Now read what I have to say about the Star Wars prequels. Now it's my turn to bitch and moan and be nostalgic!Well, I've read a few books by Alex Kerr, who is definitely a Japanologist. I definitely would not call him a Japanophile, although as I pointed out in a previous essay,being a Japanophile is not necessarily a bad thing. Mr. Kerr is certainly passionate about Japan, but it's only for the aspects in which he believes Japan should be. I learned a lot from reading books by Alex Kerr, and one thing I've learned is how much I do not like Alex Kerr. Japan has changed, and it has every right to do so. However, Alex Kerr doesn't want Japan to evolve. From reading his books, It has become apparent that he wants Japanese people to live in outdated, ancient houses and wear kimonos and geta sandals.
Lost Japan, aka "why Alex Kerr wants Japan to stay the way it was hundreds of years ago"
I finished reading this book this month. What I like about this book is that it is a collection of memoirs of how Japan used to be, in the '60s and '70s when Mr. Kerr was younger. I can respect that, but he also comes across as one who has established a very inflexible notion of how the country should be, and is upset that Japan does not conform to his narrow ideals. His bias is perfectly illustrated on page 89 when he writes, "Even in the prewar years, when Japan's culture was still more or less intact..." Oh, come on dude. So America destroyed Japanese culture? When Japan lost the war, nearly everything that its citizens had been taught was shattered, including the invincibility of its military, the deification of the emperor, and their duty to the emperor to invade other countries. There was a lot of disillusionment, especially among younger people. I'm sure this lead to embracing Western ideals and such, but Japan still has its own cultural identity.
The book does have some interesting insight into Japan. I was especially interested in the chapter on his experiences in Iya valley in Shikoku with its long history as descendants of the Heike clan, a place of their refuge dating back to their conflict as depicted in Lady Murasaki's classic The Tale of Genji. He was able to see the unspoiled beauty of their way of life firsthand in the last few decades before their way of life died off completely. He describes a breathtaking valley with the people in the village living in thatch roofed huts along the mountainside. He decided to buy a house there, and had many to choose from since many families abandoned their houses to move away from the poverty there. I felt my soul leap as I read the part where he mentions about reading the diary of a young girl in the '50s he found in one house. The diary spoke of the teenage girl's depression of living in the dark house and a fear of having no future, and a yearning to escape to the cities. The diary entries end when the girl is 18, and the villagers told him that she had run away from home.
The roofs are no longer thatched, and the last remaining roof thatcher in the area apparently retired in the '80s. I completely understand his lamenting of the dying off of a traditional way of life, and I can appreciate the sentiment. However, Mr. Kerr really needs to understand how the spirit of that young girl who confessed her sadness in her diary is just not compatible with his stubborn vision of how Japan ought to be. The people were living in poverty, and while that may seem charming and quaint since it appeals to his romantic view of how Japan once was and how it should never have changed into what it is today, he really needs to accept the fact that not everything lasts forever. Sometimes it's just time to move on. Mr. Kerr, you had the privilege of witnessing Iya Valley much in the way it had been for so long. You saw the way it was before it changed forever. Count yourself blessed for having witnessed the last of this way of life, but please, don't be so selfish as to expect it to last forever merely because you hate Westernization. The local economy just wasn't there to sustain the way of life anymore.
The chapter on Kabuki was interesting and I learned a lot about this art, although I am still not interested in ever going to see a kabuki play. My wife is Japanese, and she's never gone to see a Kabuki play, nor does she have interest in ever seeing one. I guess Mr. Kerr would say that my wife is "throwing away her Japanese culture" or something and would be disappointed with her. But you know, you really can't place expectations like that on people. I can't imagine if this guy ever married a Japanese woman (or married anyone at all, since he seems so much in love with himself that there may not be much left over for anyone else). If he did, I suspect that he would expect to have a traditional Shinto wedding with the woman wearing a kimono and a big fake wig. Before we got married, I thought it might be cool if Mayu wore a kimono, minus the wig, for the ceremony. But she'd always dreamed of having a white wedding dress, so that's what she did. Really, you can't keep placing expectations in a relationship and demand that the other behave in a certain way and conform to your rigid limitations. That is an unhealthy relationship, and Alex Kerr obviously has an unhealthy relationship with Japan.
