. Before there was the bundan, there was the literature of high culture in Edo-period Japan.
• Episode 10: Taisho Magazines and Akutagawa’s Vision of Hell. The Akutagawa Prize is named for Ryunosuke Akutagawa, the “father of the modern Japanese short story”.
• Episode 13: Literature of Change in the 1960s—Mishima and Oe. Kenzaburo Oe won the Akutagawa Prize for “Prize Stock” in 1958. There is some professional overlap between Abe and Oe’s careers. This episode also includes more information about the Summer of Rage.
• Episode 15: Translating Japanese Women. Sayaka Murata won the Akutagawa Prize for Convenience Store Woman in 2016.
• Episode 16: Writing about Japan’s “Have-Nots”. Yu Miri won the Akutagawa Prize for “Family Cinema” in 1996.
• Episode 17: The Smile of the Mountain Witch. Minako Oba won the Akutagawa Prize for “Three Crabs” in 1968.

Sources

Abe Kobo. “The Crime of S. Karma” in Beyond the Curve. Translated by Juliet Winters Carpenter. Kodansha, 1991.

–. Interview with Nancy S. Hardin. Contemporary Literature, 1974.

“Abe Kobo” at Prizeworld.com, 2017. (Japanese language site via Google Translate, both free)

Ashby, Janet. “Heavy and Light in Minority Fiction” in The Japan Times, 2000.

“[Breaking News] Bookstore Clerk and Author Atsushi Sato, who Lives in Sendai, Won the Akutagawa Prize” at Kahoku News, 2023. (Japanese language site via Google Translate, both free)

Chilton, Myles. “Realist Magic and the Invented Tokyos of Murakami Haruki and Yoshimoto Banana” in Journal of Narrative Theory, 2009.

Coutts, Angela. “Gender and Literary Production in Modern Japan: The Role of Female-Run Journals in Promoting Writing by Women During the Interwar Years” in Signs, 2006.

El-Khoury, Masumi Abe. Editor’s Intentions and Author’s Desires: How Junbungaku Affects the Akutagawa Prize and Japan’s Commercial Literary World. UBC. MA Thesis. 2011. (free)

Ericson, Joan E. “The Origins of the Concept of ‘Women’s Literature’” in The Woman’s Hand: Gender and Theory in Japanese Women’s Writing, Stanford, 1996.

Fernando, Shaun. “Works Winning the Akutagawa and Naoki Prizes Are Trending on Social Media” at JapanFoward.com, 2022. (free)

Ha, Thu-Huong. “Could the Akutagawa Prize Get Its First American Winner? At The Japan Times, 2023.

Iwamoto Yoshio. “The Nobel Prize in Literature, 1967-1987: A Japanese View” in World Literature Today, 1988.

“Japan’s Kafka Goes on the Road” in The New York Times, 1979. (free)

Keene, Donald. “Ryūnosuke Akutagawa” in Dawn to the West: Japanese Literature of the Modern Era—Fiction, 4th ed., 1999.

Mack, Edward. “Accounting for Taste: The Creation of the Akutagwa and Naoki Prizes for Literature” in Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies, 2004.

–. Manufacturing Modern Japanese Literature: Publishing, Prizes, and the Ascription of Literary Value. Duke, 2010.

Mak, Rebecca. “The Akutagawa/Tanizaki Debate: Actors in Bundan Discourse” in Routledge Handbook of Modern Japanese Literature, ed. Rachael Hutchinson and Leith Morton, 2016.

Marcus, Marvin. Japanese Literature from Murasaki to Murakami, Association for Asian Studies, 2015.

Masahiko Morimoto. “Akutagawa Prize Winner Li Kotomi: Updating the Face of Japanese LIterature One Novel at a Time” at Japan-Forward.com, 2021. (free)

Napier, Susan J. The Fantastic in Modern Japanese Literature: The Subversion of Modernity. Routledge, 1996.

Powell, Allison Markin. “10 Japanese Books by Women We’d Love to See in English” at Lithub.com, 2016.

–. “Translation Women in Essential: Allison Markin Powell on Translating Kaoru Takamura’s Groundbreaking Japanese Crime Epic” at Soho.com, 2022.

Richter, Frederick. “A Comparative Approach to Abe Kōbō’s S. Karuma-shi no Hazai” in The Journal of the Association of Teachers of Japanese, 1974.

Seidensticker, Edward. “The ‘Pure’ and the ‘In-Between’ in Modern Japanese Theories of the Novel” in Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies, 1966.

Shields, Nancy. Fake Fish: The Theater of Kobo Abe. Weatherhill, 1996.

Shirane, Haruo, ed. Early Modern Japanese Literature—An Anthology, 1600-1900. Columbia, 2002.

Sterngold, James. “Kobo Abe, 68, the Skeptical Poet of an Uprooted Society, Is Dead” in The New York Times, 1993. (free)

Tatsumi Takayuki. “Generations and Controversies: An Overview of Japanese Science Fiction, 1957-1997” in Science Fiction Studies, 2000.

Check out Episode 19 of the Read Literature podcast.

