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Jan 3, 2022 • Subscribe
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10 Japanese Literature Books To Read This Halloween
In the spirit of spooky season, it’s time to delve into the mysterious, the unsettling and the downright terrifying.
Books: Reading Murakami
By Jonathan Clements. Almost everything that is written about fiction is either reception (what the reader thought of the book) or production (an occasional making-of about the author…
10 Japanese Literature Books For Your Autumn Reading List
If you're looking to add some spice to your autumn reading and wish you could travel to Japan this fall, let the pages of a book take you…
Why Should You Read Books?
Book reading is on the decline, at least in the US. According to Gallup (Jones, 2022), Americans read 3 fewer books in a year. The total percent of…
Books: Japanese Drinking
By Shelley Pallis. Masaaki Watanabe’s anime series Bartender is part of a long tradition of TV shows about smart loners who help others in secret. Its leading man…
Books: Japanese Cinema
By Jasper Sharp. There are many paths one might take through the vast and varied terrain of Japanese cinema. Peter Cowie’s addition to the ever-expanding range of publications…
Listening/reading log #15 (December 2020)
We’re at the end of the year, finally — now for 2021. Not that changing the year by one number makes that much of a difference in reality,…
Listening/reading log #29 (March 2022)
Usual apologies for the extremely late post. Otherwise, as far as the news goes, the world is even more fucked than ever. With impending doom coming ever closer,…
Listening/reading log #12 (September 2020)
No, I didn’t forget — the monthly recap is here. And this marks a full year of them. It’s weird to think, I had the idea for this…
Listening/reading log #30 (May 2022)
Aaaagh. That describes the last two months. I’m somehow simultaneously worked to hell and behind on my work. Makes me miss my government job a little bit, when…
Listening/reading log #18 (March 2021)
Sorry for the short break between posts and for not being very active in general lately. I’ve had a mountain of work to get through since the beginning…
Listening/reading log #24 (October 2021)
Late again. I’ve been going through shit as usual, but that’s no excuse. All the more reason for me to post. First up: music. Juice (Ryo Kawasaki, 1976)…
Listening/reading log #17 (February 2021)
Sorry for being late this month, work and all that. I’ve been doing these posts long enough now that I had to look up which number this one…
Listening/reading log #20 (May 2021)
Damn, 20 of these posts. This feels like a landmark somehow, though that should really be marked at 24 instead, shouldn’t it? I don’t have anything special planned…
Listening/reading log #19 (April 2021)
Another month gotten through somehow. And no matter how much else I have to do, I’ll keep going here on the site. For now, let’s get to the…
Listening/reading log #22 (August 2021)
Another month spent watching the world fucking burn. I mostly spent it working, and the parts I didn’t I spent mostly watching anime and doing other degenerate kinds…
Listening/reading log #14 (November 2020)
Well look, it’s December already and cold as fuck suddenly. I like winter better than summer, but that still doesn’t mean I like below freezing temperatures. I’m not…
Listening/reading log #27 (January 2022)
Well, that wasn’t the start to the new year I wanted. But work piled on as usual. Fuck all this talk about “work/life balance” and de-stressing. As far…
Listening/reading log #16 (January 2021)
Here’s the usual month-ending post. One day early because of my very inconvenient schedule coming up, but if anyone posts anything astounding today that I end up missing,…
Listening/reading log #26 (December 2021)
Sorry for the late post again; work has been drowning me, but every time this kind of rush happens it gets easier to deal with. Maybe this is…
Listening/reading log #13 (October 2020)
I’m writing this a few days before possible absolute freakout time here in the States. We’ll probably be okay though. And if we aren’t, then we aren’t. Let’s…
Listening/reading log #28 (February 2022)
Time for the end-of-month post a bit late again. But what a fucking month it was. The invasion of Ukraine isn’t something I’ve commented on here or elsewhere…
Listening/reading log #21 (July 2021)
Another month has passed. Two months in this case, since I skipped June. But I guess I picked a good time to return. Since many of us are…
Listening/reading log #23 (September 2021)
I’m tired. Do you ever feel like you keep walking even though you have no strength left, just because you have to? Maybe that’s the human condition. But…
Listening/reading log #25 (November 2021)
Turns out 2021 was a fucked year too. How about that. Just as we get to the end of it, we’re beaten down by yet another virus variant.…
Listening/reading log #31 (June 2022)
Everything is shit and we’re all doomed. Now that that’s out of the way, let’s get to the music and the posts from around the community as usual,…
(Updated)Books Im reading Summer 2022
Since I haven’t fully finished all these books yet, this is just a summary or review on some of the ones I’m reading currently. I have a lot…
Boost Your Japanese Reading Level with These Sources
We’re all familiar with the language plateaus, the point where you feel like you’re not learning anything new. Which is probably great in the more advanced stages but…
Translated Books I Read in 2022
Mini-translation reviews of the nine translated books I read in 2022. A mixture of fantasy, literary fiction, and non fiction.