The book goes on tangents that are full of pretentious posturing and name dropping, just to inflate the author's own ego. The chapter on art collecting had some interesting history to learn, aside from all the parts that were pompous. There's a whole chapter devoted to him attending Oxford, which was a total non-sequitir derailment of the book. For no reason, he just wanted to bring up the fact that he'd attended Yale and Oxford, and described how one of his professors would get phone calls during class from the Dalai Lama asking him for advice, or how the guy's wife was some political activist in Burma who led a democratic revolution. Blah blah blah. This served nothing to discuss about Japan, other than that he just wanted to bring up that he knew such people and was just nostalgic about them. Whatever. Then there's the chapter called The Literati, which was more posturing from self-described intellectuals proud of the fact that all they do is think and don't really do anything. I don't care if he used to hang out with Ian Fleming's wife. I thought this book was about Japan?
I learned a lot from reading this book though. From historical anecdotes, to cultural aspects such as kabuki and tea ceremony. I'm always interested in architectural design, and he describes the various transitions in architecture and identifies which buildings came from certain time periods. I learned that the upturned eaves of a building has cultural significance in Asia, and that it represents an honoring of heaven in the architecture of the building. There really is a lot to learn from reading this book.
Despite professing to love Japan, he really bashes the country quite a lot. He insists that Japan is an ugly country, and the only reinforcement to that opinion is by saying that foreign friends who've come to visit him in Japan are disappointed in how ugly the country is. Well, that's real swell, but there is still much beauty to behold. He just hates the fact that there are power lines draped across forests (that happens here in Arizona where I live, too) and he wants people to believe that only cedar trees exist in Japan and you'd be hard-pressed to find a maple tree or anything else. This is crap.
He also mentions how terrible it is that the rivers in Japan are all lined with concrete. He can complain all he wants, but I really wonder how Derp-A-Derp Land in the United States might benefit from such conditioning of rivers, as each year their homes are flooded over and over again from the rainy seasons. Perhaps concreting the rivers may not look natural and picturesque to appeal to Mr. Kerr's romantic view of how Japan ought to be, but just maybe it serves a purpose? I wonder if he's even considered this.
Just like an anime weeaboo, Alex Kerr is in love with his own skewed perception of the way he thinks Japan should be. And he resents Japan for not conforming to this view. He doesn't stop to think that there are practicalities to the change in architecture in Japan, and that maybe there are reasons why people don't want to live in extremely old houses full of problems. You can't make Japanese people love kabuki, just like you can't make Greeks love ancient Greek theater. Just because I'm an American, you can't force me to love reading Jane Austin novels, or Mark Twain for that matter. It doesn't interest me at all. If certain art forms die out, that means that they once served their purpose and no longer speak to the newer generations.
Dogs and Demons: Tales from the Dark Side of Japan, aka "why Japan is so terrible and Thailand is so great"
I read this book in 2002 while living in Japan, at the height of my culture shock, so I was in a rather impressionable state of mind when reading his hyperbole. I really wish now that I hadn't been so easily influenced by this book. It took a while to realize how full of errors this book is, and I passed it off onto a friend (with a warning though, of course). There's a lot of truth in this book, but you have to read through a lot of garbage hyperbole to find it.
To be fair, Alex Kerr does make some valid points in the book, especially when it comes to wasteful construction. I found his explanation of the outdated construction laws to be very enlightening. My in-laws live in a small town in the Japan Alps in Nagano-ken. A lazy, two-lane highway goes past their house, continues along the contour of the hills, and proceeds to the main area of town. For the past few years, however, a huge superstructure has been under construction in this quiet valley. They're building a huge, six-lane bridge to connect from one ridge to the next. So the small, two-lane highway will go through the downtown area, turn into a huge, six-lane bridge that spans a valley, connect to the ridge near my family's house, and then sudenly revert back to a two lane highway. There isn't a ton of traffic on this road, mind you. So all this effort is just to shave about 4-6 minutes off of the drive along the side of the mountain! Undoubtedly this will kill the nearby rest area along the small highway, where travelers can stop in for a quick lunch and buy the town's local senmon. The bridge will bypass this segment of the highway altogether and destroy the business. This makes me sad, and so does seeing this super huge bridge interrupting what used to be a pleasant view. It's sick and unnecessary, and I'm sure Alex Kerr would totally agree with me on this.
