I recently discovered the existence of a TV show about Japanese literature. It’s called Japan Unlocked, and it airs on the cable channel NHK World. Every week, the two hosts bring in a guest to discuss a work of Japanese literature in translation. According to the website, a major theme of the show is translation itself. Specifically, the hosts will pick a term and demonstrate what its translation reveals about cultural differences. So far, they’ve covered books like Kawabata Yasunari’s Snow Country, Suzuki Kōji’s Ring, and Kirino Natsuo’s OUT. They’ve also made the decision to count manga as literature (yay!) and have aired episodes focusing on titles like Astro Boy and AKIRA. As if the discussion topics of Japan Unlocked weren’t cool enough by themselves, the show can also boast guests like Roland Kelts, the author of the eminently enjoyable JapanAmerica (and an eminently enjoyable pop culture blog of the same name), and Michael Arias, the producer of The Animatrix and the director of Tekkon Kinkreet.
I’m so excited about this show that I’m actually kind of upset I’ve missed so much of it. NHK isn’t streaming the archives of the program, and there are only two episodes left. The episode airing today at 23:30 UTC (which equates to 6:30 in the evening EST) covers Miyazawa’s Kenji’s classic Milky Way Railroad, and the episode airing next Thursday covers a collection of kanshi (poems written in Chinese) called Breeze through Bamboo by the Edo-period lady poet and painter Ema Saikō. You can watch these episodes as they stream through the main NHK World site, although you have to tune in at the right time to catch one of the six showings over the set 24-hour window (the schedule is posted on the program’s webpage).
I’m bothered by the lack of publicity this show has received, and obviously I’m annoyed that I can’t watch any episode I want whenever I want – but I suppose that’s NHK for you. I’m also a bit concerned about the undertone of cultural essentialism running through the program’s ad copy. However, the show’s premise, its selection of titles, and the star quality of its guests have made me very curious, and I’m definitely going to tune in for the remaining two episodes. I’m writing this post as a shout-out to anyone else who might be intrigued, since the show deserves way more attention than it’s gotten so far…
Thanks for the heads up on this, but don’t think I get NHK here in Canada. I’d be very interested though on ‘Japan Unlocked’ and it’s discussions on Japanese lit in translation. I’ve just finished reading Kawabata’s Snow Country (thanks to your recommendation some months ago), and have enjoyed Edward G. Seidensticker’s translation. Just posted my take on the book. I’ll be definitely read more of Kawabata’s work, The Sound of the Mountain next probably. What do you think of Seidensticker’s translations? Any other translators you’d recommend?
Thank you for your comments! And I apologize for taking so long to get back to you – I’m going to blame it on holiday travel. Anyway, I just wanted to say that the streaming video on the NHK website shouldn’t be region-locked, so you should be able to view it, even from the North American equivalent of Snow Country (which is an awesome way of thinking about it, by the way, consider me impressed). The last episode is airing right now, so I hope you get a chance to check it out!
I could write a lengthy essay about Seidensticker, but let’s just say I like him a lot despite a few issues of author and voice that have recently sprung up in Japanese translation theory. My two other favorite translators are Juliet Winters Carpenter (who translated Masks and The Hunter) and Alfred Birnbaum (who translated A Wild Sheep Chase and All She Was Worth). My hero, however, is Michael Emmerich. Everything he’s translated, from a collection of Kawabata short stories called First Snow on Mount Fuji to Akasaka Mari’s Vibrator, is eminently worth reading.
Thank you again for commenting, and thanks for the link to your awesome post about Snow Country!
I wonder, does the phrase 銀河鉄道 originate with Miyazawa Kenji’s novel? Or is it somehow older, coming from a popular phrase or idiom or something? Do you know?
I ask only because the phrase seems to really roll off the tongue, as if it’s a very natural word, as if I’ve heard it a lot. And yet, I never heard of the novel before reading this post. (Maybe I’m just thinking of the anime ^_^;; )
Now that is an interesting question. I would need to hole myself up in my university library’s East Asian Seminar Room and play with all of the reference materials to give you a real answer, but allow me to make an educated guess. I think Miyazawa came up with the phrase himself. He was a first-rate poet (he’s the guy who wrote the Ame ni mo makezu poem, as you probably know, I guess); and, as a poet and fiction writer, he was deeply interested in how nature and technology work together. I’m willing to bet that he came up with that phrase, and I’m willing to bet that it’s popular precisely because he came up with it.
I will be honest, though – I am not a huge fan of the novel. I like the short story collection 注文の多い料理店 much, much better, and there are several good English translations of his poetry that are worth reading. He’s not my cup of tea, but Miyazawa Kenji was really interesting as a person in a very unique way…
This sounds amazing! I’ll have to check it out. I love translation and seeing how people make decisions about how to translate things. (I’m dying to see the translation of 「大奥」!)
From what I’ve seen so far, it’s an interesting show. However, it’s very, um, how to put this, NHK-flavored. Maybe it’s simply that Miyazawa Kenji lends himself to that sort of THIS IS JAPAN rhetoric, though (and it’s not like I don’t find Nihonjin-ron endlessly entertaining). In any case, I wish I could have seen the other episodes, and I’m looking forward to the one about Ema Saikō that’s airing right about now…