Magical realism is a literary genre famous for unexplained fantastical encounters that pop-up in the otherwise everyday world.

Today, we’re going to take a look at magical realism in Japanese fiction.

We’ll start with defining magical realism, including a look at why that term is difficult and why some people think of it as controversial.

Then we’ll turn to the history of magical realism in Japan and take a closer look at the work of Tomihiko Morimi, especially The Night Is Short, Walk on Girl.

(CW: brief mention of fictional suicide attempt)

Become an RJL supporter for five minutes of bonus content.

Support this podcast by buying from Bookshop.org.

The Night Is Short, Walk on Girl by Tomihiko Morimi (translated by Emily Balistrieri)

More by Tomihiko Morimi:

• “20th Century Hotel” (translated by Emily Balistrieri) (read for free online)
• “Fireworks” (translated by Emily Balistrieri) (read for free online)
• Fox Tales (translated by Winifred Bird)
• Penguin Highway (translated by Andrew Cunningham)
• The Tatami Galaxy (translated by Emily Balistrieri)
• Tower of the Sun (translated by Stephen Kohler)

This episode also mentions:

• The House of the Sleeping Beauties by Yasunari Kawabata (translated by Edward Seidensticker)
  • includes the story “One Arm”
• Life for Sale by Yukio Mishima (translated by Stephen Dodd)
• People from My Neighborhood by Hiromi Kawakami (translated by Ted Goossen)
• Ten Nights Dream: And the Cat’s Grave by Natsume Soseki (translated by Matt Treyvaud)

A Reading List of Japanese Magical Realism

• Hideo Furukawa
  • Belka, Why Don’t You Bark? (translated by Michael Emmerich)
  • Horses, Horses, in the End the Light Remains Pure (translated by Akiko Takenaka and Doug Slaymaker)
  • Slow Boat (translated by David Boyd)
• Hiromi Kawakami
  • People from My Neighborhood (translated by Ted Goossen)
  • Record of a Night Too Brief (translated by Lucy North)
• Tomohiko Morimi
  • The Night Is Short, Walk on Girl (translated by Emily Balistrieri)
  • The Tatami Galaxy (translated by Emily Balistrieri)
  • Tower of the Sun (translated by Stephen Kohler)
• Haruki Murakami
  • 1Q84 (translated by Jay Rubin and Philip Gabriel)
  • The Elephant Vanishes (translated by Jay Rubin and Alfred Birnbaum)
  • First Person Singular (translated by Philip Gabriel)
    • including the short story “Confessions of a Shinagawa Monkey” (read for free via The New Yorker)
  • Kafka on the Shore (translated by Philip Gabriel)
  • Killing Commendatore (translated by Philip Gabriel and Ted Goossen)
  • Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World (translated by Alfred Birnbaum)
  • South of the Border, West of the Sun (translated by Philip Gabriel)
  • Sputnik Sweetheart (translated by Philip Gabriel)
  • The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle (translated by Jay Rubin)
  • A Wild Sheep Chase (translated by Alfred Birnbaum)
• Yoko Ogawa
  • The Diving Pool: Three Novellas (translated by Stephen Snyder)
  • Revenge: Eleven Dark Tales (translated by Stephen Snyder)
• Yoko Tawada
  • 3 Streets (translated by Margaret Mitsutani)
  • The Bridegroom Was a Dog (translated by Margaret Mitsutani)
  • Facing the Bridge (translated by Margaret Mitsutani)
  • Memoirs of a Polar Bear (translated from the German by Susan Bernofsky)
    • read an excerpt for free via Words without Borders
• Banana Yoshimoto
  • Asleep (translated by Michael Emmerich)
  • Dead-End Memories (translated by Asa Yoneda)
  • Lizard (translated by Ann Sherif)

• Before the Coffee Gets Cold by Toshikazu Kawaguchi (translated by Geoffrey Trousselot)
• Diary of a Void by Emi Yagi (translated by David Boyd and Lucy North)
• “Droplets” by Shun Medoruma in Southern Exposure: Japanese Literature from Okinawa
• The House of the Sleeping Beauties by Yasunari Kawabata (translated by Edward Seidensticker)
• If Cats Disappeared from the World by Genki Kawamura (translated by Eric Selland)
• Life Ceremony by Sayaka Murata (translated by Ginny Tapley Takemori)
• Life for Sale by Yukio Mishima (translated by Stephen Dodd)
• The Lonesome Bodybuilder by Yukio Motoya (translated by Asa Yoneda)
• The Miracles of the Namiya General Store by Keigo Higashino (translated by Sam Bett)
• Ten Nights Dream: And the Cat’s Grave by Natsume Soseki (translated by Matt Treyvaud)
• There’s No Such Thing as an Easy Job by Kikuko Tsumura (translated by Polly Barton)
• Things Remembered and Things Forgotten by Kyoko Nakajima (translated by Ginny Takemori and Ian MacDonald)
  • including the short story “When My Wife Was a Shiitake” (read for free via Words without Borders)

A Tale for the Time Being by Ruth Ozeki. Ozeki is a Japanese-American-Canadian, but her book is deeply influenced by Japanese literary history.

