I think I’m gonna try reading both stories of the day if I have enough time for each.
reading the guide linked in the OP beforehand was very useful for ピアノ. I was only aware before that old verbs ending in ふ are written today as う, but never thought that the h kana were used so often, it would’ve confused me a lot if I had gone in blind.
I assume this version of 蜜柑 was modernized except for the kanji spellings, but personally I thought that was enough to make a difference, and it felt a bit easier than ピアノ
both were pretty interesting reads. I hadn’t noticed that both were by the same author, only decided to check when I noticed the use of repeated phrases (又不可解な、下等な、退屈な人生 in one, 桃色、水色、薄黄色など in the other) and thought it was too similar
Read ピアノ today and really enjoyed it. Great sense of atmosphere, and a lot of the old kanji were fun (yet more okami flashcards came in handy as well , saw 鼬 and did the leonardo dicaprio point meme) Then listened to it again after with the read-along. That’s my first 芥川, and if he writes shorts like this it definitely wont be my last.
Will try to go back and read 蜜柑 when I’m back at home tomorrow, but it’s got a little too much going on to read while being at my parents still.
Getting done with the N1 (I don’t know how to feel but exhausted) and then having such a lovely little store as 蜜柑 to relax into
I didn’t even notice I put 芥川 as the first story author for both calendars I did some last minute shuffling of the order and totally missed that. Happy accident!
I couldn’t stand him til last year My first few introductions to him were awful. I think in general I like his short stories but can’t stand his essays or moral story telling. I also accidentally read his suicide note as my very first intro to him which soured me for awhile.
So mean! I was like ‘wow, he’s really going in on this poor kid’
Ahh I’m glad you enjoyed it! And isn’t it amazing how some Japanese writers just evoke such intense imagery and atmosphere with only a few pages? I remember reading my first Dazai (another famous author we’ll see in this challenge!) and being so wowed by it
It’s crazy how quickly you get used to them, too! If I go a long while I need a refresher, but usually by the end of an Aozora binge I feel like a pro
I suspect you are right. You can see the source they took from at the bottom of the Aozora page and most are modern publications and I guess it’s up the editor/publisher at that time to decide if they want to modernize it for their audience.
Yesss!! It was v. rewarding, glad I jumped in! Def. won’t have time to do every story because I have a lot of reads to focus on rn, but will try and read a couple more when I can.
So good!! I’m impressed. Went back to my werewolf survival game children’s book after this and somehow the prose was not quite as evocative…
I’ve decided to make this a listening challenge for me using the easier advent of the 2, so I’ve listened to the first 2 between yesterday and today, will be doing a read through at a later date. Today’s one was definitely easier and I understood the majority of it without look ups.
Haha, I looked up sooo much and I’m probably going to reread it after work because I still feel a bit puzzled
Here are some things I looked up:
天才になりそこなった男の話
襷掛け - style of wearing a kimono. Looks like this:
千人針 - ‘soldier’s charm’ - seems to be for wishing for the safe return of soldiers. Looks like this:
四谷お岩, who his face was said to be swelled up to look like, is a youkai
And finally I don’t know if I’ve encountered 羅府 to mean Los Angeles before (my IME won’t even let me write it, had to copy it) but I looked it up and sure enough, the Manchuria invasion was 1931 and the Los Angeles Olympics were 1932
Ok I reread today’s story (天才になりそこなった男の話) and liked it so much on reread. Since I wasn’t splitting my attention so much I could just enjoy the story for what it was. As an aside, what he describes in the story isn’t actually that far off base! It’s rare, but it can happen. It’s called Acquired Savant Syndrome - source
I wasn’t quite sure what to think of 一房の葡萄 at first, and as I was reading it I kept thinking of the time period and trying to figure it out as some sort of political allegory, but when I read a little more about the author and the collection this was published in, I think it’s fine to treat as just a children’s story. Good depiction of those kinds of random strong memories you hold on to from childhood.
Language wasn’t too bad other than the one funny kanji jumpscare, ballpark it somewhere in the mid-high 20s, natively didn’t give me the option to compare, but it felt pretty similar to 怪人二十面相 difficulty at like 27/28
I swear 宮沢賢治 always has me googling things to see if I missed something The opinions of laypeople is also ‘errr…is this a scrap of a story?’. The intentional writing of 〔以下原稿空白〕makes me think that this is intentional, though.
桜の樹の下には | L32 This was a re-read for me. Last year I only gave it 2 stars, but it has actually improved to 3 stars… I don’t love it, but 2 stars was too harsh. It’s got vibes, for sure.
正月の思い出 | L30?? This seems to be nonfiction of an autobiographical nature. Was an interesting snippet. I think most people will experience a similar disconnect in their life at least once.
Wow, yeah, no kidding. Other than everything being written with kanji forms and using all the kana repeater marks, really all the feelings in this could’ve been from something written in the last few years
Published in 1937, apparently – given the time period, the tail end of the essay seems to strike a subtly antimilitaristic note. But maybe I’m reading too much into it.
桜の樹の下には is an odd one all right, and one that I feel like I’ve seen referenced before in contemporary stuff, although I can’t remember any off the top of my head. I’ll keep an eye out for it, though
Went and found a translation to compare to after reading it because there were a few parts that felt too strange to be what was actually being said, but no, they were
(yet more okami flashcards came in handy as well , saw 鼬 and did the leonardo dicaprio point meme) Then listened to it again after with the read-along. That’s my first 芥川, and if he writes shorts like this it definitely wont be my last.
I did some last minute shuffling of the order and totally missed that. Happy accident!
My first few introductions to him were awful. I think in general I like his short stories but can’t stand his essays or moral story telling. 
Seems like the story was left unfinished.
