/lit/ - Literature

Dunno can't read Japanese

>>9053739
this

>>9053732
I haven't read much, just a few books by Akutagawa, Mishima, Kawabata, Abe, and also some poetry. What really put me off was their unhealthy obsession about sensuality and sadness. My theory is that, by simulating strong human emotions in their literature, the japs try to make up for the fact that they, being the soulless drones they are, actually have no feelings or empathy.

>>9053751

Yeah pretty much. Sad really. Many such cases!

>>9053751
Probably.

No wonder they have such a high suicide rate. They keep becoming self aware.

>>9053751

mean

>>9053732
10/10 comics, 2/10 prose novels, 6/10 poetry.

>>9053774
>prose
>2/10
>implying you can even read the language
Stick to Berserk

sōseki

dazai

>>9053732

Their Catholic literature is better than their Shinto literature.

>>9053809
>shinto literature

you havent read any jap lit have you you memelord

>>9053809
Well that goes without saying

Nothing just that Morimi Tomihiko is the Pynchon of jap lit

i like tanizaki and dazai. wasn't that into murakami, and i need to check out other classics, but tanizaki is pretty good.

>>9053739
/thread

Akutagava was cool in my opinion.
LOGH was pretty good too.

The japanese are creative but often lack the quality in the execution.

>>9053965
But I can

>>9053990
>judges the entire body of Japanese literature based on one autistic space opera and another who literally only writes short stories

just

I enjoy the stories themselves but the writing is pretty bad.

>>9053732
I use to fuck it in the asshole every weekend

>dude magical realism
>dude japanese food

That's what I've gathered but I've only read like 3 Japanese authors.

>>9053751
they are like aliens imitating real humans

>>9053732
All of the Japanese literature I've read is deeply melancholy. And the mundane is often described very poetically, elevating it such that it no longer seems dull and ordinary but new, essential and sometimes even mysterious. I suppose that's Buddhism's influence.

>>9053732
Poor really. Haven't read anything that I really liked.

>>9054182
Explains why Ozu is the only highly regarded director whose work I can't get into. Melancholy alienates me.

Why do so many Japanese 20th century authors commit suicide, /lit/? Weren't they all womanizers from wealthy families? I don't get it,desu.

>>9054237
>womanizers
Have you seen japanese women?

>>9054281
I watched almost all Anri Okita JAV if that counts.

Well this thread tells me no one has actually read Japanese literature on /lit/

Why are you guys such posers?

Loved everything I've read, save for IQ84, which was still better than I was expecting.

I finished The Master of Go last week and I strongly recommend it, btw, very touching book and extremely insightful on japanese traditions.

>>9054322
It doesn't. A few porn starlets specifically selected out of tens of thousands Japanese women are not representative of the entire female population, you know.

>>9054414
Give counterexamples that prove Japanese literature is something more than endless emotional masturbation about the same things over and over again.

>>9053732
As a man who has read Soseki's Kokoro, Mishima's Confessions and Sailor and Dazai's No Longer Human, I can say this with confidence: It's all shit the chinese are better go read Dream of the Red Chamber.

>>9053732
i like it

>>9054442
>what is the burden of proof?

>>9054539
>What is appeal to authority?

Pretty good

If I could teach a course of comparative literature at my local university, it would probably be Japanese literature. I think there is something particularly fascinating about the sense of loss in Meiji era and Postwar Japan that doesn't pervade quite as strongly elsewhere in the world, only because Japan was forced to take such a rapid track to Westernization. There is a deep feeling explored that there is in that Westernization a loss of identity, especially in Soseki, in Ogai, and later in Mishima, Dazai, and Kawabata.

Abe doesn't really fit into that mold, but Kangaroo Notebook is probably the funniest thing I've ever read.

High, because of the emphasis on beauty and sadness. (Related: guess who my favourite Japanese writer is).

>>9054708
are you familiar with literature pre-Meiji era?
I'm always looking for good translations of medieval-era poetry that can capture that Buddhist feel in english, but as evidenced by this thread nobody knows what they're talking about

>>9054750
Not as familiar as I'd like to be. If threads weren't as transient as they are, I would be able to hook you up by next week (I think there is a professor in the Japanese department who teaches an entire course on the Japanese novel), but alas.

>>9054322
>I watched almost all Anri Okita JAV if that counts.
w-which one you recommend?

>>9054804
give him your email

>>9054808
I don't think there's any way for me to do that anonymously, and giving my personal email out on 4chan sounds like a beacon to get spammed with DFW faces, or worse.

>>9054805
pppd-451
pppd-288
mide-225
mide-186
mird-150 (threesome with Hitomi Tanaka)

>>9054813
Then give him your non personal email and send him your real email from there

This isnt rocket science

Besides nobody cares enough to spam you. I've given my email out plenty of times

このスレに、誰か日本語を読める?

>>9053732
Japanese is flat and dull, and literally doesn't have room for good prose.
Take Murakami, for example. In the west, he is hailed for short and concise -yet deep- prose. However, his writing is standard plain nippongo, and translated into English with heaps of fluff and advanced expressions.

t. Anon who wasted his youth learning moonrunes

>>9053739
I can, its pretty good. Fuck Murakami though.

>>9055760
you know murakami isnt considered japanese literature right?

>>9055798
>Japanese writer writing in Japanese and internationally acclaimed as the best Japanese contemporary author is not considered Japanese writer
whew, lad

>>9054804
>>9054808
or just make a new thread about it when you get the chance, I'm sure I'll still be browsing 4chan in a week (as depressing as that sounds)

>>9054237
suicide is big in japan

clearly anime is the lifeblood of japanese creative culture

What do you think about Kenji Siratori, buddies?

>>9055835
I think that japs are incapable of pronouncing the syllable 'si', so he can't possibly be named Siratori.

>>9053732 (OP)

I dedicated the previous year of my life to reading Japanese literature, gotta say it's really worth it once you get beyond the surface.

See, the problem is plebs like praising Dazai, Mishima and the like for their "sensual, reflective & oh-so-deep" style while their prose basically holds no value for a modern western reader. If people were more honest with themselves, bright and talented authors like Mariko Koike or Miyuki Miyabe would be considered representatives of Japanese literature instead of that bunch of pretentious, depressed edgelords mistakenly thought of as "classics".

>>9053732
>What is your impression of Japanese literature?
It ras best of timesu, it was wust of timesu

>>9053732
Sentimental, immature, young adult.

>>9055805

he's completely divorced from the Japanese literary tradition and is frequently ignored by the japanese literary establishment. he's japanese literally by ethnicity only, he's an american author who happens to have a Japanese name.

Haven't read too much - probably a similar amount to most posters here (Murakami, Mishima, Soseki) but I like the more explicit discussion on principles and values. But I guess those are just the ones that get popular in the West since they're so explicitly 'Japanese'. Hmm.

>>9053751
I don't think that they're soulless, per se, I think there's a limit to what the language itself can express. They've basically lived on top of eachother for their entire history. As the saying goes, good fences make good neighbors, and I think they made up for it in their language which does a pretty good job of making clear relationship distinctions.

>>9055548
>>9054697

>>9053732
The only thing I've read from the gooks was NHK.
I think NHK should have been retitled My Diary DESU. It's barely even a novel, it's like a long confession.

What should I read next? I wanna start scratching the surface.

>>9055854
Kunrei-shiki romanization is much more common in Japan than Hepburn romanization, which is far more popular in the west. Which is a shame, because kunrei-shiki is fucking awful to look at.