Find Out More

“I Am Not a Magic Realist” by Alberto Fuguet.

“The Future of Latin American Fiction” by Jorge Volpi.

“What We Talk about When We Talk about Magical Realism” by Fernando Sdrigotti.

“Saying Goodbye to Magic Realism” by Silvia Moreno-Garcia.

–

“11 Questions You’re Too Embarrassed to Ask about Magical Realism” at Vox.com.

Yasunari Kawabata’s 1968 Nobel Prize acceptance speech, “Japan, the Beautiful, and Myself”.

More about Yukio Mushima’s Life for Sale from Read Japanese Literature.

“Metafiction” at the Oxford Research Encyclopedia Online.

“Conflict in Literature” at KnowYourMeme.com.

–

An interview with Tomihiko Morimi.

Translators Emily Balistrieri and Andrew Cunningham talk about Tomihiko Morimi.

–

Tengu via Tofugo.com.

Rihaku (Li Bai in Chinese) via the Poetry Foundation.

The Uncanny Japan Podcast on Daruma.

Information about Kyoto from the Japan National Tourism Organization.

RJL on The Night Is Short, Walk on Girl. This blog post includes a “glossary” of some of the features of Japanese culture that come up in the novel.

–

“Literature” at Japanese Wiki Corpus

Japanese Literature at Facebook

Japanese Literature at Goodreads

Other RJL Episodes of Interest:

• Episode 8: Meiji Literature & Japan’s Most Famous Literary Cat. This episode includes an extended look at Japanese literature’s earliest encounters with European modernism.
• Episode 10: Taisho Magazines and Akutagawa’s Vision of Hell. Scholar Susan Napier classifies some of Akutagawa’s work as magical realist.
• Episode 11: The I-Novel, Osamu Dazai, and No Longer Human. The I-novel is the perhaps fullest realization of Japanese realism.
• Episode 13: Literature of Change in the 1960s—Mishima and Oe. Both Mishima and Oe produced works of magical realism.
• Episode 17: The Smile of the Mountain Witch. Minako Oba’s “The Smile of the Mountain Witch” has magical realist elements, incorporating Japanese folk stories in a realistic, modern setting.

Sources

Ashkenazi, Michael. “Tengu” in Handbook of Japanese Mythology. ABC Clio, 2003.

Chilton, Myles. “Realist Magic and the Invented Tokyos of Murakami Haruki and Yoshimoto Banana” in Journal of Narrative Theory, 2009.

Cunningham, Andrew and Emily Balistrieri. “Readers Don’t Need to Be Babied: A Conversation on Translating Japanese Literature” at TheMillons.com, 2019.

Dash, Michael J. “Marvellous Realism—The Way Out of Négritude” in Caribbean Studies, 1974.

de la Campa, Román. “Magical Realism and World Literature: A Genre for the Times?” in Revista Canadiense de Estudios Hispánicos, 1999.

Faris, Wendy B. “The Question of Other: Cultural Critiques of Magical Realism” in Ordinary Enchantments: Magical Realism and the Remystification of Narrative. Vanderbilt UP, 2004.

–. “Scheherazade’s Children: Magical Realism and Postmodern Fiction” in Magical Realism: Theory, History, Community. Edited by Lois Parkinson Zamora and Wendy B. Faris, Duke UP, 1995.

Fincher, Alison. “God’s Plot Conveniences: The Night Is Short, Walk on Girl” at Read Japanese Literature, 2020. (free)

–. “Killing Commendatore; or, What the Hell is a Double Metaphor” at Read Japanese Literature, 2020. (free)

–. “Magical Realism in Penguin Highway” at Read Japanese Literature, 2020. (free)

Fuguet, Alberto. “I Am Not a Magic Realist” in Salon, 1997. (free)

Gordon, Andrew. A Modern History of Japan: From Tokugawa Times to the Present, 4th ed. OUP, 2019.

Hussein, Sawsan Malla and Brahim Barhoun. “The State of the Debate on Magical Realism and Ben Okri” in Oyé: Journal of Language, Literature, and Popular Culture, 2020.

Kamerer, Tamara. “Fantastic Realities: Magical Realism in Contemporary Okinawan Fiction” in Vienna Journal of East Asian Studies, 2014.

Klinkowitz, Jerome. “Metafiction” in Oxford Research Ensearch Encyclopedia Online, 2017. (free)

Keene, Donald. “The I-Novel” in Dawn to the West: Japanese Literature of the Modern Era—Fiction, 4th ed. Columbia UP, 1999.

Li Bai. “The Solitude of Night.” Translated by Shigeyoshi Obata. PoetryFoundation.org.

Morena-Garcia, Silvia. “Saying Goodbye to Magic Realism” in NYTimes Online, 2022. (free)

Marcus, Marvin. Japanese Literature from Murasaki to Murakami. Association for Asian Studies, 2015.

Morimi Tomohiko. Interview with Kyoko Sugimoto. Translated by Emily Balistrieri. Anime News Network, 2020.

Napier, Susan J. “The Magic of Identity: Magic Realism in Modern Japanese Fiction” in Magical Realism: Theory, History, Community. Edited by Lois Parkinson Zamora and Wendy B. Faris, Duke UP, 1995.

