Japan, the "she" craze for bestsellers
Welcome to pay attention to the public account [Lao Sa has found] (sashuchang2015)
On January 19, 2017, the Naoki Prize and the Wasagawa Prize, the most prestigious in the Japanese literary world, were announced at the same time. As a result, the four-time male writer Sumato Yamashita struggled to win the Wasagawa Prize, while the Naoki Prize fell into the hands of female writer Riku Onda (Naomi Kumagaya). Considering that the Wasagawa Prize is mainly for "new writers" and short works, while the Naoki Prize is mainly for "backbone writers", both long and short works, Anda's award seems to be higher.
However, winning one of the two awards will not make Japanese female writers rejoice, but Japanese male writers are expected to breathe a sigh of relief - in the past few years, three awards have been occupied by women, and now they can finally give some explanation.
For countries like our country, there is only one Women's Day every year, and in the Japanese writer community, in recent years, female writers have been celebrating the festival, taking the Naoki Prize and the Wasagawa Prize as an example, in the past five years, a total of twenty-four people have won, of which fourteen women account for fourteen, only ten men, including a Chinese Higashiyama Shōryo (Wang Zhenxu), the japanese literary circle of women, has almost overwhelmed the Japanese manhood.
Women writers are "rampant" in the halls of literary awards, showing that "women's literature" is setting off a fierce wave in Japan.
Daily View, a famous big data analysis website in Taiwan with a great influence on Japan, was selected as one of the "Top Ten Modern Japanese Novelists" in 2015, and although there are two pillars of Keigo Higashino and Haruki Murakami to support male writers, female writers still account for six, indicating that their books have reached a level no less than that of male counterparts in terms of influence and popularity.
Since ancient times, Japanese female writers have occupied a considerable position in the literary world with their delicate brushstrokes and sensitive perspectives, but classical female writers such as Zi Shibu and Kiyoshi Nayan are still the main objects of description of the male world. Zi Shibu did not even dare to use Chinese characters, because this was illegal for women in the era.
The majesty of the patriarchal world continued until after World War II, when the new generation of female writers gradually got rid of the shackles.
Today's Japanese women writers, the theme of creation is more around the female perspective - sex, feelings, psychology, healing, two-dimensional, fantasy has become their main area of narration. The so-called "women's literature" includes the works of female writers, as well as the works of male writers who use the theme of women and women's perspectives.
The former, such as Nadō Miyashita's "The Forest of Sheep and Steel", describes with vivid brushstrokes how teenagers have heartstrings with music, and readers comment: "I am intoxicated and even surprised how someone can put such a feeling that can only be explored by touch into the pen." The young adult novel ranked sixth among Japan's top ten bestsellers in 2016, and even overwhelmed wasagawa Prize winner Sayaka Murata, whose "Super Merchant" could only rank seventh.
The latter, such as Sumino Night's romance novel "Want to Eat Your Pancreas", was also listed in the top ten bestsellers in 2016, and its deep and desperate description of love even made people doubt the author's gender. "Female stream literature" occupies a huge share of today's Japanese book market, and this "she" wave has deeply branded today's Japanese literature.
It is worth mentioning that although the topics are diverse and close to life, Japanese women's literature is not exquisite, generally has a high literary level, and is not greatly affected by the secularization of online literature. This is mainly due to the unique characteristics of Japan's media system. In Japan, the print media has also been strongly impacted by the Internet, but it has not been as depressed as the United States, and after years of competition, it has formed a relatively complete diversion with online media.
In Japan, when an event occurs, if you want to learn about the latest developments and diverse voices, the internet is the first choice; if you want to see relevant in-depth analysis, interview tracking, you can only go to print media.
Because of its high-speed and extensive characteristics, Japanese online media have assumed the function of meeting the audience's broad cognitive needs, but traditional print media use its existing system to provide more resources and dig into a topic, so it has become a symbol of depth. Female writers are predominantly involved in print media, and their work is largely invisible on the Internet. Generous remuneration and strict copyright protection make them more interested in creating exquisite works than disdainful of fast-food literary consumption.
It is generally believed that the formation of the "she" wave is related to the fact that Japanese society is in a new era of introspection. Throughout history, we will find that Japanese society has often alternated between expansion and introspection.
At the end of the Sui Dynasty and the beginning of the Tang Dynasty, Japan set foot on the Korean Peninsula, which belonged to the first outward expansion, and entered the era of introspection after the defeat of the Tang army at the Battle of Baicun Jianghai, and the tea ceremony and flower ceremony took root in the Japanese archipelago;
In the middle of the Ming Dynasty, Japan expanded for the second time, invaded the Korean Peninsula, and entered the era of introspection after being defeated by the Ming army, so the so-called "prosperous Yuan Lu era" appeared;
Japan expanded for the third time after the Sino-Japanese War, and returned to introspection after the defeat in World War II.
Whenever Japan is in the stage of expansion, there will be wars and disasters, and whenever Japan is in the era of introspection, it will often lead to cultural prosperity.
The delicate and delicate Japanese culture and the pursuit of extreme characteristics have brought a spring of creation to female writers. After the passage of the Equality Act on The Employment of Men and Women in Japan in the 1980s, the improvement of women's social status has made women's topics and women's feelings a topic of increasing concern in society.
However, perhaps feeling repressed and despised for many years, the "she" wave in the Japanese literary world in recent years can feel strangely challenging, and many female writers can be said to subvert the image of traditional Japanese women.
For example, when the female writer Hitomi Kanehara won the 2003 Wasagawa Prize, Japanese public opinion was shocked because the twenty-one-year-old writer was a rebellious girl who not only attempted suicide at the age of fifteen, but also based her award-winning work "Snake Letter and Tongue Ring" based on the body transformation that still has a moral controversy today, the female writer was inspired by surgery to cut her tongue into a snake-like fork.
Mitsuyo Kakuda, who won the Naoki Prize in 2005, is a decent work in her own right, but she is a boxing madman after writing.
Their challenges are widespread, and Japan's "cute culture" is very popular, while the female writer Kitahara Minori denounces it as "the disgusting obsession of patriarchal society."
Women in Japan are often labeled "kawaii," but the writer Jane Su asks, "How old do you want to be a teenage girl?" "Advocating that women after the age of thirty become tough "female uncles"...
This is also part of the wave of Japanese women's literature, but such a variety of challenges inevitably makes our perceptions messy. How do we understand this wave of "she"?
Women's questions, or let women answer themselves.
Aiko Sato, a Japanese female writer who wrote her first novel at the age of ninety-three, may have philosophically analyzed this phenomenon: "Whether you are a young lady or not, when you grow up, you will have to do something, this is society." ”
It seems that Japanese women are really growing up now.
However, the old lady also said: "Women can't write novels." Women have the habit of thinking that they are always right. I think I'm still emotional, so I can't do this. ”
Well? Didn't the old lady herself write novels? Now, we're really going to mess up.
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