{"id":8760,"date":"2010-01-28T04:27:06","date_gmt":"2010-01-28T09:27:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/bookdragon.si.edu\/?p=8760"},"modified":"2014-05-19T19:44:18","modified_gmt":"2014-05-19T23:44:18","slug":"the-times-of-botchan-first-volume-by-jiro-taniguchi-and-natsuo-sekikawa-translated-by-shizuka-shimoyama-and-elizabeth-tiernan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/the-times-of-botchan-first-volume-by-jiro-taniguchi-and-natsuo-sekikawa-translated-by-shizuka-shimoyama-and-elizabeth-tiernan\/","title":{"rendered":"The Times of Botchan (first volume) by Jiro Taniguchi and Natsuo Sekikawa, translated by Shizuka Shimoyama and Elizabeth Tiernan"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/10\/2010\/01\/Times-of-Botchan-1.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft size-full wp-image-29303\" src=\"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/10\/2010\/01\/Times-of-Botchan-1.jpg\" alt=\"Times of Botchan 1\" width=\"949\" height=\"1326\" srcset=\"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/10\/2010\/01\/Times-of-Botchan-1.jpg 949w, https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/10\/2010\/01\/Times-of-Botchan-1-572x800.jpg 572w, https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/10\/2010\/01\/Times-of-Botchan-1-800x1117.jpg 800w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 949px) 100vw, 949px\" \/><\/a>Not quite a year ago, my highly revered, most beloved advisor (of my second unfinished almost-ABD-PhD) passed away. As well as being one of the most important (and groundbreaking) Japanese scholars working in English, he was \u2013\u00a0and remains \u2013\u00a0<em>the <\/em>definitive western authority on Natsume S\u014dseki (1867-1916). A household name in Japan if for no other reason than because he appeared on the 1000-yen note for two decades (until 2004), S\u014dseki\u00a0is considered the most important novelist of Japan&#8217;s Meiji era\u00a0(1868-1912) as well as a pivotal figure in Japanese modern literature.<\/p>\n<p>I just can&#8217;t picture my august advisor in his hallowed office reading manga ever, especially in his later years (OMG! \u2013\u00a0have to sit a moment with that thought!). He was born too early to have been a manga-reader in his youth growing up in Japan (he was hapa-Japanese\/Scottish). But perhaps he&#8217;s making up for lost time, and chuckling from above, head together with S\u014dseki himself, laughing over the imaginative antics of S\u014dseki&#8217;s manga self in the multi-volume <em>The Times of Botchan.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>The series begins with a 38-year-old S\u014dseki as he contemplates writing another novel. He has\u00a0recently returned from studying in England and is now a literature professor at Tokyo Imperial University (today&#8217;s University of Tokyo, or &#8220;Todai&#8221; \u2013 Japan&#8217;s premier university). Having found a welcoming audience with his serialized story, <em>I Am a Cat,<\/em> S\u014dseki embarks on what will become\u00a0his novel, <em>Botchan<\/em>, whose protagonist is not unlike his own self.<\/p>\n<p>S\u014dseki\u00a0is surrounded by a group of sake-loving friends, who both entertain and challenge him, as they discuss the many changes that are happening to a once closed Japanese society. S\u014dseki recalls some of his past experiences, vividly remembering the miseries he faced living among foreigners especially in London.\u00a0Little by little, he explores potential plots, creating his characters after careful observations of the quickly changing world around him.<\/p>\n<p>Funny enough, S\u014dseki&#8217;s own grandson, Natsume Fusanosuke, is a noted contemporary manga critic. He insists in the book&#8217;s epilogue that his grandfather was no drinker, which means &#8220;the rowdiness that S\u014dseki exhibits at the beginning of the story must be fictitious. Just as the encounters between the historical characters that are narrated in this work must be figments of the imagination.&#8221; But the grandson is also quick to add, &#8220;it is not my intention to disapprove of any of these inventions just because I am proud to be S\u014dseki&#8217;s grandson. I like the character who appears in the story and his imaginary personality, and I very much enjoyed reading it.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>I&#8217;m thinking my beloved advisor, too, is enjoying it muchly from above. That&#8217;s my story, and I&#8217;m sticking to it!<\/p>\n<p><strong>Readers<\/strong>: Young Adult, Adult<\/p>\n<p><strong>Published<\/strong>: 2005 (United Kingdom, United States)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Not quite a year ago, my highly revered, most beloved advisor (of my second unfinished almost-ABD-PhD) passed away. As well as being one of the most important (and groundbreaking) Japanese scholars working in English, he was \u2013\u00a0and remains \u2013\u00a0the definitive western authority on Natsume S\u014dseki&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":29303,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,73,76,66,31],"tags":[6608,59,2834,11,24,51,2835,2847,571,42,2848,2837],"class_list":["post-8760","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-adult-readers","category-graphic-novel-manga-manwha","category-japanese","category-translation","category-young-adult-readers","tag-bookdragon","tag-cultural-exploration","tag-elizabeth-tiernan","tag-friendship","tag-historical","tag-identity","tag-jiro-taniguchi","tag-natsuo-sekikawa","tag-personal-transformation","tag-series","tag-series-times-of-botchan","tag-shizuka-shimoyama"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v19.14 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>The Times of Botchan (first volume) by Jiro Taniguchi and Natsuo Sekikawa, translated by Shizuka Shimoyama and Elizabeth Tiernan - BookDragon<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/apa.si.edu\/bookdragon\/the-times-of-botchan-first-volume-by-jiro-taniguchi-and-natsuo-sekikawa-translated-by-shizuka-shimoyama-and-elizabeth-tiernan\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The Times of Botchan (first volume) by Jiro Taniguchi and Natsuo Sekikawa, translated by Shizuka Shimoyama and Elizabeth Tiernan - BookDragon\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Not quite a year ago, my highly revered, most beloved advisor (of my second unfinished almost-ABD-PhD) passed away. 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