The online poetry journal Big Bridge has in its May 2012 issue a special selection, edited by Jane Nakagawa-Joritz, of contemporary Japanese poetry.  Among them are a number of Japan’s most interesting, avant-garde poets.  Among them are two of expatriate poets living in Japan (Phillip Rowland and Jane Joritz-Nakagawa) and two Japanese poets (Yoko Danno and Goro Takano) who live in Japan but write and publish exclusively in English. 

Arai Takako 新井高子, trans. Jeffrey Angles
Danno Yōko 團野葉子
Sekiguchi Ryōko 関口涼子, trans. Eric Selland
Takagai Hiroya 高貝弘也, trans. Eric Selland
Takano Gorō 高野吾郎
Tanaka Atsusuke 田中宏輔, trans. Jeffrey Angles
Torii Shōzō 鳥居昌三, trans. Taylor Mignon
Tsukagoshi Yūka 塚越裕佳, trans. the author and Judy Halebsky
Philip Rowland
Jane Joritz-Nakagawa

Thanks to the folks at Big Bridge for bringing more work from Japan into English.

MIYAZAWA Kenji 宮沢賢治 (1896-1933)
“Strong in the Rain” 「雨ニモマケズ」

This poem is probably the most well known, most often memorized poem in contemporary Japan.  It was discovered in the notebook of the great and wildly imaginative poet and writer MIYAZAWA Kenji upon his death.  Although there are relatively few translations of his work into English, he is currently one of the most beloved authors of early twentieth-century Japan. 

Miyazawa was from Iwate 岩手, one of the regions most devastated by the March 11, 2011 earthquake.  This film was created after the earthquake as a way of encouraging Japan in its recovery.  Reading the poem is the actor WATANABE Ken 渡辺謙.  Although the Chinese viewer who added the translation did not acknowledge the translator in the film, this appears to be Rodger Pulver’s translation. 

In celebration of National Poetry Month 2012

TANAKA Atsusuke 田中宏輔 is a Japanese poet, born and raised in the ancient capital of Kyoto, where he still lives and works as a high school mathematics teacher.  Tanaka has published seven volumes of poetry in Japanese, including an ongoing experimental series of postmodern poems called The Wasteless Land, which draws inspiration and quotations from wide array of sources ranging from pop music to classical Western and Japanese literature.

Sadness


1/2 + 1/4 + 1/8 + 1/16 + 1/32 + 1/64 + …… ＝ 1 

1 ＝ 1/2 + 1/4 + 1/8 + 1/16 + 1/32 + 1/64 + …… 

1/2 + 1/4 + 1/8 + 1/16 + 1/32 + 1/64 + …… ＝ 1 

1 ＝ 1/2 + 1/4 + 1/8 + 1/16 + 1/32 + 1/64 + …… 

Half+half of a half+half of a half of a half+half of a half of a half of a half+…… ＝1 

1＝half+half of a half+half of a half of a half+half of a half of a half of a half+……
Half+half of a half+half of a half of a half+half of a half of a half of a half+…… ＝1 

1＝half+half of a half+half of a half of a half+half of a half of a half of a half+……
Therefore, take half of sadness and treat it not as sadness.

Treat the half of the sadness that remains as something else.  

The half of the half of the sadness that remains is something else yet again.
Repeat this, and sadness becomes something else again, ad infinitum.

Yet even so, the thing that remains is the same as at the start,

The same single sadness from which it all began.

        — Translation by Jeffrey Angles

        Published in Inventory, No. 2 (2011)

悲しみ



1/2 + 1/4 + 1/8 + 1/16 + 1/32 + 1/64 + …… ＝ 1 

1 ＝ 1/2 + 1/4 + 1/8 + 1/16 + 1/32 + 1/64 + …… 

1/2 + 1/4 + 1/8 + 1/16 + 1/32 + 1/64 + …… ＝ 1
１ ＝ 1/2 + 1/4 + 1/8 + 1/16 + 1/32 + 1/64 + ……
半分+半分の半分+半分の半分の半分+半分の半分の半分の半分+…… ＝ １ 

１＝半分+半分の半分+半分の半分の半分+半分の半分の半分の半分+…… 

半分+半分の半分+半分の半分の半分+半分の半分の半分の半分+…… ＝ １ 

１＝半分+半分の半分+半分の半分の半分+半分の半分の半分の半分+…… 

だから、悲しみの半分を悲しみではないものにする。 

残った半分の悲しみの半分をほかのものにする。

さらに残った半分の半分の悲しみの半分をほかのものにする。 

これを繰り返して、悲しみを限りなくほかのものにする。 

それなのに、残ったものは、最初にあったものと同じもの、 

同じひとつの悲しみであった。

      「The Wastleless Land VI」(2011)より

In celebration of National Poetry Month 2012

The newest issue of Asymptote, one of the very best and innovative online journals of international fiction, includes an excerpt from my translation of TAKAHASHI Mutsuo’s memoirs Twelve Views from the Distance. Takahashi is one of Japan’s most prominent poets, known for his bold explorations of homoeroticism as well as for his philosophical and erudite writing. 