Books: Branding Japanese Food
By Jonathan Clements. In 2013, the Japanese prime minister Shinzo Abe took the remarkable step of appearing on YouTube to talk about Japanese food. He was addressing the…
Celestial Method
Years after conducting a strange and mystical ritual as children, a group of friends reunite in their old town to regain long-forgotten memories, confront a supernatural force holding…
Comfort Reading in Japanese
I was in the middle of reading 「熱源」, which won the most recent Naoki Prize, when the coronavirus began spreading, and suddenly reading a book in which the…
Advanced Japanese Reading Practice with Side-by-Side Readers
Want Japanese reading practice with newspapers or essays? Here's how to level up your Japanese game with side-by-side readers.
Can Japanese Spot Foreigners' Japanese by Listening? (Tokyo)
Learn Japanese with Yuta: https://bit.ly/3s0iV18 Support me on Patreon: https://goo.gl/aiWNd5 Twitter: https://twitter.com/ThatYuta Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thatyuta/ Facebook: https://bit.ly/381qpHS Blog: http://www.yutaaoki.com/blog/
Read Manga in Japanese Update (Why I'm Done with Flashcards)
Blog Post: https://myhuangopinion.wordpress.com/2021/01/16/why-i-gave-up-on-flashcards-learning-to-read-manga-in-japanese-addendum/ An update on the series. Hopefully my handwriting is legible. Leave any questions or comments down below, or under the blog itself! Also, timestamps are probably…
Reading list: independent Japanese animation
This is a work in progress (and probably always will be), but here’s a list of resources on indie animation in Japan. I will use a generous definition…
Celestial Method Review
Celestial Method is a show that can be watched in your spare time, and that's about it. TheOASG's anime review.
How to Read Japanese Folktales
Japanese folktales have layers that require some thought to fully understand. Of course, Grimm’s fairy tales and even the Bible require reflection too. Context matters for understanding any…
5 Books Lovers of Japan Need to Read
The following list of books are must reads for those who are interested in Japanese culture, anime, and manga. This list focuses on important events and sections of…
Books: Cooking with Ghibli
By Helen McCarthy. Les Recettes des Films du Studio Ghibli by cook Minh-tri Vo, with photos by Apolline Cartier and film research by Claire-France Thevenon, is out now…
Books: Japanese Film and the Challenge of Video
By Jonathan Clements. Tom Mes’s new book begins in 2022 with Ryusuke Hamaguchi’s Drive My Car winning an Oscar, followed by a flood of gushing articles about how…
Books on Japanese Culture and Society
This past semester I taught a class on Japanese science fiction and fantasy, and I was surprised by how interested my students were in learning more about the…
Overlord viewers who haven't read the books must be so confused
I can understand if some viewers don't recognize Hilma from the second season.
2021 Reading List (Japanese Literature & More…)
After my challenge to read 20 books of Japanese literature in 2020 – and absolutely smashing it – I took a short break over the winter holidays to…
My Saturday Night Listening to Japanese Rap Music
It’s another Saturday night in Japan. You’re sitting in your room, trying to work on an assignment that’s due very soon and suddenly you hear a familiar voice…
Listening to Japanese Music — 2021 Recommendation Roundup Awards
Folks, it’s that time of the year
Listening to Japanese Music — Favorite Band/Group Names
Y’know what they say: it’s all in the name ? Oftentimes the most immediate thing that stands out (to me at least) when I come across Japanese bands…
Listening to Japanese Music — 2022 Recommendation Roundup Awards
It’s awards day babyyy!
Listening to Japanese Music — 2020 Recommendation Roundup Awards
It’s that time of the year