かがみの孤城 Week 2

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Week 2

Start date: November 13th
End page (bunko): 66
End percentage (bunko): 16
End phrase: この子たち、みんな、こころと同じで学校に行っていないのだ。
Last week
Next week

End page may be a bit off. Look for a “flower” break.

Discussion Rules

  • Please use spoiler tags for major events in the current chapter and any content in future chapters.
  • When asking for help, please mention the page number. If you are reading the ebook version mention the percentage.
  • Don’t be afraid of asking questions, even if they seem embarrassing at first. All of us are here to learn.
  • To you lurkers out there: Join the conversation, it’s fun! :durtle:

Read Aloud

We will be reading on Sundays at 10:30PM Japan time (reading the previous week’s content). Here is the time in your local time zone:

2021-11-21T13:30:00Z

Participants

Mark your participation status by voting in this poll.

  • I’m reading along
  • I already finished this chapter
  • I’m still reading the book but I haven’t reached this chapter yet
  • I’m no longer reading the book

0 voters

3 Likes

Currently up to about 11% - to be more precise: Kokoro just went to a world inside her mirror and has now exited and is staring at the mirror wondering what just happened. I feel like so far in this block of reading there’s been less sentences that have just completely stumped me so that’s a good sign. Still have a couple of questions though:

8%

「学校を休むようになって少しして…」
I’m not sure about the 少しして here - what is the する for?

9%

「…ピアノの発表会か、誰かの結婚式ででも着るような…」
So here the bit I’m wondering about is the でも - is this the “or something” kind of でも? It just caught me a little off-guard coming after another で

10%

「混乱が増しながらも、頭が徐々に冷静になってしまうのが怖った」
So with this one I’m just not sure what it’s saying overall and feel like I’m missing something

“While her confusion increased, her head gradually ending up becoming composed was scary”? I’m not sure how to make sense of it

4 Likes
8%

I think of it just as saying a little time has passed. Working backwards from that understanding, I think it’s definition 10 of する on jisho.


I tihnk your understanding of the 9% question is correct.


10%

I’m not too sure on this part either, but maybe it’s not her becoming composed that’s scary, but the things she’s realizing once composed (the following sentence, saying that it’s not a dream, etc.) that’s scary. Like I said, I’m not sure though.

7 Likes
I don't have a useful percentage marker to give, but I have a question on the line starting with 「つかまった」.

This follows right after the wolf-mask girl grabs onto Kokoro, and 「タックルしてくる。」

The line I’m stuck on:

「つかまった(はず)みに、エメラルド色の床に、顔からびたん、と転ぶ。」

Is this line telling the result of the wolf-mask girl tackling Kokoro, that Kokoro falls and hits her face on the ground? Or am I clearly missing something and misinterpreting?

I’ve never (knowingly) seen 弾む before, so I’m not familiar with its usage, which makes it more difficult for me to get a sense of its part in this sentence.

5 Likes

For people with a physical copy, page numbers as follows for VikingSchism’s questions above:
8% = p.38
9% = p.42
10% = p.45
and ChristopherFritz’ question is on p.44

6 Likes

I gathered that this meant that Kokoro was afraid she will gradually get used to an increasingly crazy situation-- and not take it seriously, I suppose. She follows this up by taking about how it’s clearly NOT a dream, after all.
しまうis nonpast tense, so it’s not something she’s already done, it’s something she will do

7 Likes

Also! A clue into the great 気がする debate from week one appears on page 57:

ただそれだけのことに、こころはあわてて、見てはいけないものを見たような気がして顔を伏せた。

Clearly, this is Kokoro’s impressions of her own (somewhat mysterious) feelings. So, perhaps the author uses 気がする in a somewhat idiosyncratic way.

4 Likes

はずみに has a similar meaning as 途端に

This is the definition that my J-J dictionary spat out

(4)何かをしたその拍子。その途端。「滑った―に足首をひねる」

and here is a site explaining this point in more detail

5 Likes

I don’t think it’s idiosyncratic so much as just another possible usage. It didn’t strike me as odd until it was brought up last week, so it probably wasn’t the first time I saw it used that way.

But yes, I think we can be sure ころろ isn’t too sure about what’s going on in her heart. :upside_down_face:

Sorry.

5 Likes

Aha, so it goes with the “Japanese to English dictionary” word/meaning “moment”. This makes sense at least for the first two words of the sentence now.

It looks like this specific usage only comes up once in the book, so I won’t worry about committing it to memory, but it gives me a new outlook on how to potentially look up grammar in a certain situation.

