Reading {J}ournal—on Japanese Short Stories—2: Reflect

An autoethnographic look into my previous experience with Japanese literature–Kitchen, Socrates in Love, Norwegian Wood

Warning: Some spoilers ahead (Kitchen—Banana Yoshimoto, Norwegian Wood—Haruki Murakami, Socrates in Love—Kyoichi Katayama)

Analyticality

In my most recent post, I went down a nostalgic memory lane of experiences with Japanese literature, setting up a background for my upcoming Digital Artefact* on Japanese short stories and the culture’s reflection between the lines—the stories are like age rings of a tree, looking at which one can observe the subtle changes in history and culture, especially among the commoners. Now that I have had some time to distance myself from my writing, it is only apt that I practise looking at that narrative with some objectivity, dissecting the emotional with more logic to bring out an autoethnographic aspect. Continue reading “Reading {J}ournal—on Japanese Short Stories—2: Reflect”

Reading {J}ournal—on Japanese Short Stories—1: Rewind

On the memories of the Japanese fiction books I have had my nose stuck in so far and my upcoming autoethnographic journey into Japanese short stories

Here’s to all the memories of the very few Japanese fiction books I have had my nose stuck in so far and my upcoming autoethnographic journey into Japanese short stories.

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From my love of reading

kitchen
Kitchen book cover (n.d.)

I first picked up a copy of Kitchen by Banana Yoshimoto eight years ago, when I was bored out of my wits at a sleepover at my cousins’. I barely remember the details of that story now—other than that it is a short window into the life of a make-shift family of a young orphan, her friend and his transgender mother—but the afterward melancholic feeling and indescribable thoughts, so alien to a thirteen-year-old back then, still surface so vividly at any sight of the book cover.

Continue reading “Reading {J}ournal—on Japanese Short Stories—1: Rewind”

On ‘Akira’ (1988)—The Beginning of the End

My take on the 1988 anime Akira.

The 1988 anime Akira has officially topped my list of hardest-to-watch films, packing millions of details in both the graphics and the content of each sequence, in the span of more than two hours. Admittedly, I yawned rather widely during the middle part, since it started to drag on and became too slippery (plus excessively violent) for my attention to grab on. Continue reading “On ‘Akira’ (1988)—The Beginning of the End”

#BCM325 Live-Tweeting a.k.a. the (Joyful) Trials and Tribulations of Multitasking

A reflection on my live-tweeting of our weekly BCM325 screenings. Warning: Spoilers.

*Spoilers ahead; you might not want to read this post if you have yet to watch one of the following films: Ghost in the Shell (1995), WestWorld (1973), The Matrix (1999), Be Right Back (Black Mirror S2E1, 2013), Robot & Frank (2012), Hated in the Nation (Black Mirror S3E6, 2016).

This session, I have sailed (waddled, more like) into uncharted waters, thanks to BCM325’s live-Tweeting requirement. Throughout the first eight weeks of this subject, Future Cultures, eight films were screened and analysed/commented on in real time by us students. Continue reading “#BCM325 Live-Tweeting a.k.a. the (Joyful) Trials and Tribulations of Multitasking”