Japan prompts some interesting questions

Recently, we had an entry into the Global Short Story Competition from Japan.

Japanese fiction is interesting because it brings together two strands of debate which often crop up in conversation with writers.

One strand is how much of themself does the writer inject into the story? How much of their own experience and their own emotion shapes their writing? If at all. That has brought forth some really interesting, and at times fairly vigorous, replies. It is clearly a contentious subject for some writers.

My research has suggested that there is a very strong sense of the writer in some Japanese fiction. One historical piece about modern Japanese fiction suggested: “Although modern Japanese writers cover a wide variety of subjects, one particularly Japanese approach stressed their subjects’ inner lives, widening the earlier novel’s preoccupation with the narrator's consciousness. In Japanese fiction, plot development and action have often been of secondary interest to emotional issues.”

It’s another take on a fascinating subject - how much does the writer stand back and tell a story? And if they do decide to embrace deep emotion, how much of their take on the world makes its way into the final edit? And does it get in the way of the storytelling process? I am sure there will be further comments on this one.

The second debate in which Japan features is a purely technological one dealing with the future of the book.

Japan has already been leading the use of technology in the writing and publishing process, witnessing the appearance of mobile phone novels in the early stages of the 21^st Century. Famously, at the end of 2007, four of Japan‘s five fiction best sellers were produced on mobiles.

As I understand it, rather than appearing in printed form, the story is sent directly to the reader via SMS text message, usually chapter by chapter. And it’s growing in popularity in Japan as well as in other countries.

It is another example of how technology shapes publishing and something that very much interests us as we plan our own future.
John Dean