On the creation of a book

I am learning a lot about what goes into putting together an anthology. It's not just slapping a bunch of stories between some covers and calling it a book. There's has to be balance, an internal structure. And one of the most amazing things is reading the work people have sent and being able to see themes developing. Of course we're still reading, still taking submissions, and the shape is not complete. But I'm starting to see the outline.

With that in mind, I'd love to see some more stories (especially stories, but also art) about:

• Schoolgirls and salarymen and subcultures and modern Japanese pop culture.
• Japan outside Japan (we have two beautiful submissions that capture the delicate way Japanese culture touches the rest of the world; I would love one more of these set in LA.)
• Animals -- foxes and catfish and koi and herons and cats.
• Food. (If someone has a story built around an actual recipe, that would be amazing.)
• Folklore and legends -- I would love to see some of vibrant characters from Japanese folktale and mythology brought to life in new stories. 
• Cherry blossoms and origami. ('Nuff said.) 

Some things I would love to see, that we have not seen much of yet, are:

• Futuristic Japan--robots, cyberpunks, high-tech. (Go ahead, send us that near-future science fiction!)
• Manga! I know there are some coming our way--but we haven't seen it yet. We would love at least one story in manga.

I think these stories must be out there, and we would love to see them.

(Please do not send stories about the tsunami and the earthquake; we have received so many eloquent, touching stories about the disaster, but if we included them all, this book would read like a dirge when it is meant to be a celebration--a reminder that Japan is still a beautiful country.)

Thank you, everyone, who has already sent us something. It's because of you that this book is going to be beautiful.

More Banana, Please

There are many reasons I have come to love Japanese literature, but if I had to list a few of the top things which I am drawn to I would have to say the deceptive simplicity and the way some of the Japanese writers tend to go around and around things leaving you stunned at the end when you realize you were actually looking directly at it all along.

One of the writers I most admire is Banana Yoshimoto. I think the following graph from Elizabeth Wadell's review of Hardboiled & Hard Luck in The Quarterly Conversation really does a fantastic job of summing up the magic that is Banana Yoshimoto:

The narrators are in a fragile, undetermined state of trying to figure out how to pay tribute to their tragedies while still finding some way past them. At times, they express nostalgia for the real, clear pain of the tragedy, and all moments when feeling was genuine and clear. Describing the aftermath of her sister’s cerebral hemorrhage, the narrator of “Hard Luck” explains, “Kuni hadn’t only given us pain, she also created moments for us that were so much more concentrated then usual. In the world we lived in, the good times were a hundred times better. If we couldn’t catch that sparkle only the agony would remain.”

This is what I would love to see more of in our submissions.

This attempt to transcend the horrifying tragedy still unfolding in Japan.

What we're looking for

It is so hard for me, for all of us, to read your submissions. They are beautiful, they are poignant. They are heartfelt; we know how deeply you care. We read it in your words, as you try to make sense of this terrible thing that has happened and try to understand how the world did not end, how life can go on.

Last night I went to bed and cried.

We've been talking, as editors, about our vision for this book.

It's not a book that makes people go to bed and cry. It is too soon for that kind of tribute. We do not need to remember the tragedy; it's still happening.

This is not a book of mourning. This is a book of hope.

This book is of Japan.

It is about sushi and salarymen and samurai. It is about emperors and ASIMO. It is about gyaru and cherry blossoms and love hotels. It is about temples and tatami mats and tea ceremonies. It is about the past, and the future. It is about the present too, but not only The Disaster.

We aren't going to ignore the earthquake, the tsunami, the nuclear emergency. How could we? But there must be balance. It's going to be a very small part of the book. Just like it's a very small part of all the things that have made Japan Japan.

So send me poems about Chiba cyberpunks and armies of giant robots commanded by schoolgirls. Send me The Merchant of Venice set in Twenty-first century Tokyo. Send me a story about how a paper crane saves the world. Send me a story about how a boy and a girl fall in love. Send me J-horror and 50's sci-fi. Send me manga--we haven't seen any yet, and how can we have a book about Japan without?

We don't need stories about what's happening in Japan, we need stories about Japan.

(And, thank you.)

-Frankie