As has been pointed out more times than I can count, and not just by me, anything we write that is meant to be read constitutes an implied contract with the reader, whoever that reader might be. The reader agrees to read what we’ve written with an open mind, and in return, you agree not to waste their time. I say anything, because this applies to a legal document or a business letter just as much as it applies to a work of fiction. One distinction is, in fiction, you’re allowed to play with reader expectations, mostly because you’re allowed to do anything, even things you don’t yet have the skill to get away with. Even when you do have that skill, turning readers’ expectations on their heads and making them like it is a trick you can only pull now and then, for the obvious reason that, if you do it enough, then the readers’ expectations change and now they’ll be disappointed if you don’t try to lead them down the garden path. The contract remains the same but the assumptions informing that contract change all the time.
Review: Hyakunin Isshu – One Hundred People, One Poem Each
Hyakunin Isshu edited by Fujiwara no Teika, Translation by Larry Hammer, Cholla Bear Press, 2011. Print edition through Lulu.com
In the 13th century CE, a nobleman named Teika of the Fujiwara clan compiled an anthology of 100 poems, each by a different poet, the Hyakunin Isshu. This volume wasn’t unique, but as Larry Hammer notes in his foreward, this particular collection has become so famous over the years that any time someone refers to the Hyakunin Isshu, they mean this one. Anyone who has watched much anime may have seen a memory card game called karuta being played on New Year’s Day. That card game is based on this compilation, which shows that the anthology has survived in Japan’s popular culture down to the modern age. Continue reading
In Which I Am a Raving Idjit
Pardon my silence of the last few days. In addition to some long-delayed DIY projects for the household, I’ve been nursing my poor computer back to health after a serious system crash. Nothing lost but a few games I didn’t need in the first place, though I will have to key in the data from last year’s tax return. Could have been a lot worse.
Of course, I made it worse than it had to be. For the last two days off and on I’ve been trying to track down a really nasty humm/hiss in my PC’s audio playback, with no success. It was maddening. Drivers up to date, mixer settings apparently correct, digital sound configured…but it was still hissing like a pit of snakes on espresso. Keep in mind, my day job is computer/network support. And I couldn’t even correct what should have been a relatively minor audio glitch compared to the system crash?
To make a long story short, I’d left the #$@# headset mic on. I wasn’t using it, I never do, but it was taking input in the form of electronic hissing. Nor did I figure it out like a good tech, I just stumbled across it when looking at the mixer settings for umpteenth time.
Gad. Sometimes I think I’ve got a decent handle on things. At other times I think I’m just not all that bright. This is one for the second category. Tomorrow, maybe, I’ll put an actual post together. It could happen.
A Little Knowledge is Dangerous — and Annoying
I’m a junker. This is not a confession, just a statement of self-evident fact. No, our house is not packed to the rafters with antique garbage (or any other kind). We buy very selectively, and “the hunt is always more fun than the kill,” metaphorically speaking. But that hunt is something Carol and I do for fun, and I was more or less hooked the day I found a Hiroshi Yoshida woodblock print for fifteen bucks, when a comparable one sold at auction for $600+. “Antique” stores, flea markets, whatever. If we find one we have to check it out. This interest branches out into other areas—Woodblock prints, Japanese swords and mountings, and other things I have neither the time nor money to pursue properly. But I’m a writer. I research. It’s almost instinctive. So is learning a little bit about a lot of things, which helps you to know where to dig when more depth is required for a project. Plus, anything that interests me, I have to know more about it. Human nature, that is. Continue reading
Reflections on “The Tongue-Cut Sparrow”
As with most folklore there are variations on this story, but this is the basic tale–a poor but kindly old couple more or less adopt a sparrow because they like to hear it singing. A bad-tempered neighbor doesn’t like the sparrow at all, because it wakes her up in the morning. So she decides to catch it and split its tongue so it can’t sing anymore. This she does, and the maimed bird flies away. In sorrow, the old couple go looking for the bird, but when they follow in the direction it flew, what they find is a magnificent mansion where they are warmly greeted by a man who identifies himself as the sparrow. This is not so strange in context since, in Japanese folklore, almost all animals were thought to be shapeshifters. Regardless, the old couple are treated to great hospitality. When they are ready to leave, the sparrow offers the couple their choice of two baskets as gifts. One is small and light, the other rather large and heavy. Still in sorrow for what happened to their friend and not wishing to impose on his generosity, they pick the small basket. Once they return home, they discover that the basket is magic, and will produce whatever they wish: rice, cloth, even gold. The poor old couple are no longer poor. The bad-tempered neighbor, seeing their good fortune, asks how they came by the basket and they tell her. At this point the neighbor resolves to visit the sparrow herself. Continue reading
