Traveling Far to Read a Book.

Introduction

For about three years now, I have been going on trips I call "Reading Journeys," where I take the time to travel specifically to read books that I could just as easily read at home. You might expect an elegant essay, but what I actually do is jump on the first train of the morning, embarking on a high-stakes reading journey where a single delay or missed connection means I won't reach my destination.

I love reading books. As a preschooler, I read picture books while being driven to kindergarten, and in elementary school, I would read the hardcover Harry Potter series on my way to school, occasionally bumping into utility poles. In college, I sought solace in books during my unfamiliar hour-and-a-half train commute, sometimes continuing to read past my stop and having to rush back from the end of the line. After finishing the "moratorium" of college life and entering the workforce, I dedicated my morning commute to reading. However, that time was interrupted in less than an hour, and the stories I had deeply immersed myself in on the morning train were mercilessly ripped away before I reached the office. Every time that happened, I felt like I was going to catch a cold. On the train home, I was too tired from work to dive into a book properly, and the words would just slide before my eyes. My days off were consumed by recovering from fatigue and staring aimlessly at my smartphone screen. I felt a sense of crisis that I would lose the ability to read books.


I want to sit down and keep reading books.


In April of my first year as a working adult, while riding the train home after work, hunched over, I suddenly remembered how I used to ride to the end of the line just to read books back in college. A flash of inspiration struck me, as if to say, "If you want to read, why not just keep riding the train?" This was it—at the time, that’s how I felt. Since then, I have been traveling far away just to read books.

Kagawa Chapter

It is said that with a Seishun 18 Kippu, you can make a round trip from Aichi to Kagawa in a single day. While looking at a map app to plan a reading journey, I decided to finally verify the story I had heard back in elementary school. Checking it, I found that while my stay would only be about 90 minutes, a round trip was possible. Once that was decided, it was time to prepare for the trip.

To spend as little time as possible looking at my smartphone, I wrote down my transfers, platforms, and the number of train cars in a field survey notebook. As I lined up the characters as if tracing the tracks, I felt as though the journey, which hadn't even started yet, had already begun. It was as if I were forcibly tearing my body away from a daily life that was beginning to wear me down with unfamiliar work. My movements as I packed my bags echoed the scene at the beginning of "My Father's Dragon" where the boy prepares for his journey, and my heart leaped.

The next morning, I boarded the first train. The reading journey was finally beginning. Since there wasn't much time left before the Seishun 18 Kippu expired from the moment I decided to go, and I had proceeded with preparations without thinking about the consequences, it was only after I sat in my seat that it finally started to feel real. I had never taken a trip with a 90-minute stay before, and furthermore, I had only traveled far alone a handful of times. I don't have a dragon to help me, but isn't this truly like an adventure...? The first train of the morning was serene, welcoming passengers for the first time since the last train of the previous night. I took a deep breath of the faintly cool air, filling my alveoli. Feeling the weight of my luggage on my knees, I sat down and opened my book.

From then on, it was mostly time spent turning pages. I rode to the end of the line and made about three transfers. I kept reading as if to make up for the time I hadn't been able to read. Suddenly looking up, I saw the Seto Inland Sea outside the window. I was impressed that they were really practicing Mediterranean-style agriculture just as I had seen in my textbooks, and that they were really planting olives on the slopes, but I kept reading, only occasionally glancing at the scenery.

On the return trip, I was able to return to my local station a few trains before the final one. When I got back home, in addition to the fatigue of sitting in a train seat for over 10 hours for the first time, I was filled with a sense of satisfaction from having traveled far and a sense of fulfillment from having traveled while carrying as many of my favorite books as I could. On the other hand, even though I had been to Kagawa, almost no sense of that remained. However, my heart was already fluttering in anticipation of future reading journeys.

From this day on, a "tower of unread books for reading journeys" began to be built in my room. This tower of unread books is not just something to be added to or reduced; just looking at it makes me feel happy.

Tokyo Round Trip Chapter

At the end of the year, I traveled to Tokyo and back just to read books. While my previous "reading journeys" were called reading journeys, I had done some sightseeing at each destination, but this time, to make it a pure reading journey, I decided to go in a circle between Tokyo and Aichi. The itinerary was to read on the Chuo Main Line on the way there and the Tokaido Main Line on the way back. Since there is no destination, it is a journey where nothing happens other than reading books. I would travel 763 kilometers over nearly 12 hours. It is strange that even a distance and time that seem long at first glance don't feel like travel for the sake of moving, but rather travel for the sake of reading, and I even feel like it's not enough.

