First of all, I want to thank you for dropping by here.
This is the very first post on this blog... Shyness and solemnity will rule over the next lines.
The purpose: why a blog?
There are already countless blogs and websites on Japan out there, some of them of outstanding quality. Why a new one? In short, I tend to think that as a culture is alive, it should always be discussed, debated, approached from various critical perspectives, in order to remain strong, in order to keep on living. This blog aims at just that: providing another take on culture, but also on issues that face Japan today and on its unique features and quirks. Also, if you ask yourself why I chose the blog form over the regular website one, well, it's just because my depressing lack of skills in that field sort of obliged me to do so.
What's with this name? « Miso soup »?
In the Miso Soup is a novel written by the Japanese author Murakami Ryu and published for the first time in 1997. Trash, gore and highly clever, the book has the seediest part of Tokyo as its setting and, as is always the case with Murakami Ryu, depicts a dark, sexual and violent Japan, never very far from a civilization crisis. The miso soup is also a typical Japanese soup, often eaten as a side dish or for breakfast. It's thus, as I see it, both a symbol of traditional Japan and a reference, through Murakami, to the darkest aspects of this country. The Miso soup, it's Japan itself...
Who am I?
Without entering deep, boring details, I feel like a short introduction is not totally irrelevant: I'm a graduate student in Paris, where I was born. I have also studied for one year in Tokyo, an experience that has deeply influenced me, made me think a lot and made me change my mind on many things I used to take for granted. Since childhood, I have been passionate for comics (mostly European and Japanese ones, widely known as manga for the latter), video games – with a preference for role-playing games, books and cinema. You can expect those interests to be widely discussed around here. Ah, and English is not my native language – so please forgive my occasional unintentional assaults on Shakespeare's wonderful idiom.
But this is enough about me.
A last word (or just a bit more)
See you around! またね～
