Tag Archives: RKS literature

RKS Japanese Literature: The Pure Art of Conversation Lost on People Like This (Nagai Kafū)

“Now the argument centres on him until the evening dishes line up beneath the dusky lamp-boiled beans, pickled vegetables, a stew of fish bones and scallions, and a rice tub smeared with dirty fingerprints. Gathered around their flimsy table, the family talk about uncle so-and-so, who showed up wanting to know the cost of Mother’sContinue reading “RKS Japanese Literature: The Pure Art of Conversation Lost on People Like This (Nagai Kafū)”

RKS Literature: In Poverty You Discover Boredom (George Orwell)

“You discover the boredom which is inseparable from poverty; the times when you have nothing to do and, being underfed, can interest yourself in nothing. For half a day at a time you lie on your bed, feeling like a jeune squelette in Beaudelaire’s poem. Only food could rouse you. You discover that a manContinue reading “RKS Literature: In Poverty You Discover Boredom (George Orwell)”

RKS Japanese Literature: Making the Yellow Man Believe in the White Man’s Yellow Peril (Nagai Kafū)

“Here, then, is proof that cruelty to animals is an issue only to a few Christians, not a pressing problem for the whole of Japanese society. Is this a matter for grief or celebration? Witnessing these scenes only deepens my sense that the Japanese are a warlike people who are sure to defeat the RussiansContinue reading “RKS Japanese Literature: Making the Yellow Man Believe in the White Man’s Yellow Peril (Nagai Kafū)”

RKS Literature: In Poverty You Discover Hunger (George Orwell)

You discover what it is like to be hungry. With bread and margarine in your belly, you go out and look into the shop windows. Everywhere there is food insulting you in huge, wasteful piles; whole dead pigs, baskets of hot loaves, great yellow blocks of butter, strings of sausages, mountains of potatoes, vast GruyèreContinue reading “RKS Literature: In Poverty You Discover Hunger (George Orwell)”

RKS Japanese Literature: A Repulsive Mess of Fish and Sorrow for the Japanese People (Nagai Kafū)

“Upon a wooden counter disturbingly overgrown with green moss sits a shallow, round sushi rice mixing bowl half filled with greasy water containing fish parts, shaved fish meat and rows of skewered shellfish that have been dried in the sun, almost all bearing price tags of ten sen or less. As far as I canContinue reading “RKS Japanese Literature: A Repulsive Mess of Fish and Sorrow for the Japanese People (Nagai Kafū)”

RKS Japanese Literature: Should I Become an Artist in Japan? (Nagai Kafū)

“Should I become an artist? No, this is Japan, not the West. Far from demanding art, Japanese society looks upon it as a nuisance. Those of us with a deep-seated desire to devote ourselves to the Muses or to Venus must leave this fatherland of ours with all its stringent rules before we can beginContinue reading “RKS Japanese Literature: Should I Become an Artist in Japan? (Nagai Kafū)”

RKS Japanese Literature: Family Ties as Oppressive and Debilitating (Nagai Kafū)

“No, nothing in this world is as oppressive and debilitating as blood ties. Any other relationship-be it with friend, lover, wife; be it obligatory or constraining or difficult-is something one has consciously entered into at some point. Only one’s ties with parents and siblings are formed at birth and are unbreakable. And even if oneContinue reading “RKS Japanese Literature: Family Ties as Oppressive and Debilitating (Nagai Kafū)”

RKS Literature: Soaking up Cheap Wine in the Slums of Paris (George Orwell)

“There was R., an Englishman who lived six months of the year in Putney with his parents and six months in France. During his time in France he drank four litres of wine a day, and six litres on Saturday; he once had travelled to the Azores, because the wine there is cheaper than anywhereContinue reading “RKS Literature: Soaking up Cheap Wine in the Slums of Paris (George Orwell)”

RKS Literature: Buying Pornographic Postcards in Paris? (George Orwell)

“There were the Rougiers, for instance, an old ragged, dwarfish couple who plied an extraordinary trade. They used to sell postcards on the Boulevard St. Michel. The curious thing is that the postcards were sold in sealed packets as pornographic ones, but were actually photographs of châteaux on the Loire; the buyers did not discoverContinue reading “RKS Literature: Buying Pornographic Postcards in Paris? (George Orwell)”

RKS Japanese Literature: The Merest Whiff of the West Makes Tomada Gag (Tanizaki Jun’Ichiro)

“I did everything I could to resist the voice. But I could do nothing about the fear that gripped me tighter with each day that passed. By now, every aspect of my life in the West revolted me. I shuddered every time I had to walk past a high-rise building or get in a liftContinue reading “RKS Japanese Literature: The Merest Whiff of the West Makes Tomada Gag (Tanizaki Jun’Ichiro)”