On my reading journeys, I use different bags for each itinerary, using one of the following two.
One is a 50-liter mountaineering backpack, which I use for trips of two days or more, and it is one I loved using when I was in the Boy Scouts. The backpack that once held tents, cookers, ropes, and handbooks is now stuffed with stacks of paper.
The other is a tote bag, large enough to hold A4 documents. In college, I used to stuff it with pocket law books, basic textbooks, and casebooks. The tote bag supports a reading journey of the same weight (or perhaps a little more) as it was back then.

Whichever bag I use, I like to put in more books than I could ever possibly read. A few hardcovers, a few paperbacks, and twenty e-books. I don't bring them to choose from, but to block off any escape routes. Even in my daily life, I keep a spare book in my bag in addition to my main paperback, so I can say my reading journeys are an extension of that.
Since this was a day trip, I chose the tote bag. Even so, when I lifted it, there was a weight that made my hand pause for just a moment.

With the setting sun from the train window at my back, I finished reading "Anne and Happiness." When I was in junior high school, I liked to stop by the bookstore in the station building to kill time before cram school. One of the few novels I bought then was "Anne of the Sweets Shop." This work is one in that series, and being able to read a work I have an emotional attachment to in an environment where I could sit down and focus was in line with the purpose of this trip.

Anyone who has traveled long distances on the local trains of the Tokaido Main Line will likely sympathize, but the Tokaido Main Line in Shizuoka Prefecture is incredibly long. When you look at the endless scenery from the window, the feeling of just continuing to move forever remains more than the sense of where you are heading. There is a feeling of just continuing to advance along an endless straight line without the scenery changing (my apologies to the people of Shizuoka Prefecture). The mood is just like the Galaxy Express or Junichiro Tanizaki's "The Makioka Sisters." During that time, I just read books. It felt as if only "Wonderful Solitude: The Technique of Reading in the Renaissance" was by my side during the long, long return trip through Shizuoka. According to the book, Renaissance humanists engaged in spiritual dialogue with the great intellects of the past through reading. I, too, felt like I was having a spiritual dialogue with those stories and myself while crossing Shizuoka Prefecture.

It's not that I read because I have nothing else to do, but rather that I start to feel as if I am not allowed to do anything but read. There is no reason to stop turning the pages. Even if I stopped, the same scenery would just keep flowing outside. A reading journey is a trip where you can read as much as you like, and at the same time, it is a trip where you have nothing to do but read. "I want to look at the scenery or take a nap until the end of the line... Ugh, but the bag is still full of books." I even feel affection for this emotion. As I keep turning the pages, "reading" becomes a premise rather than a purpose. When I got off at Toyohashi Station, it felt as if only my body had returned to reality first, and my consciousness was still left behind in the book. I entered a cafe near the station and sank into a sofa. That sofa, which is usually loved by everyone and so worn out that you can feel the frame when you sit on it, felt like a luxury sofa just for this day. That was when I finally felt like I had returned to reality. I was exhausted. I felt a pleasant sense of fatigue and the feeling of walking between reading and reality.

Honshu Northbound Chapter

In March, when it had become warm enough not to worry about heavy snow, I went on a reading journey to Aomori. I headed to Sendai on a local train, and from there, I transferred to the Shinkansen to aim for Aomori Station. The return trip was an itinerary where I flew to Kobe by plane and then returned to Aichi by local train again. Up until then, I had planned my reading journeys on the premise that I would be able to sit down, but this time it was different. I would be going via the "Ueno-Tokyo Line." Those living in the Kanto region might wonder what I was bracing myself for, but for me, living a lazy and comfortable life in Aichi Prefecture, the crowded trains of Tokyo and Kanagawa were more distant than the food that appears in picture books. I had to pass through crowded sections while making stops and transfers. The average occupancy rate in Tokyo is said to be 139 percent. In that, holding a heavy backpack on my knees, opening a hardcover book, and furthermore getting off at a station that is not the end of the line—I had no idea if such a thing was really possible. In the first place, I wasn't even sure if I could read. Even so, I thought it would be fine until Yokohama, so I opened "The Dictionary of Lost Words."