Roh, Franz. “Magic Realism: Post-Expressionism (1925)” in Magical Realism: Theory, History, Community. Edited by Lois Parkinson Zamora and Wendy B. Faris, Duke UP, 1995.

Sdrigotti, Fernando. “What We Talk about When We Talk about Magical Realism” in LA Review of Books, 2020. (free)

Stretcher, Matthew C. “Beyond ‘Pure’ Literature: Mimesis, Formula, and the Postmodern in the Fiction of Murakami Haruki” in The Journal of Asian Studies, 1998.

Suter, Rebecca. “The Artist as a Medium and the Artwork as Metaphor in Murakami Haruki’s Fiction” in Japan Forum, 2020.

Volpi, Jorge. “The Future of Latin American Fiction” at Three Percent. (free)

Weinberger, Christopher. “Reflexive Realism and Kinetic Ethics: The Case of Murakami Haruki” in Representations, 2015.
Zamora, Lois Parkinson and Wendy B. Faris, eds. Magical Realism: Theory, History, Community. Duke UP, 1995.

Check out Episode 18 of the Read Literature podcast.

Today, we’re going to look at cats in Japanese literature.

We’ll start with the history of cats in Japan.

We’ll move on to cats in Japanese folklore and fiction, including the work of Haruki Murakami.

And finally we’ll end with a discussion of our readers’ choice, “The Town of Cats” by Sakutaro Hagiwara.

Become an RJL supporter for seven minutes of bonus content.

Support this podcast by buying from Bookshop.org.

Modanizumu: Modernist Fiction from Japan, 1913-1938, edited by William J. Tyler 

• includes the story “The Town of Cats” (translated by Jeffrey Angles)

“The Town of Cats” also titled “Cat Town” also appears in Cat Town by Sakutaro Hagiwara (translated by Hiroaki Sato)

“Cat stories“ by Haruki Murakami:

• 1Q84 (translated by Jay Rubin and Philip Gabriel)
  • “Town of Cats” is part of the story.
• Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman (translated by Philip Gabriel and Jay Rubin)
  • includes “Man-Eating Cats” (translated by Philip Gabriel)
• Kafka on the Shore (translated by Philip Gabriel)
• “Town of Cats” (translated by Jay Rubin; free—article limit)
• A Wild Sheep Chase (translated by Alfred Birnbaum)
• The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle (translated by Jay Rubin)

Recently-translated “cat books”:

• The Cat Who Saved Books by Sosuke Natsukawa (translated by Louise Heal Kawai)
  • Read my review in Asian Review of Books.
• The Guest Cat by Takahashi Hiraide (translated by Eric Selland) 
• If Cats Disappeared from the World by Genki Kawamura (translated by Eric Selland)
• Oh, Tama! by Mieko Kanai (translated Tomoko Aoyama and Paul McCarthy)
• The Travelling Cat Chronicles by Hiro Arikawa (translated by Philip Gabriel)

This episode also recommends:

• A Cat, a Man, and Two Women by Junichiro Tanizaki (translated by Paul McCarthy) 
• I Am a Cat by Natsume Soseki (translated by Aiko Ito and Graeme Wilson)
• Japanese Fairy Tales and Others by Lafcadio Hearn
  • includes the story “The Boy Who Drew Cats”
• Kotto: Being Japanese Curios, with Sundry Cobwebs by Lafcadio Hearn
  • includes the essay “Pathological” about Hearn’s pet cat, Tama
• Once and Forever: The Tales of Kenji Miyazawa by Keni Miyazawa (translated by John Bester)
• The Pillow Book by Sei Shonagon (translated by Meredith McKinney)
• She and Her Cat by Haruki Nagakawa and Makoto Shinkai (translated by Ginny Tapley Takemori)
• The Tale of Genji by Murasaki Shikibu (translated by Royall Tyler)

Find Out More

The Letters of Lafcadio Hearn. This episode opened with a discussion of Hearn’s letter to Basil Chamberlain dated August 1891.

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“Japan’s Love-Hate Relationship with Cats.” A free, article-long summary of Davisson’s work via Smithsonian Magazine.

“Feline Fatale: A Look at Japan’s Growing Cat Mania.” A fascinating article translated from Japanese about the place of cat’s in Japanese culture and literature.

“Cats in Japanese Art—Printed, Painted, and Sculpted Felines: Cat Memes from 300 Years Ago.”

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“6 Books for People Who Love Japan and Cats.” Books and Bao is a fantastic resource for translated fiction recommendations. You can also check out the YouTube channel, including the video “7 Great Japanese Books Featuring Cats.”

Naoki-Prize-winning author Kazufmi Shirashi talks about his love for cats. Three of Shirashi’s novels have been translated into English: Me Against the World, The Part of Me That Isn’t Broken Inside, and Stand-in Companion. Sadly, none prominently feature cats.

Author Mitsuyo Kakuta talks about her love for cats. Two of Kakuta’s novels have been translated into English, The Eighth Day and Woman on the Other Shore.

