MARCH WAS MADE OF YARN

z

Reections on the Japanese Earthquake, Tsunami, and Nuclear Meltdown

Edited by Elmer Luke and David Karashima

VINTAGE BOOKS A DIVISION OF RANDOM HOUSE, INC. NEW YORK

A V I N TAG E B O O K S O R IG I N A L , M A RC H 2 012

Introduction and compilation copyright 2012 by Elmer Luke All translations are copyright 2012 in the name of their respective translators.All rights reserved. Published in the United States by Vintage Books, a division of Random House, Inc., New York, and in Canada by Random House of Canada Limited, Toronto. Vintage and colophon are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc. The following pieces were originally published separately in Japan in 2011, except where otherwise noted: The Crows and the Girl copyright 2011 by Brother & Sister Nishioka The Charm copyright 2011 by Kiyoshi Shigematsu Box Story copyright 2011 by Tetsuya Akikawa Nightcap copyright 2011 by Yoko Ogawa God Bless You, 1993 and God Bless You, 2011 copyright 1993, 2011 by Hiromi Kawakami March Yarn copyright 2011 by Mieko Kawakami Ride on Time copyright 2011 by Kazushige Abe Words copyright 2011 by Shuntaro Tanikawa The remainder of the pieces were commissioned for this book and are copyright 2012 in the name of their respective authors. This book is published with the support of the Read Japan program of The Nippon Foundation. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data March was made of yarn : reections on the Japanese earthquake, tsunami, and nuclear meltdown / edited by David Karashima and Elmer Luke. p. cm. A Vintage Books original. ISBN 978-0-307-94886-1 1. Japanese literature21st centuryTranslations into English. 2. Tohoku Earthquake and Tsunami, Japan, 2011Literary collections. 3. Fukushima Nuclear Disaster, Japan, 2011Literary collections. I. Karashima, David James. II. Luke, Elmer. III. Title. PL782.E1M29 2012 895.6'080358520512dc23 2011050010

Book design by Claudia Martinezwww.vintagebooks.com Printed in the United States of America 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

CONTENTS

zForeword John Burnham Schwartz xiii Introduction Elmer Luke and David Karashima xviiTHE ISLAND OF ETERNAL LIFE

Yoko Tawada 3THE CHARM

Kiyoshi Shigematsu 13NIGHTCAP

Yoko Ogawa 35

xGOD BLESS YOU,

CONTENTS

2011 Hiromi Kawakami 37MARCH YARN

Mieko Kawakami 55LULU

Shinji Ishii 71ONE YEAR LATER

J. D. McClatchy 93GRANDMAS BIBLE

Natsuki Ikezawa 95PIECES

Mitsuyo Kakuta 109SIXTEEN YEARS LATER, IN THE SAME PLACE

Hideo Furukawa 127THE CROWS AND THE GIRL

Brother & Sister Nishioka 137

CONTENTS

xiBOX STORY

Tetsuya Akikawa 151DREAM FROM A FISHERMANS BOAT

Barry Yourgrau 157HIYORIYAMA

Kazumi Saeki 163RIDE ON TIME

Kazushige Abe 183LITTLE EUCALYPTUS LEAVES

Ryu Murakami 189AFTER THE DISASTER, BEFORE THE DISASTER

David Peace 197

Authors 207 Translators 211

INTRODUCTION

z

M

arch 11, 2011. An earthquake off the northeastern coast of Japanmagnitude 9.0, duration six minutes, type megathrust unleashes a fty-foot tsunami that within fteen minutes slams its way ashore, surging inland six miles, crushing all in its path, and triggering the slow, relentless leak of radiation from rst two, then three, then ve nuclear power plants. In ones wildest imagination, this is beyond conceivable. But this is just the beginning. The waves do not stop; they recede and rush back in without ceasing. Nor do the aftershocks, which are themselves rolling earthquakes of terrifying magnitude. Nor does the death toll, or the number of missing, or the danger from radiation, which seems to be controlled incrementally, until the meltdown begins. Nor does the overwhelming sense of loss and despair.