A little before I started this trip, there was a period when I would spend my lunch break at a bookstore near my workplace. That bookstore was a large bookstore that could be found anywhere, the "that bookstore" that is rumored to be the one that libraries across the country use as a reference for the layout of books and the placement of search machines. The bookstore, with its new arrivals piled flat on the left from the entrance, new arrivals on the shelves, domestic and foreign literature, photo books, paperbacks, and new books on the walls... was truly an oasis. In particular, I began to look at the "Foreign Literature" shelf there as if I were licking it. My favorite publishers like Shinchosha Crest Books, Hakusuisha, Tokyo Sogensha, and Kokusho Kankokai increased, and I would pick up a book thinking, "This looks good!" only to check my home library and find that I had already purchased it and it had become part of my tower of unread books. "The Dictionary of Lost Words" was a book I bought during that time. As I read on, the population density around me increased. This day was a weekday, and the time passing through from Shinagawa to Omiya coincided with the evening rush hour. Feeling restless, I put the hardcover in the outer pocket, took out the smartphone I had in my clothing pocket, and opened the e-book version of "Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire." I had considered a paperback, but for me, a complete outsider, the act of swapping books in and out of my backpack on a crowded train seemed like a daunting task at the time. I usually claim to be a paper media lover, but on this day, I couldn't help but feel the gratitude for e-books. The "Harry Potter series" is always interesting to read because the characters I root for change between my childhood and now, and my impressions of the scene descriptions are different. I want to keep reading the Harry Potter series even when I'm seventy. By the time I passed Omiya, I was used to following the text, and before long, as if blown away by a Blast-Ended Skrewt, I succeeded in getting off at Kuroiso Station, my accommodation for the day. I firmly vowed to myself to stop including crowded trains in my routes in the future.

I stayed overnight in Northern Kanto, and the next morning, I boarded the first train before sunrise. On the way to Aizu-Wakamatsu, taking a detour, it was snowing. On the train, I read "The Twelve Kingdoms: White Grass, Moon of the Black Moon, Volume 1." It was exactly when the long-awaited sequel for the first time in over a decade was released that I started reading "The Twelve Kingdoms." I remember feeling restless, even though I knew nothing, when I saw the large advertisement covering the wall of the Shinchosha building, with a young man with a stern expression and only the words "Taiki, Return" written on it. It didn't even take half a month for me to be captivated by that world after receiving a passionate recommendation from a university professor.

While the snow was falling silently, I watched the slightly visible sunrise from the train window. Seeing the scene where new snow piled up on top of hardened snow and only the new snow danced in the wind, I felt deeply moved thinking that the people of the Tai Kingdom living close together while the country was devastated, and Taiki, might have seen the same scenery. I cannot see Mount Iimori from the train window, but perhaps Mount Iimori is like Mount Kanyo.

Iida Line Full Ride Chapter

In March, with a lingering chill. To return to the basics of a reading journey, I looked for a route with few transfers and the Iida Line hit, so I decided to go on an Iida Line full-ride reading journey, going up from Nagoya to Tatsuno on the Chuo Line, and down from Tatsuno to Toyohashi. On the Iida Line, there are 0 transfers during the 6-hour ride, or at most 1. How wonderful it is to just be able to read intently.

On this day, I jumped on the first train with "The Twelve Kingdoms: White Grass, Moon of the Black Moon, Volume 4," "Spring," and several e-books. "Spring" is a novel written by Riku Onda set in the ballet world. One of the reasons I became a book lover is my interaction with the eccentric owner of a picture book specialty store. In my childhood, I had the impression that he was a quiet but kind owner, but when I opened the lid, I found out he was an eccentric owner who loved reading and was bad at socializing. Also, this bookstore, while being a picture book specialty store, has a shelf where books that are neither picture books nor children's books are displayed. It is a shelf packed with "The Uncle Who Relies on Books," "The Chronicles of Narnia," "The Glass Horse," etc., next to "Honeybees and Distant Thunder," and new books and paperbacks that don't have any connection at first glance. It was the owner's private selection of books. And strangely, I was often drawn to that bookshelf. When I brought them to the register, the owner would happily say, "You get it, don't you." I started reading Riku Onda's works after the eccentric owner recommended "Honeybees and Distant Thunder," saying, "You'll probably like it." The content of "Honeybees and Distant Thunder" was, of course, wonderful, but the hardcover binding was truly magnificent. When I flipped the cover and saw the cover, the headbands, and the bookmark, I was surprised, wondering if that owner hadn't recommended it with all of that in mind. I haven't confirmed the truth, but I feel like I'm probably being seen through.