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An interview between Haruki Murakami and Deborah Tresiman for The New Yorker. This 2011 interview discusses “Town of Cats”. It was translated by Jay Rubin. (free—article limit)

Murakami’s essay “Abandoning a Cat: Memories of My Father” in The New Yorker. (free—article limit)

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What Is the Uncanny? A six-minute video by Oregon State University Professor Ray Malewitz.

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“Literature” at Japanese Wiki Corpus

Japanese Literature at Facebook

Japanese Literature at Goodreads

Other RJL Episodes of Interest:

• Episode 2: The Tale of Genji. A full episode about The Tale of Genji, the site of an early encounter with cats in Japanese literature.
• Episode 6: High and Low Literature in Edo Japan. This episode includes a description of Japanese printing. It also explains with “low literature” or popular fiction is such a key part of Japanese literary history.
• Episode 8: Meiji Literature and Japan’s Most Famous Literary Cat. Natsume Soseki’s I Am a Cat is probably Japan’s best known story about cats.
• Episode 14: Banana and the Bubble. Banana was part of the kawaii movement that included cat (or cat-like) pop-culture icon Hello Kitty.

Sources

Chen Yan. “A Cat in the History of Japanese Literature” at LaiTimes.com, 2021. (free)

Cucinelli, Diego. “Feline Shadows in the Rising Sun: Cultural Values of Cats in Pre-Modern Japan” in Ming Qing Studies, 2013.

Davisson, Zack. Kaibyō: The Supernatural Cats of Japan, 2nd ed. Mercuria, 2021.

Eiji Iwazai. “‘Wakeneko’ Studies: A Journey into Japan’s Cat Lore” at Nippon.com, 2021. (free)

Manabe Masayuki. “Objections to the History of Cats as Commonly Portrayed” at Waseda Online. (free)

Murakami Haruki. “Abandoning a Cat: Memories of My Father” translated by Philip Gabriel in The New Yorker. (free—article limit)

–. “Man-Eating Cats” translated by Philip Gabriel in The New Yorker, 2000.

 –. “This Week in Fiction: Haruki Murakami.” Interview conducted by Deborah Treisman, translated by Jay Rubin in The New Yorker, 2011. (free—article limit)

Nathan, Richard. “Cool for Cats: Japanese Literature and the Feline Form” at Red Circle, 2017. (free)

Rosen, Allen. “Lafcadio Hearn and Cats” at Kumamoto University Repository System, 2010.

Sakutaro Hagiwara. “The Town of Cats: A Fantasy in the Manner of a Prose Poem,” Jeffrey Angles, trans. in Modanizumu: Modernist Fiction from Japan, 1913-1938. U of HI, 2008.

Tyler, William J., ed. Modanizumu: Modernist Fiction from Japan, 1913-1938. U of HI, 2008.

Updike, John. “Subconscious Tunnels: Haruki Murakami’s Dreamlike New Novel” in The New Yorker, 2005. (free—article limit)

Vasukem Adeline. “Cat Imagery in Haruki Murakami’s Fiction”, 2012.
Yosuke Kita. “Feline Fatale: A Look at Japan’s Growing Cat Mania” at Nippon.com, 2017. (free)

Check out Episode 17 of the Read Literature podcast.

In this episode…

Is she a man-eating crone?

Is she a lonely wanderer?

Or is she a sensual matriarch?

However you define her, she’s the yama-uba—Japan’s legendary mountain witch.

Correction: This episode claims former health minister Hakuo Yanagisawa called women “child-bearing machines” in 2020. He actually made those comments in 2007.

Donate to RJL’s Patreon.

Support this podcast by buying from Bookshop.org.

Yamamba: In Search of the Japanese Mountain Witch edited by Rebecca Copeland and Linda C. Ehrlich

• includes Minako Oba’s “The Smile of the Mountain Witch” (translated by Norkio Mizuta Lippit, assisted by Mariko Ochi)

“The Smile of the Mountain Witch” also appears in

• Japanese Women Writers: Twentieth Century Short Fiction edited by Yukiko Tanaka and Elizabth Hansen
• The Penguin Book of Japanese Short Stories edited by Jay Rubin

This episode also recommends:

• The Goddess Chronicle by Natsuo Kirino (translated by Rebecca Copeland)
  • Learn more about The Goddess Chronicle.
• Masks by Fumiko Enchi (translated by Juliet Winters Carpenter)
• Woman Running in the Mountains by Yuko Tsushima (translated by Geraldine Harcourt)
  • Read my review of Woman Running in the Mountains in the ARB.

Find Out More

Hyakumonogatari Kaidanka: Translated Japanese Ghost Stories and Tales of the Weird and the Strange. Zack Davisson is an English-language expert on Japanese manga and folklore. His work is accessible, and everything on this website is free to read.

The-Noh.com is a great resource for learning more about Nōh theater. This link will take you to a summary of Yamamba, including text from the play in Japanese and English.

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The Asia-Pacific Journal on Japan’s Marital System Reform. A free-to-read and relatively up-to-date article.

