What is "criticism" for an intellectual? On the publication of "Jun Eto and Norihiro Kato"
Finally, today (5/15), the new book "Jun Eto and Norihiro Kato" is released. As shown in the header, Chizuko Ueno has provided an overly generous blurb.
...and if I write something so virtuous, people will come along and say, "You're just paying lip service, you're not actually humbled, are you?" but that is not the level this conversation is on.
The country is broken, and there is the novel—from Osamu Dazai to Ryu Murakami and Haruki Murakami.
Tracing the 80-year history of the soul after the war with two great predecessors of criticism.
Recommended by Chizuko Ueno!
"A successor to the legitimate lineage of postwar criticism has appeared. I feel that the best tradition in Japan, where literary criticism becomes political thought, has been inherited."
For the 20th anniversary of Eto's death, Ueno gave a famous lecture titled "Jun Eto, the Legitimate Successor of Postwar Criticism" (Shincho, September 2019 issue; reprinted in Iwanami Gendai Bunko). The blurb is a response to her saying in that lecture, "If there is a 'post-Jun Eto' worthy of the title 'legitimate successor of postwar criticism' of this lecture, that would be Mr. Kato," so it has become a seriously big deal.
However, there are some sharp-tongued people in the world, and Mr. Atsushi Koyano, who has disliked me since long ago even though we have never met, wrote something like this.
Judging from Mr. Koyano's political stance, Ueno should be the Stalin, so this is the same as writing "Jun Yonaha is like Hitler." In some European countries, or especially in Israel, you might be able to charge someone with a criminal offense if you sued them.
It would be a lie to say I don't have a desire to laugh at internet news like "Atsushi Koyano Imprisoned," but it is not my hobby to stifle free speech by making legal complaints without acknowledging this level of insult art, so I will do nothing, including disclosure requests, lawyer letters to his employer, or civil lawsuits.
Actually, I was quite a reader of Koyano, so I know that he wrote long ago (2010) about the "Haisen-go Ron" (Post-Defeat Theory) controversy, which I also take up in my own book:
In 2000, Karatani [Kojin] began the "NAM" movement, claiming to dismantle the capitalist system... after a process of immediate collapse, he lost his position as the emperor of literary critics, and Kato [Norihiro] half-replaced him; in short, the essence of the "Haisen-go Ron" controversy was something like the Battle of Sekigahara between Karatani and Kato.
I am aware that he wrote that.
It should be self-evident which is a more significant event in human history, Sekigahara or the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact (bitter laugh). If someone writes that it was that much of a shock, the way to protect the freedom of criticism and critique is to think "well, whatever" and let it slide.
By the way, I previously wrote that I am a "master of making memories with people I have never met," and I received this blurb from Ueno even though I have never met or spoken with her (I met her later, so I will talk about that another day).
I had an editor send her the draft, but as some people might maliciously assume, it is absolutely not the case that I sucked up to her by saying "Ueno is the best!" in the text and asked her to "please recommend it."
Rather, while respecting Ueno's achievements as someone who has directly interviewed both Jun Eto and Norihiro Kato, I am actually quite critical of her as well. For example, regarding the 1992 "Danryu Bungaku Ron" (Male-Style Literature Theory)—
Chizuko Ueno, born in '48 and a participant in the Kyoto University All-Campus Joint Struggle Committee, in a co-authored book that is a pioneer of Japanese feminist criticism, describes the protagonist of "Norwegian Wood" as "being like a focal point or a black hole, and thanks to the reactions of the people who come into contact with that black hole, his outline is finally understood... Watanabe-kun has no active actions at all."
It is exactly the same as Fumio in "Our Days", but at this time her perspective simply cuts off the pre-history.
(Omitted)
Because the similar experience of "one before" is not told as a genealogy and is simply "overwritten" by the hands of a new generation, history disappears from this country.
Please check my book for the "way of cutting off"
That is the feeling, and regarding Ueno's reading of Kato's posthumous work "Introduction to Article 9," which I also took up the other day,
While showing respect for Kato, Chizuko Ueno comments on his final written work published before his death in 2019, 'Introduction to Article 9', much like Akira Asada, by stating, 'There are almost no new arguments. It is almost a repetition of what Mr. Eto wrote in 'The 1946 Constitution'.' But isn't such a reading missing the point? Isn't it only possible to read it that way because one is looking only at the 'grass'?
The meaning of 'grass' is also in my book
However, a hint is here
and so on, I have written.
It is often said that in Japan, many people cannot distinguish between critique and criticism. A critique (or criticism) intended to clarify the location of a problem and refine ideas is different from criticism intended to disparage the other party and launch a negative campaign.
……This was originally something one learned first in university humanities, but now liberal arts faculty at universitiestake the lead in making noise on social media when faced with legitimate critique, crying 'I've been criticized! Slander!', or spreading vulgar insults under the guise of criticism, so it has become increasingly forgotten.
It is time for us to graduate from such an era of childish 'infant intellectuals'……or rather, showing that it was not originally like this, and that it is just that 'infantilization' has progressed too much in recent years, is also a major focus of my book.
There is one photograph I included in the book as a symbol.
It is a photo taken at a roundtable discussion where novelists of the 'post-war debut group' are talking, surrounding Ken Hirano, who had been a literary critic since before the war. You can see that people with surprising! combinations are actually sitting at the same table. Although it was a coincidence, the fact that the far right and far left are that person and that person is also indescribable.
Seicho Matsumoto, Kobo Abe. From 'Bungakukai', January 1959 issue.
Pre-war or post-war? Right or left? The fact that such dialogue was possible in an era when the divide in generations and ideologies was far greater than it is now gives us courage.
Let's reclaim such 'critique' in the correct sense. This is by no means limited to people in specific industries like the literary or intellectual circles.
In order to end the uniformity of opinion that society falls into due to plagues, wars, scandals, or online firestorms, where self-important people fly in to incite a lynching, shouting 'How imprudent!' or 'Crush them!' at anyone who expresses even a slight sense of discomfort, let alone a dissenting opinion—the distorted social media society of the last few years—I want this book to be picked up now.
As I depicted in 'Shadows of Empire' and 'Heisei History', I love the era of the 'post-war,' whose legacy can never be fully exhausted. Although I became a 'legitimate heir' by chance, I will continue to convey its charm with a calm mind.
It will be in bookstores nationwide starting today, but please take a look, even if just to browse the abundant photos. The society that actually once existed, an entrance to a society that was rich, free, and above all, open to enjoyable 'critique,' is there.
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