After reading this book, it did shed some light on some of the absurdity of Japan. I live in Arizona, so after reading this book, I can imagine what it would be like if the Grand Canyon was located in Japan. Safety railing would be installed along the entire perimeter, and loudspeakers would constantly chime in with a woman's voice, telling everyone to please be safe. Snack vendors selling ice cream, yakisoba, and corn dogs would be lined up along the canyon, too.
However, the author does exaggerate quite a bit, and some of the things he complains about betray his ignorance. One thing he complains about several times is those huge concrete "jacks" that are put along the shorelines, and what an ugly eyesore they are. Well yes, they don't look very picturesque, but perhaps Mr. Kerr is forgetting that Japan is often battered by typhoons and tsunamis? Those are put there for a reason. He includes an anecdote about some neighborhood in Tokyo complaining about having trees along the road, and this would lead the reader to believe that Japanese hate trees and you don't ever see trees lining the streets of Tokyo. This is more ridiculous hyperbole. He also complains about the telephone poles everywhere. While they can be ugly to look at, in such an earthquake-prone country, there are several reasons why Japan mustn't bury them all underground. He complains about stuff like the melodies at the train stations, too. Many JR train stations in Japan have their own unique melodies and are specific even to individual track platforms, adding to the personality to the area. That's part of the charm and beauty of Japan, and it's sad that he fails to realize that.
Of particular note is that Alex Kerr seems to hate manga and anime. He contends that Pokemon is targeted at adults in Japan (HUH?) and how anime just doesn't appeal to real adults, such as Disney movies (again, HUH?)! The example he uses is "Disney's" Prince of Egypt movie (It was Stephen Spielburg's Dreamworks, duh!). It only further shows how out of touch he is. As I've discussed on my page before and on my YouTube channel, there is nothing "immature" about an adult reading stuff like comic books, but Mr. Kerr really takes issue with Japanese adults who dare to read manga. Sorry Mr. Kerr, but you may already know that ukiyo-e was considered the "vulgar" pop art of its time, yet it became a part of Japan's identity. Heck, Hokusai's "The Wave" is nearly universally recongized, and its design is imitated, such as the logo for the Quicksilver line of clothing.
Additionally, he complains at length about cute stuff in Japan. Sorry, but plenty of people love Japan because of its obsession with "cute." Japanese girls love stuff like Rilakkuma and Hello Kitty merchandise, while American teenage girls beg their parents for tattoos and body piercings. Between a Japanese teenage girl and an American teenage girl, should I even bother asking which one is at a higher risk of teenage pregnancy? Perhaps there are some things that Japan does right? There's the charm of innocence in Japan that should be treasured, not scoffed at. Look at the highly sexualized treatment that girls receive in other countries.
...Which leads me to the point I want to make about this book. Alex Kerr gushes on and on about how great and beautiful Thailand is, and how much nicer it is than Japan. So let's take Bangkok for example, and what a cesspool of humanity that place can be, particularly with its blatant child sex trade. So Mr. Kerr ignores all this and attacks the erosion of Japanese culture, all because Thailand doesn't line their lakes and rivers with concrete? Have a great life in Thailand, Mr. Kerr. My aunt from Bangkok had tanks rolling through the streets right by her family's mansion while the coup d'etat instilled martial law in the country a few years back. On a more recent trip to visit her family, she and my uncle had to be escorted to the airport while there were violent demonstrations in the streets. Have fun in Thailand, Mr. Kerr.
Sure, the Japanese government can be a rather unfunny joke. But at least it's not run by militaristic despots. I sure hope the author realizes by now that every country has its share of problems, and I imagine he must feel silly having painted the United States as a good model of fiscal responsibility, especially with all the so-called "stimulus spending" that Washington has cooked up in recent years. It would be pretty far-fetched to say that the United States doesn't have more than its fair share of bureaucracy and skyrocketing, irresponsible government spending since we haven't had a President who could balance a budget since Bill Clinton. And it keeps getting worse with each new President. But hey, enjoy Thailand, Mr. Kerr. Just pretend those little girls standing on the street corners in their underwear don't exist. At least they don't collect Hello Kitty dolls!
Now read what I have to say about the Star Wars prequels. Now it's my turn to bitch and moan and be nostalgic!
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mail: greg -atsign- stevethefish -dot- net