Unseen Japan on “The Feminist Movement in Japan: WWII to the 1970s”. Part of a 3-part series about feminism in Japan, beginning in the Meiji Era.

More from RJL about sexism in Japan. This article includes my strongly-worded negative review of the book Before the Coffee Gets Cold.

–

Other RJL episodes of interest:

• Episode 1: The Kojiki. Japan’s creation myth. Many people consider The Kojiki’s Izanami a kind of proto-yama-uba.
• Episode 2: The Tale of Genji. The role of women in Heian Japan. Genji’s lover, the Lady of Rokujo, is one of the great monstrous women of Japanese literature.
• Episode 7: Kaidan—Japan’s Ghost Stories. Minako Oba translated Ueda Akinari’s Tales of Moonlight and Rain into modern Japanese.
• Episode 9: The Women Writers of Meiji Japan. Early Japanese feminism. The 1st generation of prominent women writers in 1000 years.

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“Literature” at Japanese Wiki Corpus

Japanese Literature at Facebook

Japanese Literature at Goodreads

Sources

Ashkenazi, Michael. “Yama-Uba” in Handbook of Japanese Mythology. ABC Clio, 2003.

Bullock, Julia C. “Burning Down the House: Fantasies of Liberation in the Era of ‘Women’s Lib’” in Japanese Language and Literature, 2015.

Copeland, Rebecca. “Mythical Bad Girls: The Corpse, the Crone, and the Snake” in Bad Girls of Japan, ed. Laura Miller and Jan Bardsley. Palgrave MacMilllan, 2005.

Copeland, Rebecca and Linda C. Ehrlich. Yamamba: In Search of the Japanese Mountain Witch. Stone Bridge, 2021.

Davisson, Zack. “What’s the Difference between Urei and Yokai” at HyakumonogatariKaidankai.com, 2013. (free)

Foster, Michael Dylan. The Book of Yokai: Mysterious Creatures of Japanese Folklore. U of CA, 2015.

Fusek, Alyssa Pearl. “The Feminist Movement in Japan: WWII to the 1970s” at UnseenJapan.com, 2020. (free)

Gordon, Andrew. A Modern History of Japan: From Tokugawa Times to the Present, 4th ed. OUP, 2019.

Hansen, Kelly. “Deviance and Decay in the Body of a Modern Mountain Witch: Ōba Minako’s ‘Yamanba no bishō’” in Japanese Language and Literature, 2014.

Hurley, Adrienne. “Demons, Transnational Subjects, and the Fiction of Ohba Minako” in Ōe and Beyond: Fiction in Contemporary Japan, ed. Stephen Synder and Philip Gabriel, U Hawaii, 1999.

Landau, Samantha. “Subversions of Gender and Power in Ōba Minako’s ‘Yamamba no Bishō’” in Gakuen, 2015.

Lippit, Noriko Mizuta and Kyoko Iriye Selden. “Introduction” in Japanese Women Writers: Twentieth Century Short Fiction, ed. and trans. Noriko Mizuta Lippit and Kyoko Iriye Selden. Routledge, 1991.

Mackie, Vera. Feminism in Modern Japan. Cambridge UP, 2003.

Mizuta Noriko. “The Dream of the Yamanba—An Overview” (translated by Luciana Sanga) in Review of Japanese Culture and Society, 2018.

“Ōba Minako” in Japanese Women Writers: A Bio-critical Sourcebook, ed. Chieko Mulhern. Greenwood Press, 1994.

Oba Minako. “Special Address: Without Beginning, Without End” (translated by Paul Gordon Schalow) in The Woman’s Hand: Gender and Theory in Japanese Women’s Writing, ed. Paul Gordon Schaler and Janet A. Walker. Stanford UP, 1996.

Reider, Norkio. Japanese Demon Lore: Oni from Ancient Times to the Present. Utah State UP, 2010.

–. “Locating the Yamamba” in Yamamba: In Search of the Japanese Mountain Witch, ed. Rebecca Copeland and Linda C. Ehrlich. Stone Bridge, 2021.

–. Mountain Witches: Yamauba. UT State UP, 2021.

Schaler, Paul Gordon and Janet A. Walker, eds. The Woman’s Hand: Gender and Theory in Japanese Women’s Writing. Stanford UP, 1996.

Toyoda Etsuko. “Japan’s Marital System Reform: The Fūfubessei Movement for Individual Rights” at The Asia-Pacific Journal, 2020. (free)

Viswanathan, Meera. “In Pursuit of the Yamamaba: The Question of Female Resistance” in The Woman’s Hand: Gender and Theory in Japanese Women’s Writing, ed. Paul Gordon Schaler and Janet A. Walker. Stanford UP, 1996.

Wilson, Michiko Niikuni. Gender Is Fair Game: (Re)Thinking the (Fe)Male in the Works of Ōba Minako. M. E. Sharpe, 1999.

–. “Introduction” in Of Birds Crying (translated by Michael K. Wilson and Michiko N. Wilson). Cornell UP, 2011.

“Yamamba (Mountain Crone” at The-Noh.com. (free)

Check out Episode 16 of the Read Literature podcast.

In this episode…

Post-bubble Japan.

