Everybody should feel free to post and ask questions–it’s what makes book clubs fun! But please do not post until you are familiar with Spoiler Courtesy!
Spoiler Courtesy
Please follow these rules to avoid inadvertent ネタバレ. If you’re unsure whether something should have a spoiler tag, err on the side of using one.
Any potential spoiler for the current week’s reading need only be covered by a spoiler tag. Predictions and conjecture made by somebody who has not read ahead still falls into this category.
Any potential spoilers for external sources need to be covered by a spoiler tag and include a label (outside of the spoiler tag) of what might be spoiled. These include but are not limited to: other book club picks, other books, games, movies, anime, etc. I recommend also tagging the severity of the spoiler (for example, I may still look at minor spoilers for something that I don’t intend to read soon).
Any information from later in the book than the current week’s reading (including trigger warnings that haven’t yet manifested) needs to be hidden by spoiler tags and labeled as coming from later sections.
Instructions for Spoiler Tags
Click the cog above the text box and use either the “Hide Details” or “Blur Spoiler” options. The text which says “This text will be hidden” should be replaced with what you are wishing to write. In the case of “Hide Details”, the section in the brackets that is labelled “Summary” can be replaced with whatever you like also (i.e, [details=”Chapter 1, Pg. 1”]).
Hide Details results in the dropdown box like below:
Example
This is an example of the “Hide Details” option.
The “Blur Spoiler” option will simply blur the text it surrounds.
This is an example of the “Blur Spoiler” option.
Posting Advice
When asking for help, please mention the page number, and check before posting that your question hasn’t already been asked. As the threads get longer, it becomes more convenient to use the Search function, which is located in the upper right corner of the forum. It is the magnifying glass which is near your profile picture! The best way to search is usually to type part of the sentence you are confused about, and select “in this topic”. This will show you all posts within the current thread which has that string of text.
Be sure to join the conversation! It’s fun, and it’s what keeps these book clubs lively! There’s no such thing as a stupid question! We are all learning here, and if the question has crossed your mind, there’s a very good chance it has crossed somebody else’s also! Asking and answering questions is a great learning opportunity for everyone involved, so never hesitate to do so!
Participation
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Note that (as with all the extracts and discussion sections for novels in part III) they may contain spoilers for the full novel, so if there are any novels here where you care about that, you might wish to skip over or wait for another reader to let you know how significant the spoilers seem to be.
I’m happy we’re finally getting to the 実践 section.
That said, having not read any 漱石 before, it was a bit weird to jump right into a random middle part. That added onto the feeling of a textbook exercise, somehow, haha. I never much liked the analysis part of language studies back then… I can do it when I need to, but it was never as much fun taking apart a text as simply reading it.
I’m not sure there’s so much benefit when you’re just reading for yourself but I agree it makes sharing about it easier, like the author previously mentioned. I’ve been reading more reviews on bookmeter since we starting this book and noticed that they do seem to employ quite a few of those ‘techniques’, if you will. They mention themes, pick out a sentece that resonated with them, stuff like that. (Not all of them, of course, but it’s not rare.)
Compared to that, I feel like my reviews are mostly quite vague: it made me feel xyz; it felt like this or that; I liked it (or not).
So for review writing at least, these techniques seem really useful.
Weirdly enough although I usually detest them, I didn’t mind the spoilers so much here. They seem pretty major though, haha. Maybe because I’m in a sort of ‘study mode’ when I read this book? It feels almost disconnected from my normal reading. And I am still planning to read some 漱石, maybe more so than before. This excerpt at least was very readable.
Yeah, I think the author here is definitely assuming a Japanese audience who’s studied the book already; as a standalone excerpt I’m not so sure what to make of it. I did an initial read through of it and want to read it again before moving on to the author’s analysis.
I liked 三四郎 | L40 and it is also readable like this. Don’t start with 吾輩は猫である | L48 , because it is definitely not…
That might be a good strategy.
I let it set a bit and then went right on into the analysis, then doing a re-read a bit after that. But I think I’ll adopt your strategy on the next one.
Noted! That’s the only one I own physically, but I’ll resist! I’ll try to pick up a copy of こころ and 三四郎 when I’m in Japan again.
Out of curiosity I checked next week’s text (the 森鷗外 one - I’ve read it before so it was safe to check for me) and that section is also jumping right to the meat of the story, which is also a major spoiler as basically the whole story running up to that bit is just about wondering what happened before the story starts - and the section quoted here explains that. Now this story is only 17 pages in total iirc, so I can recommend reading the full text if you care about the story. The text is very approachable despite its age. You can find it here on Aozora: 森鴎外 高瀬舟
Having gotten that far, I also checked 蛇にピアス and there it’s the same - also a major spoiler part right towards the end of the book…
The part where Hirano talks about differences between generations reminded me of an old academic paper I read earlier this year titled “Generational Conflict After the Russo-Japanese War” (originally published in Japanese as 日露戦争後における新しい世代の成長, but I read it in translation). That paper argues that the period between the end of the Russo-Japanese War in 1905 and the start of WW1 in 1914 saw a big change in how young people viewed the world and their place in it compared to their parents’ generation (as evidenced by a big upswelling of “opinion leaders” criticising the “youth of today” in particular ways). こころ was written in 1914 and I think you can see the difference between the protagonist’s brother and his father as an example of that. The paper suggests that the underlying cause of the change in outlook was that since the Meiji Restoration society had broadly speaking fallen in behind the concept of a national mission to modernise Japan and bring it into a position where it could stand equally with the powerful nations of the world. So to a man of the protagonist’s father’s generation, naturally if you had any talent you put it at the service of the state in whatever small way you could, and if you did nothing it was because you could do nothing. But in the Russo-Japanese War Japan demonstrated that it could defeat the great power of Russia, and so in a sense that national mission was complete. So as a young person you might tend to think more in terms of individual success, or adopt a hedonistic worldview, or fall into doubt and disillusionment about whether anything mattered. Hence the protagonist’s brother readily understanding that somebody might have potential but not try to do anything with it, even though he despises such people; he seems also to have a focus on work and individual success. (This isn’t exactly the same as the difference in views that Hirano sees and describes, but there are similarities.)
Being born in 1867, Natsume himself was in the older of these generations, but his time as a university lecturer presumably gave him the opportunity to see how younger people felt and thought.
This prompted me to check, and the story is in the Ogai short story collection I have, so I have read it in the past. I think I’ll reread it for next week…
It certainly is interesting to know a bit about the time something was written and the authors circumstances in life.
I read 高瀬舟 today. The story, not the part in this book. It’s not a new topic, but it’s also not a new book. When you consider that it’s more than 100 years old, it really changes your perspective.
I can do it when I need to, but it was never as much fun taking apart a text as simply reading it.
That’s the only one I own physically, but I’ll resist! I’ll try to pick up a copy of こころ and 三四郎 when I’m in Japan again.
