/lit/ - Literature

From the sticky:
http://images.wikia.com/4chanlit/images/1/12/1298503721666.jpg

http://images.wikia.com/4chanlit/images/d/d1/1276577235824.jpg

nope

>>3703329
and a huge download of japanese lit
http://pastebin.com/2hhkv53u

I am not that familiar with Japanese literature, but I am a Cat is one of the most brillant pieces of satire I have ever read. Knowledge of the era in which is was written is a necessity, as well as knowledge of Japanese customs, but at its best, it almost feels like a Japanese Dostoevsky.

>>3703341
after i finish the russian canon, hopefully this summer, i'm going to turn to japanese lit, do you recommend any japanese history books?

>>3703351
>do you recommend any japanese history books?
Interested as well, especially on the 20th century/postwar culture.

not exactly /lit/, but check out Samurai Executioner. It's pretty poignant and morose for a manga. Very interesting take on the Edo period

>>3703351
>>3703366
Sorry, but I cannot help you. I understood the references mostly because I am third-generation Japanese - distant enough that Japanese culture is an entity that does not come in contact with my life, but close enough that I at least understand bits of it. I am sure that a simple search will yield good results. If I knew of a good Japanese history book, I would have read it already. I should get to reading about Japanese history, actually.

A fair warning - Japanese is a strange language, even after translation. I don't understand it, but I know enough that I can tell you that a good translation is vital - people tend to note details that westerners would consider extremely menial. Also, the language is rather simple, which puts a burden on the translator of actually having too elaborate on the original work so as not to make it sound like a children's book.

>>3703374
Then what's with the russian name? japanese is trending af

>>3703366
im >>3703351
If you haven't already studied some japanese history, I think you'll find everything from the beginning of the meiji era (starting ~1870) interesting. That was japan modernized within an astounding 30 years, going from samurais and shit to defeating chinese empire in 1890s to beating the russian navy in 1905.

>>3703381
Well, I'm mostly interested because I like japanese movies and want to get a better understanding of the context, especially after ww2, and how it had been just before the war

>>3703375
It's not my name. Lev Nikolayevich Myshkin was the main character of The Idiot, my favorite book from Dostoevsky, my favorite writer.

>>3703374
im curious, what makes japanese novels good if they read like children's books?

>>3703407
Perhaps it was an exaggeration to say that they read like children's books. If you have ever heard a speech of the Dalai Lama, that is what they sound like.
Japanese novels are often very simple. There is little to obscure the main idea of the work - you are simply supposed to consider the idea yourself. The Japanese never viewed literature as a separate entity from thought in the same way that western society came to, and thus, the reader is meant to simply take in the information and ponder on it. It is no coincidence that the Japanese invented Haikus - their literature can be very similar.

What I've read:

No Longer Human - Osamu Dazai
(second-best selling novel in Japan)

Ringu series (four books) -Koji Suzuki

A Wild Sheep Chase
The Wind-up Bird Chronicle
Kafka on the Shore
1Q84 - Haruki Murakami

Hagakure - Yamamoto Tsunetomo

Rashamon - Ryūnosuke Akutagawa

A handful of others I'm forgetting...
All were worth reading except for arguably the Ringu series, which only had one flaw, but a big one to me.

>>3703451
Adding Revenge - Yoko Ogawa (Short stories)

Temple of the Golden Pavilion by Mishima was ballin. Gotta read some more of his stuff soon.

Kenji Miyazawa has some great childrens lit.

>>3703351

If you want a solid academic overview/textbook I'd recommened A History of East Asia by Holcombe

>>3703335

Thank you fair Anon

>>3703335
Oh man, so good to see raven again.

Well, this is related but it's not prose. I was looking around for Haiku anthologies and chanced upon those glorious Blyth volumes only to find the price like, $400 for the set of 4 really old books. Why aren't they being printed anymore?

If I had the cash, I'd be acquiring and scanning it so it lives on for at least a decade or more online.

My recommendations:

A Personal Matter - Kenzaburo Oe

Musashi, Taiko - Eiji Yoshikawa (Shiba Ryotaro is the better historical fiction writer supposedly, but afaik he is not translated into English)

Snow Country, The Old Capital - Kawabata

Rashomon and Seventeen Other Stories - Akutagawa

All of Mishima

Personally, I do not like Soseki, Tanizaki, Dazai, Murakami (either of them though Haruki is much better than Ryu), or even Akutagawa's Kappa.