There are two advantages to reading books on a train. One is that you can read without being disturbed by anyone. The second is that it gives you a reason to stare blankly out the window. Since I'm riding for more than 6 hours one way, honestly, I can't be reading the whole time. Sometimes I stretch or rest my head. When I decide to sit down and read deeply, being interrupted by "The next station is..." or "I have to transfer after this" during a tense scene is a matter of course when reading while commuting or going out, but in reality, it becomes a stressor and frustration accumulates. However, especially on a reading journey (especially if you get on a train like the Iida Line that doesn't have a single transfer), you can literally read the whole time. You can dive as deep as you want. The day I read "The Unwomanly Face of War" all at once, I was absorbed in the story while wearing a foot heater and a blanket in a dim, empty university laboratory while the north wind was blowing fiercely. The sense of speed as I ran through Leningrad with Serafima in the silence that could be called a calm at that time filled me with an indescribable sense of satisfaction. Thinking about it now, I think I didn't just like reading books on the train, but I wanted an environment where I could quietly devote myself to stories. I am looking for a place where I can quietly sink with a book. After graduating from university, the place where I could read books to my satisfaction changed from a dim laboratory to JR trains running endlessly.

2026 Iida Line Chapter

Since becoming a working adult, I have been going to various places calling it an "18 Kippu Reading Journey." I have crossed Gifu on the return trip from Unazuki Onsen, and I have also circled Hokkaido over 4 days on local trains. I have continued reading for 17 hours to Beppu, entered Osaka by ferry, and returned tracing the Kisei Main Line. These trips were not just pure reading trips, but I went to places I had always wanted to visit, and I also had many human-filled experiences that were reading journeys in name only. I won't touch on them this time, but I would like to record them someday.

After doing this kind of trip for over 3 years, the credibility of the exchange with people at work, "Kanadome-san, do you like traveling by train?" "No. I like reading books in train seats, and I go here and there for that purpose," had become thin.I looked back on my train trips so far and decided to return to the basics to see what the easiest environment to read in was. It is the "Iida Line" where you can keep riding without transfers. However, this time, I decided to use JR Central's discount tickets instead of the 18 Kippu to go to Tenryukyo and back. Either way, I can keep reading for over 4 hours without transfers. After all, the Iida Line is where a book lover should ride.This time, I carefully selected three books, "The Tartar Steppe," "The Sea of the Underground Library," and "Library Pilgrimage," with the goal of finishing them. Previously, I used to stuff a large number of books into my bag to block off escape routes, but this time it is a reading journey with mental leeway. The next morning, I jumped on the first train and opened a book."The Tartar Steppe" is a book I bought because of the "obi" (book band). If I heard that Tomihiko Morimi said, "This is interesting," was there any choice other than to buy it? Looking up the synopsis, it said it was a fantasy novel. It was from "The Sea of the Underground Library" that I started collecting fantasy novels while being conscious of them as fantasy novels. I finished reading this book when I went to Unazuki Onsen two years ago. The Unazuki Onsen trip, which had relatively few transfers, was perfect for diving into the sea of the underground library. The content, which conveys that the story structure where various worlds intersect from the structure where the protagonist Zachary enters the underground library led by Max dressed as Max from "Where the Wild Things Are," and that all kinds of fantasy novels are the foundation, is truly a masterpiece in one word, and I was captivated by fantasy novels. Also, the book band of the book at this time was wonderful. "A story for people who couldn't help but check if the back of the wardrobe led to Narnia when they were children"—that was written on the band. It was the best. Just when I read the Narnia story, I was close in age to Lucy, and I had the experience of stepping into the wardrobe in the Japanese-style room in the middle of the night, leaving wrinkles on my parents' coats and suits, and going deeper and deeper. From this trip, I came to love the fun and pain of immersing myself in stories on the train and fantasy novels the most.As I went north on the Iida Line, Major Drogo in "The Tartar Steppe" moved his horse to the fortress. The itinerary this time was relatively short, and it was to turn back at Iida Station and make a transfer at Tenryukyo on the return trip. The scenery outside as I departed Tenryukyo in the afternoon and headed to Toyohashi gradually became darker. The Tenryu River, the cherry blossoms and magnolias in full bloom, and the towering mountain surfaces that I watched from the train window on the way there felt like a switch to take me far away, and they felt positive and pleasant. However, what about the return trip? The mountain surfaces that felt so close and intimate during the day changed into something distant and terrifying when the sun went down. The Iida Line keeps running through the mountains away from human habitation. When I completed the Iida Line last year, I was even elated that the darkness was just a trigger to immerse myself in the story. Is it because I was reading "The Tartar Steppe" that this turned into such fear? The pitch-black mountains approaching from both sides narrowed my mind and body. The Tartar Steppe was a terrifying novel where "days and months flow every time you turn the page," like a monster wearing the skin of a fantasy novel. About 30 minutes before reaching the end of the line, I finished reading the main story and the commentary, and I was in a state of distraction until I got off the train. Long ago, when I was a ronin, I was working through a reference book called "Fighting with Modern Japanese," and although the meaning of fighting is different, I felt like I was fighting at this time.