Asymptote includes an English translation, the original text, and an MP3 of a reading of the text in the original language.  The reading in this issue is by OKAMOTO Sayuri, one of the editors, and with her quiet, intimate voice, she brings the original Japanese alive in a beautiful way. 

The entire book is scheduled to be published in fall 2012 by University of Minnesota Press. The illustration above is by Hugo Muecke.

In honor of National Poetry Month 2012

TANAKA Yōsuke (1969- ) is a research scientist specializing in molecular cell biology at the University of Tokyo.  He is also the author of two books of poetry, A Day When the Mountains are Visible 『山が見える日に、』 (1999) and Sweet Ultramarine Dreams 『スウィートな群青の夢』(2008), which display an unique poetic voice, rich in stylistic diversity, humor, and poetic resonance.  YOTSUMOTO Yasuhiro wrote on Poetry International Web, that Tanaka “casually introduces elements from the past or from other poetic forms such as tanka, combining them with a 21st-century sensitivity to create something extraordinary which is simultaneously old and new, traditional and experimental, lyrical and critical.”

The Station to Spring

I screw up my face against the oncoming wind
Which carries my feet to the left and the right
I climb the slopes to the plateau
Just barely managing to hold back
Everything brimming inside me

I had been dreaming of a partially underground movie theater
Swallowing the audience members like a rectangular mouth
Feathers sprouting from an elevator car
And scattering like dandelions in April

A warm café, I hope for
A café on this street
On the rocks, sir?
A deep sleep.

In the darkness
The orange juice glows.
It seems to shine from within.
The station to spring is near.

——Translation by Jeffrey Angles, reprinted from Poetry International Web 

春の駅

顔がくしゃくしゃになる逆風に
右へ左へと足を取られながら
台地の坂を上がる
内面があふれ出しそうなのを
ようやく圧しとどめて

四角い口のように観客を呑み込んでいく
半地下の映画館
エレベータに羽が生え
四月のタンポポのように飛ぶ夢だった

あたたかなカフェあれ、この
道ばたに一軒のカフェあれかしと願う
ロックでいいですか？
深く眠る。

闇のなかで
オレンジジュースが光る。
自分から光っているように感じられる。
春の駅は近い。

 ――『スウィートな群青の夢』(2008年未知谷)

In celebration of National Poetry Month 2012

新井高子「月が昇と」と「Wheels」
ARAI Takako reading “When the Moon Rises” and “Wheels”
第２回東京ポエトリーフェスティバルでの朗読
2nd Tokyo Poetry Festival

ARAI Takako was born in 1966 in Kiryū City, Gunma Prefecture (Japan) to a family engaged in textile manufacturing, a traditional industry in Kiryū. Her second collection, Tamashii Dance (Soul Dance) was published in 2007 and awarded the 41st Oguma Hideo Prize. Many of the poems in this collection describe the continuing economic troubles in her hometown. She is currently working on a collection of poems documenting the lives of the young women who worked in her father’s factory.

This poem appears in the book Soul Dance: Selected Poems of Takako Arai, translated Jeffrey Angles, Sawako Nakayasu, and You Nakai (Mi’Te Press, 2008).

In honor of National Poetry Month

『三月は毛糸でできていた』震災文学集（英訳）

One year after the March 11, 2011 earthquake that destroyed much of northeastern Japan, editors David Karashima and Elmer Luke have put together a stunning collection of translations of fiction, poetry, and reflections on the earthquake, tsunami, and nuclear meltdown.  Included in here are pieces by many of Japan’s most important authors, including TAWADA Yōko 多和田葉子, KAWAKAMI Hiromi 川上弘美, IKEZAWA Natsuki 池沢夏樹, KAKUTA Mitsuyo 角田光代, and many others.  There is even one short, surreal manga, and some poetry by TANIKAWA Shuntarō 谷川俊太郎, whom some people have called the “national poet” (国民の詩人) and American poet J.D. McClatchy. 

I received a copy of this collection last week, and within a day, I eagerly devoured most of the pieces in here.  3.11 wrought almost unimaginable devastation, leaving many voiceless, unsure about how language could address the huge gaping hole, the huge rubble of meaning left in language and in the nation.  “How,” I remember Takahashi Mutsuo asking, “can we write after this disaster?  Nothing seems big or strong enough to deal with destruction on this scale.”  Everything, even language, was thrown into doubt; however, this collection shows the many diverse ways in which writers all over Japan (and even abroad) dealt with this crisis of representation.  As we well, the crisis forced these writers forward, compelling them to address the cries of anguish, fear, and anxiety about the future. 