Dazai's biography at the beginning of "Self Portraits" is more interesting than any of his stories.

>>3703366
Tanizaki, Dazai, Sôseki, Takamura, Akutagawa, Kawabata and friends.

>>3703335
are there any more folders like this? like, big collections of other types of lit
i only ever see this one

>>3704147
There are a few! You'll have to trawl here - http://rs.4chan.org/?s=&from=%2Flit%2F

>>3704053
>(either of them though Haruki is much better than Ryu)
wtf

Should I get Self Portraits or The Saga of Osamu Dazai for his bio? Would go over the other decadent writers as well? Tao Lin instagrammed a photo where he accidentally bought two copies of Self Portraits, "I accidentally got two"

Norwegian Wood. Just finished it.

>>3703326
no

>>3704287
thanks!

>>3704343
I remember a Russian pack from years ago but it seems to be from Megaupload. Check the Lit archives too!

The only good japanese lit is manga

>>3704364
There're plenty of titles that incorporate JpLit into their stories but never get translated. Chihayafuru and UtaKoi are two.

I have a soft spot for poems.

>>3703351
J-lit grad student here. If you know absolutely nothing about Japanese culture, I would recommend Paul Varley's "Japanese Culture," which gives a nice overview of the entirety of Jp culture (stuff is left out, but a good intro). Also recommend Andrew Gordon's "Modern History of Japan" (new edition recently came out

>>3704053
Actually, there's a lot of Shiba translated into English--"Drunk as a Lord," "The Last Shogun," and a new translation of "Clouds Above the Hill." Shiba is a great writer

>>3704398
I'm going to shoe horn myself in. Not OP but I was hoping someone who studies it would turn up! As I said earlier, the Blyth Haiku books are impossible to get. Are there other books you'd recommend? Or a list of writers I should look up?

>>3704409
Depends on what you like. Poetry isnt my forte, but there's Carter's "Traditional Japanese Poetry," which gives excerpts of all types of J poetry. If you like haiku, Matsuo Basho is the best, theres an entire anthology of his works. Im biased towards postwar lit, but I like Oe, Mishima, Shiba Ryotaro, Nakazawa Keiji (manga artist of Barefoot Gen), Kawabata Yasunari, Tanizaki Junichiro

>>3704433
Well, I have the complete works of Basho and I've gotten into Ryokan. I will look into Carter's book thank you for that rec! More partial to short stories and happier fare than Dazai or something. Most J-Lit fills me with despair after I finish a book.

Does anyone know if Ryu Murakami is any good? Where should I start with him?

I keep seeing his name pop up and want to give his stuff a go.

>>3704506
Start with Almost Transparent Blue.

Don't read In the Miso Soup, it's shit. Coin Locker Babies and Piercing are pretty good but they take it very far in the pulp, sex/gore direction.

>>3704529
>>3704506
I had a lot of fun with 69.

>>3704564
Yeah? I've had it sitting in my wishlist.

Yukikaze

Ikkyu. Always Ikkyu.

Ikkyu.

>>3704506
he is... interesting

I've read Almost Transparent Blue, In the Miso Soup, Lines and Piercing

I enjoyed the Almost Transparent Blue the most, followed probably by Lines

>>3704407
thanks for the heads up. now to see if i can pirate dattttttt shit

>>3704506
>>3704529
>Don't read In the Miso Soup, it's shit.

I tried so many times to get through this novel and eventually returned it because it was that shit. People are right. Japanese literature read like children's books. The translated prose is unsophisticated and it makes me feel patronised.
Example: 'Salvation of a Saint' by Keigo Higashino.
It's like Dan Brown writing crime fiction, but worse.

Yes.

>>3706420
Nancy Andrew's translation of Almost Transparent Blue is really good, the prose feels piercing and to the point rather than awkward or stilted.
I feel like In the Miso Soup was written out of some required deal, something that would be pre-ordered and displayed in the front of Barnes & Noble. Dan Brown is right, but Almost Transparent Blue is a lot more like Bret Easton Ellis with Less Than Zero: published in college, launched the author to fame, a description of a certain decadent lifestyle and embraced by the youth experiencing it. Feels pure and fresh.

Disclaimer-- I haven't actually read Less than Zero.

Has anyone had issues with that jap lit dl link? I put them on my kindle but only a few books of the 20+ appear on it. and yes, i used the right format.