Conclusion

I have been going here and there by train for 3 years, traveling, but I don't particularly like train travel... I think. I tell myself that I am riding the train to keep reading because I can only read on the train, and that Unazuki Onsen, Tohoku, Hokkaido, etc., are just stage devices to keep reading and face stories.Entering my 4th year as a working adult, I realized that reading is something that can be easily lost if you are careless. When work is over, I end up watching videos. When it's a day off, housework and chores intervene. Even if I open a book, I remember something I need to look up and reach for my smartphone, and before I know it, I'm doing something else. The time I spent reading like breathing when I was a student had turned into special time before I knew it. Since I started reading journeys, that has become even more pronounced, and reading journeys felt like a shelter secured to read books. While I am traveling, there is nothing to tear me and books apart. That is why I go to Hokkaido and ride the Iida Line. I don't want to travel, I just want to read books.Recently, I started having small reading circles at work. The book that a person at work recommended to me, "This book is interesting," was a book with content I wouldn't buy myself, but when I tried reading it, it was very interesting. When I conveyed my impressions without holding back, the plan for the reading circle progressed rapidly. That circle, where we read one common book and share our impressions when we both finish reading, was a type of meeting I hadn't actively participated in before, but surprisingly, this is now the 6th book. Recently, thanks to the reading circle at work, I have started opening books during my commute and the few minutes before work starts. The sense of reading that I thought I had lost after becoming a working adult didn't seem to have disappeared after all. I had been looking for a place to read books for a long time. A quiet, dim, and comfortable laboratory. The last train where people gradually disappear. The first train of the early morning where there is almost no one riding just to read books. The train heading to snowy Aizu-Wakamatsu. The Iida Line where the sun rises and sets. In such places, I was able to dive into stories surprisingly deeply. I sometimes thought for a moment what I would do if I couldn't read books unless I rode a train. However, the other day, I used my annual paid leave for the reading circle book and curled up in my house all day to read it through. I tasted the sense of accomplishment of reading at home for the first time in a while, but honestly, I felt something was missing. Isn't it because I have learned the joy of diving into stories while looking at the scenery flowing past the train window? I buy tickets, write down transfer information in a field survey notebook, and stuff my bag with more luggage (books) than I can read, like Elmer. I don't go to save a dragon, but I am traveling to save time to face books. I feel my heart racing every time that season approaches. What should I do with the luxury of continuing to read on the first train in spring, for a few hours until the transfer in summer, and with the winter sunset at my back?The season for the summer Seishun 18 Kippu is coming soon. Then I will buy the ticket, write the itinerary in the field survey notebook, and groan in front of the tower of unread books, making a reading journey selection tower.When I circled Hokkaido in the summer of the year before last, I brought Goethe's "Italian Journey." When I started reading it while heading from New Chitose Airport to Sapporo, the date Goethe left his birthday party to travel to Italy and the date I departed for my reading journey were coincidentally the same. It felt like the journey in the book and the reality of the journey were suddenly connected, and I still remember the excitement of that time.The summer of carrying a backpack that looks like the zipper will break from books is coming soon.

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