i didn’t expect to write another one of these so soon, but i read a book on the plane and couldn’t put it down. self-portraits by osamu dazai. i read no longer human a few years ago and wasn’t blown away but i was absolutely enamored with this one.
you should read this book if:
you’ve ever intentionally drank too much
you’ve pissed everyone off
you’ve said “i hate myself” under your breath
you thought you had to kill a dog to impress a landlord
this is how i felt too. I read Akira Kurosawa’s autobiography around the same time which i enjoyed a lot more as something written by someone of the same generation about the same time period – though maybe it’s a little silly to compare them. a few years later I read The Setting Sun and was blown away. After finishing it, I suspected that Dazai is the sort of author who needs his characters to be different from him in some crucial way in order to really be free and not descend into a thousand layers of paralyzing introspection. though maybe I should read self-portraits and be proven wrong!
I had a free afternoon yesterday, so I ended up reading Scandal in a single sitting. I feel a little silly now for using the word “psychosexual” to describe Foreign Studies – that was child play compared to what he writes in Scandal lol
I think my favorite scene was the television interview where whenever he tried to say something about his personal views on Christianity (e.g. the nature of sin, sin containing the possibility of redemption), they somehow anticipated what he would say and made him watch clips they already had loaded up from an interview they did last week with a Buddhologist saying the exact same thing in Buddhist terms, as though trying to expose him as Actually Just A Buddhist. It feels like a weird dream sequence – i suspect based on real conversations Endo had had with people knowledgable in Buddhism (or maybe just arguments he’s had with himself), but masterfully redirected into the surreal.
I’m 10 chapters into the first one and I’m having a really good time! Zahn has some writing ticks that sometimes stand out in a negative way but his overall take on Star Wars is really cool so far. Getting focus on Empire minutiae(especially when Darth Vader isn’t involved) like this is rare and I think Zahn is doing a really good job sketching that side of the conflict out.
I’m still getting used to reading the continuing adventures of Luke, Leia, and Han. It feels strange to be back with that crew in this different format with the more detailed peek into their thoughts that the book gives. There’s always a bit of fanfic element to it that I don’t think is bad but is taking getting used to. I do like some of the Luke characterization a lot so far though.
I also wouldn’t currently consider myself a big Star Wars fan though I’m having a bit of a moment right now. I recently read the Tales of the Jedi comics (also from the early 90s) and those were absolutely kick ass. I’m playing The Old Republic for the first time and am having a nice time. I love the KOTOR games. I tend to like the media that has nothing to do with the Skywalker saga, and the further in the past the better. I only like 3 of the 9 main movies. I don’t like anything I’ve seen from the Disney era(haven’t seen Andor though). These books were released in a different context so I’m feeling more open to them.
i also read kurosawa’s autobiography around the same time….
funny enough, self-portraits is autofiction in the purest sense of the word. he would even do the contemporary thing of referencing the story itself as he was writing it. i don’t remember much of no longer human so i can’t say why it didn’t work for me. but i can say self-portraits was plainspoken and wry. it was raw without being gratuitous, serious but with a light touch. i really loved it.
@connierad two of the stories in that book you linked were in self-portraits! 100 views of mt fuji was close to my favorite in the collection. i loved how meandering it was and how the narrator kept contradicting his own contrarian proclamations about the mountain. it felt very true to me, and the ending was quite touching.
@saddleblasters yeah, that scene was awesome. in addition to what you highlighted, it also really sold the protagonist as someone who has given up on life, as if he doesn’t have enough fuel in the tank to even engage. i’m not sure if i had a favorite scene, but the development of the nurse character was shocking to me. i think that character was a reflection of what i liked most about the book–it successfully portrayed two realities. one that is superficial and logical (of course there can’t be two versions of the author prowling the streets of tokyo) and one that is mythic (of course there are).
i also tried to look up the syllabus from the japanese lit class. i couldn’t find it, but i did find a lot of old emails and papers from that time that will allow me to reasonably recreate what we read:
the three cornered world by natsume soseki
sanshiro by natsume soseki
the civilization of modern-day japan by natsume soseki
japan’s revolt against the west by natsume soseki
silence by shusaku endo
scarlet gang of asakusa by yasunari kawabata
the broken commandment by toson shimazaki
nami-ko by kenjiro tokutomi
origins of modern japanese literature by kojin karatani (this was really good)
i’m forgetting 1-2 novels……
so a lot of soseki and some historically significant novels like nami-ko and the broken commandment that didn’t necessarily translate across time and space. i probably had more fun reading in my japanese history classes where we read things like the tale of the heike and the pillow book.
now i need to emotionally recover from reading so many of my undergrad emails……
I’m not nearly as well read as most folks on here but my first thought was the Quentin chapter of The Sound and the Fury and didn’t care to think about book chapters much further.
even though i was joking this is actually a great list, particularly the brothers k pick. bold of you to not choose the part about the murders for 2666
How do folks feel about Elena Ferrante? They just restocked a bunch of her stuff at Skylight and I was considering checking her out after I finish Creation Lake.
Yeah- I feel like unless I’m just reading classics, it’s often easy to get sold these celebrity authors and I just gotta go on the press saying they’re good. New release sections are weird (of course these aren’t new books, but she gets a whole section like they’re new)
Yup! Big fan. I think the Neapolitan Novels are a lot stronger than her other work though. The quartet is big and sprawling - and dare I say more “hangoutable”? - than the novellas. And the additional space lets her weave in more complex themes and explore her characters more fully
you’re not being basic. Not worth being too influenced by those kinds of trends one way or the other. Maybe 20% of the people opining on the internet have actually read the books they claim to lol