The history of socially-conscious Japanese literature.

And Yu Miri’s Tokyo Ueno Station, a powerful examination of Tokyo by one of the most invisible people imaginable—the ghost of a homeless day laborer.

Donate to RJL’s Patreon.

Support this podcast by buying from Bookshop.org.

Tokyo Ueno Station by Yu Miri (translated by Morgan Giles)

Read Miri for Free:

• An excerpt of Tokyo Ueno Station at Words without Borders
• “Fukushima During Coronavirus: Life in Double Isolation” by Yu Miri (translated by Morgan Giles) at LitHub
• “North Winds Blow the Leaves from the Trees” by Yu Miri (translated by Morgan Giles) at Granta

This episode also recommends:

• Out by Natsuo Kirino (translated by Stephen Snyder)
• There’s No Such Thing As an Easy Job by Kikuo Tsumura (translated by Polly Barton)
  • Read my review of There’s No Such Thing As an Easy Job.
• Touring the Land of the Dead by Maki Kashimada (translated by Haydn Trowell)
  • Read my review of Touring the Land of the Dead.

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Find Out More

Unseen Japan. Among many topics, Unseen Japan provides English-language news coverage about under-represented communities in Japan, including Zainichi Koreans and the homeless.

ETHOS Typology on Homelessness and Housing Exclusion

The Japan Foundation New York Literary Series: Yu Miri and Morgan Giles. Yu Miri and her translator Morgan Giles talk about Tokyo Ueno Station. Other guests include moderator Stephen Snyder, interpreter Bethan Jones, and Strong Women, Soft Power member Allison Markin Powell.

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“Marxist Literary Criticism: An Introductory Reading Guide” at HistoricalMaterialism.org.

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JFNY Literary Series: Yu Miri x Morgan Giles. An hour-long video interview and discussion about Yu Miri’s work and Tokyo Ueno Station, hosted by the Japan Foundation of New York.

The National Book Award Page for Tokyo Ueno Station. This pages includes the judges’ citation:

This deft translation by Morgan Giles of Korean-Japanese writer Yu Miri’s Tokyo Ueno Station is a welcome and necessary addition to the translated Japanese canon, which unfolds in the memories of a deceased narrator occupying the eponymous train station. The book is an observation of Japan at the gateway of its capital, at multiple thresholds of shifting eras, told in the bardo of a mourning father and compatriot, reciting his surroundings and circumstances as if a prayer, a mantra.

“Her Antenna Is Tuned to the Quietest Voices” in The New York Times. This article, written after the English translation of Tokyo Ueno Station won the National Book Award, contains more information about Miri’s biography.

“Why the World Needs Literature” in Metropolis. Morgan Giles talks about Tokyo Ueno Station and translating Yu Miri.

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“Literature” at Japanese Wiki Corpus

Japanese Literature at Facebook

Japanese Literature at Goodreads

Sources

Eagleton, Terry. Literary Theory: An Introduction. U of MN, 2008.

–. Marxism and Literary Criticism. U of CA, 1976.

“ETHOS—European Typology on Homelessness and Housing Exclusion” at Feantsa.org, 2005. (free)

Goto Hiroshi, et al. “Why Street Homelessness Has Decreased in Japan: A Comparison of Public Assistance in Japan and the US” in Selected Works of Dennis P. Culhane, 2022. (free)

Harris, Thalia. “Metalist DaiGo and Anti-Homeless Sentiment in Japan” at UnseenJapan.com, 2021. (free)

“JFNY Literary Series: Yu Miri x Morgan Giles” at Jfny.org, 2021. (free)

Keene, Donald. Dawn to the West: Japanese Literature of the Modern Era—Fiction, 4th ed., 1999.

Marcus, Marvin. Japanese Literature from Murasaki to Murakami, Association for Asian Studies, 2015.

Rich, Motoko. “Her Antenna Is Tuned to the Quietest Voices” at NYTimes.com, 2020. (free)

Scott, Simon. “Ball and Chain: Gambling’s Darker Side” in The Japan Times Online, 2014.

Weickgenannt, Kristina. “The Deemphasis of Ethnicity: Images of Koreanness in the Works of the Japanese-Korean Author Yū Miri” in Electronic Journal of Contemporary Japanese Studies, Conference and Seminar Papers: Images of Asia in Mass Media, Popular Culture and Literature, 2001. (free)

Wender, Melissa L. “Introduction” in Into the Light: An Anthology of Literature by Koreans in Japan, U of HI, 2011.

–. “Yū Miri” in Into the Light: An Anthology of Literature by Koreans in Japan, U of HI, 2011.

Check out Episode 15 of the Read Literature podcast.

In all our episodes so far, we’ve talked almost exclusively about what Japanese literature looks like in Japan.

But we’re English-speakers and English-readers on an English-language podcast about Japanese literature in English.

In honor of Women in Translation Month, we’re talking about why there is such a wealth of contemporary books by Japanese women available in English.

Donate to RJL’s Patreon.

Support this podcast by buying from Bookshop.org.

