The Earth Writes: The Great Earthquake and the Novel in Post-3/11 Japan

by Koichi Haga

Overview

This book extensively analyzes the literary works of fiction that draw on the Great East Japan Earthquake and Tsunami that occurred on March 11, 2011. This disaster inspired literally hundreds of fictional works in Japan from the time of the events through 2017. This response represents a unique and perhaps unprecedented cultural phenomenon in the world. Since a variety of writers in different genres, and even amateurs, have written and published books inspired by their experiences of the disaster, it is extremely difficult to cover the entire body of Japanese “post-3.11 literature”. Because of the breadth of this literary response, there is a scarcity of research on the subject available. This book offers the first comprehensive review of Japan’s recent post-disaster literary production to the English audience.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781498569057
Publisher:	Bloomsbury Academic
Publication date:	07/02/2021
Series:	Ecocritical Theory and Practice
Pages:	148
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.34(d)

About the Author

Koichi Haga is associate professor of Japanese and Comparative Literature at Josai International University in Japan.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments

Introduction: Overview of Post 3.11 Cultural Production

Part I:The Immediate Impact of the 3.11 Disaster on the Writers’ Consciousness

Chapter One. Ecological Time-Space Emerging from the Encounter with the 3.11

Earthquake and Tsunami: The first phase of Post 3.11 literary production

Chapter Two. Fissures Opened in Literary Ground: The Great East Japan Earthquake and

Kenzaburō Ōe’s In Late Style

Chapter Three. Animal Agencies in Post-3.11 Literature

Part II: Acceleration of the Writers’ Ecological Consciousness

Chapter Four. Remembrance of Postcolonial Conditions―The Earthquake’s Disclosure

of Uncommon Ground: Tōhoku Area as the Other Within

Chapter Five. Dystopian Novels Flourish in the Post-3.11 Period

Chapter Six. The Emergence of a Planetary Sense Through Geographic Catastrophe

Conclusion

Bibliography

Index

About the Author

Editorial Reviews

Haga shows how the massive earthquake of 3-11 unleashed not only a calamitous tsunami and the man-made nuclear disaster of Fukushima, it also shook to the foundations the form and content of contemporary Japanese fiction. Based on extensive research, the book is filled with fascinating insights that reveal the complex ways Japanese writers are reimagining what it means to live as humans on our volatile planet.

Michael K. Bourdaghs

Koichi Haga’s study of post-3.11 literature in Japan provides a fascinating and necessary glimpse for western readers into the Japanese experience of ecoprecarity in the wake of one of the most devastating natural-technological disasters in recent memory. While the March 2011 earthquake, tsunami, and subsequent nuclear meltdown received widespread attention, the cultural ramifications and interpretations of these events—and the lessons about nuclear risk that we can learn from this predictable and yet unexpected crisis—have scarcely been contemplated outside of Japan. I find this book to be a valuable contribution to risk criticism and ecocriticism.

Scott Slovic

The Earth Writes is a valuable addition to scholarship on Japanese literature. Expertly researched and smoothly written.

The Journal of Japanese Studies