4 Likes

i’m sorry i don’t have a page number or useful percentage, but my question is for a sentence near the point where the girl with the wolf mask is trying to convince her to stay

Summary

「願いがかなうんだぞ! 平凡なお前の願いをなんでも一つ叶えてやるっつってんだ! 話、聞け!」

っつってんだ!

what’s up with this? i was thinking it’s one of the verbs written as つる, but which one is it and how does it change the sentence?

4 Likes

願いを叶えてやると言っているんだ => 願いを叶えてやるっつってんだ

Very casual way of saying, usually indicates that the speaker is annoyed.

10 Likes

oh that makes so much more sense, thank you

3 Likes

Just finished the reading for this week. That was a fun chunk of reading - excited to see where it goes from here. Wonder what inevitable double-crossing and betrayal will start going on during the search for the key. And what challenges will need to be faced within the castle

I didn’t come up with any more questions to ask either. Well, I did have one, but on reading the sentence again I got it so I’m happy with that

7 Likes

As I read, me still being fairly new to reading these newfangled “books without pictures” that are all the rage these days, sometimes I’m surprised at how quickly I reach my daily reading quota. And other days I feel like I’m making good progress, until to find I’m behind quota, and on the verge of falling behind for the week. I do seem to be keeping up overall though, and I project to finish this week’s reading on time.

Working my way through, it’s been interesting to see what was added into the manga adaptation. From having read the first chapter of the manga already, I have an idea of what to expect, but then there keep being little things here and there that I expect, but they don’t happen (because they were done only in the manga).

For example, about halfway through this week’s reading, when Kokoro is about to go through the mirror again, she decides to take something with her, just in case:

Manga image

12 Likes

Just finished this week’s reading as well. What an exciting week! Thing’s are way faster-paced than i expected. I can’t seem to put the book down, which is frustrating because I end up finishing in one sitting and having to wait a week to read more.

Here’s a discussion question: What do you think about the way the parents are handling the situation?

They seem supportive and empathetic but I can’t help but think there may be a better way to handle it. There’s an implied aloofness that seems to stem from the fact that they’re both working, but I can’t criticize them for that. Perhaps it’s more of a lack of communication–they clearly care deeply about Kokoro, but this seems to manifest itself as seeking external help and talking with the school and teachers. There’s yet to be a scene where they speak genuinely to Kokoro and attempt to get her to open up about her anxieties and feelings. Instead of letting Kokoro tell them how she feels, they ascribe thoughts and feelings to her, such as “I thought you said you liked the school”, or “don’t you remember when you would only eat the gyouza skins?”

7 Likes

I think it became clear this week that they don’t really understand or pay attention to how Kokoro really feels (in the scene with the Gyoza skins) and Kokoro obviously didn’t tell them about 「あれ」(right?). Last week gave me the impression that everyone (parents and teachers) is handling the situation too ‘softly’. Why do they let Kokoro’s behaviour slide (which even Kokoro herself is surprised about)? Probably because they want to avoid being confronted with the actual truth. Hiding their head in the sand of daily life. Anyway, that’s how I feel, maybe I’m wrong, maybe I’m being too hard on them.

5 Likes
Summary

I’m sure they’re quite out of their comfort zone with this. I agree that it would be nice if we saw some of that, but I feel like there’s a lot we may have missed, as well, in the year not told.

Maybe we’ll see some of that in future flashbacks?

The frustration the mother showed in the first chapter feels like something that built up over time. She doesn’t know how to deal with a こころ who won’t talk to her. (We saw how difficult it was for her to say anything in the face of imagined or real conflict out of fear of disappointing her mother more.)

And sure, maybe they’re being too soft, but it can probably be argued that they’re afraid of being too hard and alienating her from them, making her even more closed off. I feel like things like this get even less coverage in Japan than they do here. The school is probably the most helpful thing they have found so far. They must be feeling very helpless.

Anyway, I agree that there’s more that could be done. But I don’t think that means that the parents of teacher are bad people, they simply don’t know how to handle this situation any better, and they’re not getting much if any help with this.

9 Likes

Yes, agreed! They’re not bad people and I think the book does a good job so far to show how hard such a situation can be. I shouldn’t forget that it is very very hard to deal with a child (or anyone for that matter) who refuses to talk about what is going on. I’m sure we’re going to learn a lot more about what happened before and about what is going on under the surface. And I assume all the other kids will have their own difficult situations. So much book still to go!

4 Likes

It’s been like a month though, right? Book starts in May. Japanese school year starts in April.

4 Likes