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INTRODUCTION

Life goes on, indifferently and pitilessly, but life is not the same, and life will have been reconsidered. Here, a wideranging selection of writers offer their response to this uncharted moment signicant for the double blow we have sustained from both nature and mana portentous marker in modern human history. The piecesnonction, ction, including a manga, and poetrywith perspectives near and distant, reconceive the catastrophe, imagine a future and a past, interpret dreams, impel purpose, point blame, pray for hope. Specic in reference, universal in scope, these singular heartfelt contributions comprise an artistic record of this time. Some of the pieces were written for this anthology, some were first published in literary magazines in Japan, all amid the initial horror and uncertainty immediately following the disaster when lives, seemingly secure and in forward motion, were in a matter of minutes altered, thrown off course, beyond repair. This theme is most evident for writers from Tohoku, in northeastern Japan, which bore the physical (let alone emotional) brunt of the disaster. But no writer from Tokyo the uncomfortable middle ground or, for that matter, elsewhere distant (and safe) went unaffected or untouched. Life might have seemed to go on, but not without evacuation packs, aftershocks, brown- outs, unwashed clothes, empty store shelves, worry about contamination, worry for young ones and elder ones, and our future as well as nightmares, depression, worst memories, and prayers. In this anthology, Tohoku natives Hideo Furukawa and Kazumi Saeki draw upon the immediacy of family and locality, where history provides a sense of continuity, however

INTRODUCTION

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tenuous it may be under the circumstances; while Natsuki Ikezawa, who himself spent weeks delivering emergency supplies in stricken areas, focuses on the unexpected scope of emotions of those who give care. From Tokyo, Mieko Kawakami depicts poignantly, if painfullyin the story from which the title of this collection was takenhow an earthquake far away can change the terms of something as simple as pregnancy. Similarly, with Mitsuyo Kakuta, for whom the entire notions of intimacy and dependency are called into question. Hiromi Kawakami, whose work represented here was the rst literary piece to emerge in Japan from the stunned silence after March 11, revisits the story that launched her career eighteen years beforewith a landscape physically and emotionally changed. Her updated story is accompanied with a postscript and the original story that the new work was adapted from. Kazushige Abe takes us to a place where we are perhaps most reluctant to gointo the ocean and beneath the wavesin an ironically positive tale about the irrational obsession to prevail. And Tetsuya Akikawa, in a tale lined with bureaucratic obsession, suggests redemption where we least expect it. From the greater distance of western Japan, Yoko Ogawa writes of reposeand our need for it. David Peace, who has returned to Tokyo after several years in England, inhabits the world of Ryunosuke Akutagawa as he experiences the social trauma of the Great Kanto Earthquake of 1923. Barry Yourgrau, sitting at his desk in New York, connects fragments of the Japan of his imagination to create a dreamlike narrative of postMarch 11 life. Meanwhile, Ryu Murakami seeks

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INTRODUCTION

meaningand hopein the twigs from a felled eucalyptus tree that he has stuck into dirt. In Yoko Tawadas The Island of Eternal Life, a group of doctors gathers reies to harness for evening light as they seek a cure of radiation sickness, while in Shinji Ishiis Lulu, translucent women descend each night to comfort children orphaned by the disaster. Then, in a change of pace, the Brother & Sister Nishioka team have drawn a cautionary manga for the day, and the poets Shuntaro Tanikawa and J. D. McClatchy remind us, in the depth and breadth of their response, of the value of words, simply written, gently spoken.

The idea for this project took gradual shape as we traveled among Tokyo, Tohoku, London, and New York, watching from near and far as March 11 and its aftermath unfolded. A thought became a shared idea that was developed further as we shoveled debris into the back of trucks in Tohoku, as riots racked London, as storms struck the East Coast of the United States, as a heat wave hit Tokyo, as oods raged through Bangkok, even as the cleanup in northeastern Japan proceeded but radiation continued to leak. It has been that kind of year. We wish to thank the writers who have seen through the thick haze of the moment to clarity to offer us these pieces. We thank the translators who responded with care and generosity to their tasks. We acknowledge our excellent editors Lexy Bloom, at Vintage; Liz Foley, at Harvill Secker; and Kazuto Yamaguchi, at Kodanshafor their patronage, encouragement, and advocacy of this project on

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three continents. We wish to acknowledge the Read Japan program of The Nippon Foundation for its support of the publication of this anthology. Proceeds from the book will go to support charities that have been sparing no effort in helping to rebuild towns, homes, and individual lives in Tohoku.

Elmer Luke, New York David Karashima, Tokyo

P R H S AC P U C AE O Y

V t e A c o B os i a / n h r ok ng