Here are the reflections of TANIKAWA Shuntarō 谷川俊太郎, the poet who opens the collection. (This translation was my small contribution to the project.) 

一九〇四年に永井荷風が滞在した下宿先（米国ミシガン州カラマズー市）
Home in Kalamazoo, Michigan where NAGAI Kafū lived in 1904

Kalamazoo College just published an excellent article about the time that the famous Japanese writer NAGAI Kafū 永井荷風 spent in Kalamazoo in 1904 and 1905.

As Margaret DeRitter writes in this article, we at Western Michigan Univerisity’s Soga Japan Center are working to get a Michigan state historical marker placed in front of the house at 127 Elm Street, Kalamazoo, MI where he once lived.  It was there that he wrote the story “Atop the Hill”「岡の上」 included in his book American Stories 『あめりか物語』, soon after arriving in Kalamazoo in 1904.  (An English translation of this book was published in the year 2000.)

For a copy of a long article in Japanese about Kafū’s stay in Kalamazoo and Kalamazoo’s interest in Japan during that time, click here.  This article was first published in Mita bungaku 『三田文学』in 2006.

Voyager Japan releases 4,000 Japanese eBooks on Internet Archive

Voyager Japan, Inc. in Tokyo, Japan, in conjunction with the Internet Archive in San Francisco, California, has released 4,000 Japanese ebooks in PDF format from Japan’s public domain book archive, Aozora Bunko. Aozora Bunko, or “Blue Sky Library,” advocates for the increased availability of free Japanese literature online and is known as Japan’s Project Gutenberg. The complete Aozora Bunko contains more than 10,000 public domain books and short stories.

Readers can search for books in either Japanese or English at the Internet Archive’s Open Library (http://openlibrary.org/) website, making them more accessible to students of the Japanese language. PDF ebooks can be viewed on computers, tablets, and smartphones using freely available reader software, or directly in the browser at the Open Library web site. EPUB3 files will be available in 2012. Over the next year, Voyager Japan and the Internet Archive will work to expand the total number of Aozora Bunko titles available. General information on the collection is available at the Internet Archive (http://www.archive.org/details/aozorabunko).

The titles include famous Japanese authors such as Natsume Sōseki, Mori Ōgai, Akutagawa Ryūnosuke, and Dazai Osamu, as well as one of the most famous Japanese novels, The Tale of Genji by Murasaki Shikibu. In addition, the collection includes books by Unno Jūza, the father of Japanese science fiction; writings from the writer/physicist Terada Torahiko; and western masters in translation such as Edgar Allan Poe, Charles Dickens, and Jonathan Swift.

The Internet Archive makes available a public XML catalog of all the Aozora Bunko titles using Open Publication Distribution System (OPDS: http://opds-spec.org). OPDS is an open data format that can be imported by multi-platform reading applications including Aldiko, Bluefire Reader, and Mantano, among others. The XML catalog is located at http://bit.ly/sq1cEX.

For more information, contact Peter Brantley, Director of the BookServer Project, Internet Archive, peter@archive.org.

Western Michigan University just published this little article about me, including in it several photographs of me as a fifteen-year old in Japan in 1987.  

Some of the other photos show me with the prominent poets ITŌ Hiromi 伊藤比呂美 and TAKAHASHI Mutsuo 高橋睦郎. Click here for the article and more embarrassing photos.

The exciting book My Mother She Killed Me, My Father He Ate Me: Forty New Fairy Tales, edited by Kate Bernheimer just won a 2011 World Fantasy Award for best anthology. This collection contains lots of creative and imaginative re-tellings on traditional fairy tales.  Among them is my translation of ITŌ Hiromi’s 伊藤比呂美 “I Am Anjuhimeko” 「わたしはあんじゅひめ子である」, a radical feminist re-writing of the famous medieval Japanese tale of Sanshō the Bailiff (Sanshō Dayū 山椒大夫).  Also check out the foreword by Gregory Maguire,  the author of Wicked and Son of a Witch, in which Maguire talks about the unique pleasure that fairy tales can bring.  For a list of award winners, see this page. 

A big section from the introduction of my book Writing the Love of Boys, about the ways that a key group of early twentieth-century Japanese authors helped re-invent the language used in Japan to talk about love between men, is on Google Books. 

The beautiful cover image is a painting called “Portrait of Two Boys” 二人少年図 painted in 1914 by the painter and poet MURAYAMA Kaita 村山槐多, one of the major figures that I talk about in this book.  Other figures that feature heavily in this book are the mystery writer EDOGAWA Ranpo 江戸川乱歩 and the modernist innovator INAGAKI Taruho　稲垣足穂. 

Also, click here to see the book on amazon.com. 

BBC News writes, “At midnight in London, and the same time next week in America, bookshops will open their doors to sell Haruki Murakami’s latest novel to eager fans. This is not Harry Potter, it’s a 1,600-page translation from Japanese. So why the excitement?”  Click here to find out.