Reactions to the Donald Richie Readings/Lectures

I meant to post this a while ago, but I've badly neglected this blog as of late. Anyhow, Donald Richie has been something of an omnipresence since I came to Tokyo. I had read and admired his work at my home institution, so it was quite the experience to get to see him lecture. Here are a few reactions:

Readings:
1. Lateral View: This was an interesting and relevant reading which certainly broadened my understanding of Japanese neighborhoods. Coming from a small American city where the streets are named sequentially and addresses are conspicuously displayed on the front of buildings, I found Tokyo overwhelming upon my arrival: I quickly learned that knowing the address of a place proves rather unhelpful in locating it. As such, I found Richie's essay "Tokyo: The Impermanent Capital" quite pertinent in explaining the seemingly illogical layout of Tokyo's neighborhoods. As we learned in the Metropolitan Tokyo class, urban design is a rather irrelevant concept in Tokyo; according to Richie, neighborhoods grow and change organically rather than being carefully planned out. Another aspect covered in the article is Tokyo's obsession with constantly tearing down and reconstructing buildings, which was another issue that surprised me upon coming to Japan - even an Important Cultural Property like Kabuki-za is not exempt from this process. Japan does indeed seem to have an obsession with the new, but Richie argues that the cycle of building/destroying/rebuilding can be attributed to the idea of temporality that lies at the core of traditional Japanese beliefs.

2. Tokyo: This is one of the sources I consulted as research for Golden Gai; when he said that the area prohibited pictures, I had hoped it wasn't true, but alas, the neighborhood is indeed an overly private one. In any case, this is an interesting and personal view at the city that Richie has called home for most of his life.

Lectures:
1. Cinema Eclectics: The film covered here was Kore-eda's Distance, a film that I had learned about in my Japanese film class at St. Mary's but never actually watched. I've enjoyed what I've seen of Kore-eda's work, but I have to say that I didn't much care for the film while I was watching it. That said, I appreciated it more after the Q&A session, many issues were pointed out that I had overlooked. Richie compared the film to L'Avventura, and while I never picked up on the connection before, I can definitely see now how Antonioni influenced Kore-eda. I asked a question during the Q&A, but because of my nerves, I started stumbling over my words and Mr. Richie told me to enunciate (I made sure to speak as clearly and loudly as possible when I asked a question at the next lecture.)

2. Reasons Behind Reasons: As one of the few English majors who actually enjoys critical theory, I love learning about semiotics, so this lecture was right up my alley. The concept of the signifier/signified is present in all cultures, but it's particularly relevent in Japan, a culture where there is often a marked discrepany between what a person says and how they truly feel (i.e., honne and tatemae). Yesterday when we went to Golden Gai (the blog entry is forthcoming), bartenders told us they would "think about it" when asked if they would be interested in doing an interview, which of course means they won't do it. Alas!