>>3706495
many of them were fan made, so your mileage may very

>>3706495
Did you convert them to a compatible format?

Also someone halp me pls
>>3706754

>>3704529
>>3704564
>>3705198
>>3706420
>>3706451
Thanks y'all, I think I'm going to start with Almost Transparent Blue if I can ever find a damn copy.

>>3706773

No I didnt, i just put the mobi version on my kindle. and like i said,.some work but most dont register on it. i got to read a mishima book (sailor) and it was excellent. I was really looking forward to reading others by him but they dont work. maybe its like the other anon said, fan made etc..

>>3706774
If you like Ryu Murakami, I recommend that Miyuki Miyabe, Kōbō Abe, Yumeno Kyūsaku, Ango Sakaguchi.

>>3707214
>Ango Sakaguchi.
Are any of his works available in print in english?

>>3706843
Can you name a book or two that didn't work?

Awhile back I transcribed a short story from a Japanese Lit magazine that I found at my local library here in Japan.

I finally decided to format it and make an epub:

http://pastebin.com/nBwDzK6k

>>3710230
It's called Fragments by Aoyama Nanae btw, and here is some info about the author:

Aoyama Nanae was born in Saitama in 1983 and graduated from Tsukuba University's school of Library and Information Science. She received the Bungei Prize in 2005 for "Window Light", which she wrote when she was a university student.

She won the Akutagawa Prize in 2007 for "Nice Weather for Being Alone". In 2009 she was given the Kawabata Prize for "Fragments". She is the youngest prize-winner of the Kawabata Literary Prize for highly refined short stories.

>>3708968
>>3708968

Uh, off the top of my head, The ones that worked for me were:

Murakami's Wind Up Bird Mishima, Yukio - The Sailor Who Fell From Grace With the Sea
Tsuitsui, Yasutaka - Salmonella Men on Planet Porno

Only those, and I really wanted to read a lot of those other books. Just to clarify again, im using a kindle and I did use the mobi version of the file.

>>3706761
>fan made
Most of them are actually retail copies (I should know, I provided some of them).

>>3706495
The collection is full of EPUB and PDF files. You will need to convert those to MOBI or AZW3 for your Kindle to properly recognize them. Just use Calibre.

If you still experience the same behavior, come back and be more specific ffs.

>>3710838

I was thinking about doing that, converting the epubs to mobi and seeing if those made them work. But just repeating again, like i said, i was using the correct format. im not near a computer at the moment, but ill do that. thanks for your help and the books.

>>3710646
I tried those books and it's not happening on my Kindle.

>>3711355

Not happening as in they actually worked on it? If so, I guess its something on my side..

>>3703412
haikus actually originated from linked-verse poetry
people (multiple people in the same poem, sometimes) would write dozens to hundreds of haiku-sized segments and link them together
eventually they started printing the initial segments of these poems in anthologies with the intention that readers would be able to compose their own poems following the initial segment and eventually the initial 3 lines became an entire artform

>Any good Japanese literature
*Many good Japanese literature: Shusaku Endo, Haruki Murakami, Ryu Murakami. Also all the oldfags but whatever.

>>3712458
>Haruki Murakami
>good

Ahahaha, no.

>>3712470
I thought Norwegian Wood was good. Especially as a diatribe of a generation whose works I despise.

>>3712470
Oxymoronically, although haruki Murakami is good at writing, all of his writing sucks. He's like a talented sculptor with no ideas worth actually carving.

>>3712510
Meh, he has one idea that he keeps repeating over and over. I enjoy Murakami, I don't know if I'd consider him "good literature."

The House of the Sleeping Beauties by Yasunari Kawabata

Yukio Mishima is probably also worth reading, though I've only read his short story "Patriotism", which is pretty good.

Naruto

>>3712866
If you can't enjoy naruto for what it is, you're a fag

>>3703326

Yes, absolutely, anything Tomishito Rectalune.

>>3713474
>>>/b/

First time posting on /lit and I don't know why, haha. But this interested me.

I lifted some books that my mom was gonna give away to the library, one of which caught my eye not necessarily because it was Japanese, but because the title and synopsis looked interesting. Kōbō Abe's "Woman in the Dunes." Anybody ever read it?

>>3713553
the movie is great

>>3711893
I'd love to do that online with a bunch of you, if I could write well.