Convenience Store Woman by Sayaka Murata (translated by Ginny Tapley Takemori)

Japanese Women Translated by Strong Women, Soft Power Translators:

Translated by Allison Markin Powell

• from Sentimental Education by Kaho Nakayama (read for free at Words without Borders)
• Lady Joker, Volume One Kaoru Takamura (co-translated with Marie Iida)
• Lady Joker, Volume Two Kaoru Takamura (co-translated with Marie Iida, expected fall 2022)
• The Nakano Thrift Shop by Hiromi Kawakami
• Strange Weather in Tokyo by Hiromi Kawakami (read an excerpt for free at Granta Magazine)
• The Ten Loves of Nishino by Hiromi Kawakami (read an excerpt for free at Granta Magazine)

Translated by Lucy North

• “Careless” by Hiroko Oyamada (read for free at Granta Magazine)
• Diary of a Void by Emi Yagi (co-translated with David Boyd)
• Record of a Night Too Brief by Hiromi Kawakai
• Toddler Hunting and Other Stories by Taeko Kono
• The Woman in the Purple Skirt by Natsuko Imamura (read an excerpt for free at Granta Magazine; read my review for the ARB)

Translated by Ginny Tapley Takemori

• “A Clean Marriage” by Sayaka Murata (read for free at Granta Magazine)
• Earthlings by Sayaka Murata
• “Faith” by Sayaka Murata (read for free at Granta Magazine)
• Life Ceremony: Stories by Sayaka Murata (read my review for the ARB)
• The Little House by Kyoko Nakajima
  • One of Strong Women, Soft Power’s “10 Japanese Books by Women We’d Like to See in English”
• Things Remembered and Things Forgotten: Stories by Kyoko Nakajima (co-translated with Ian McCullough MacDonald; read my review for the ARB)
• She and Her Cat: Stories by Makoto Shinkai and Naruki Nagakawa (expected fall 2022)
• “When My Wife Was a Shiitake” by Kyoko Nakajima (read for free at Granta Magazine)

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Ginny Tapley Takemori on “Strong Women, Soft Power” at Global Literature in Libraries Initiative

Strong Women, Soft Power’s list of “10 Japanese Books by Women We’d Love to See in English”

Allison Markin Power on why “Translating Women in Essential”

The Three Percent Database

Women in Translation. The project’s official website.

The Warwick Prize for Women in Translation

RJL’s List of 2022 Upcoming Japanese Fiction Releases

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Sayaka Murata talks about her life and work at Wired.com.

The Japan Foundation New York hosts a conversation with Sayaka Murata. (YouTube)

More about the work of Sayaka Murata on Read Japanese Literature:

• Aum Anxiety. Discusses Murata’s Earthlings.
• Cannibalism in Two Contemporary Japanese Novels. Discusses Murata’s Earthlings.
• Sexlessness in the Work of Mieko Kawakami and Sayaka Murata. Discusses Murata’s short story “A Clean Marriage”.

My review of Sayaka Murata’s latest in English, Life Ceremony: Stories

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“Literature” at Japanese Wiki Corpus

Japanese Literature at Facebook

Japanese Literature at Goodreads

Sources

Birnbaum, Phyllis, trans. and ed. Rabbits, Crabs, Etc.: Stories by Japanese Women. U of HI, 1982.

Copeland, Rebecca. “Intercultural Sisters: Translation and the Creation of Feminist Social Networks” in The Journal of Comparative Media and Women Studies, 2020.

Copeland, Rebecca and Melek Ortabasi, eds. The Modern Murasaki: Writing by Women of Meiji Japan, Columbia UP, 2006.

Coutts, Angela. “Gender and Literary Production in Modern Japan: The Role of Female-Run Journals in Promoting Writing by Women During the Interwar Years” in Signs, 2006.

Doppo Kunikida. “On Women and Translation” in Women Critiqued: Translated Essays on Japanese Women’s Writing. Rebecca Copeland, ed. U of HI Press, 2006.

Ericson, Joan E. “The Origins of the Concept of ‘Women’s Literature’” in The Woman’s Hand: Gender and Theory in Japanese Women’s Writing, Stanford, 1996.

Fincher, Alison. “Review: Life Ceremony by Sayaka Murata” at AsianReviewofBooks.com, 2022. (free)

Ha, Thu-Huong. “Sayaka Murata Inhabits a Planet of Her Own” at Wired.com, 2022. (free)

Keene, Donald. Dawn to the West: Japanese Literature of the Modern Era—Fiction, 4th ed., 1999.

Marcus, Marvin. Japanese Literature from Murasaki to Murakami, Association for Asian Studies, 2015.

Namkung, Victoria. “Move Over, Murakami: Female Authors Drive Growing Interest in Japanese Novels” at NBCNews.com, 2021. (free)

Powell, Allison Markin. “10 Japanese Books by Women We’d Love to See in English” at Lithub.com, 2016. (free)

–. “Translation Women in Essential: Allison Markin Powell on Translating Kaoru Takamura’s Groundbreaking Japanese Crime Epic” at Soho.com, 2022. (free)

Takemori, Ginny Tapley. “Strong Women, Soft Power” at Glli.org, 2018. (free)