owlectomy: A squashed panda sewing a squashed panda (Default)
[personal profile] owlectomy
Mishima Yukio is such a slog to get through. I bought this book, ah, 3 years ago, and I'm on page 30something. The man's vocabulary! Well, I am reading it precisely to improve my vocabulary, but it's irritating all the same.

Truth is, it's kind of hard to keep my Japanese from getting rusty when I have no interest in Japanese politics and get so annoyed with much Japanese literature that it makes me want to kill something. I don't like Mori Ogai, and I don't like Soseki, and--what can I expect when the first thing I ever wanted to read in Japanese was a Sailor Moon manga?

Some of the monogatari I had to read were kind of fun, but I'm not sure I can cope with Classical Japanese again.

It hit me suddenly today that the reason I don't write with as much élan and shameless fun as I used to is that I've told or outgrown my shameless id-stories. It was like I was dressing up dolls and playing with them before--my characters and ideas were things that existed in my head as absolute, unchangeable archetypes. And now I have to build my dolls and their clothes from scratch, and it's hard. No wonder it's not as fun and easy as it was before. But this means I can stop worrying about what's wrong with me, that I don't have as much enthusiasm anymore.

(no subject)

27/9/05 10:55 (UTC)
Posted by [identity profile] flemmings.livejournal.com
If it helps to know, Seidensticker used to curse Mishima's vocabulary too. He was translating Sea of Fertility in tandem with Genji, and complained that Murasaki was the clearer writer. Mishima just loved him some obscure kanji. As one who only sees them in manga set in China fluff, you have my sympathy.

(no subject)

27/9/05 19:28 (UTC)
Posted by [identity profile] takumashii.livejournal.com
Heh! That does help, yes.

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owlectomy: A squashed panda sewing a squashed panda (Default)
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