Foodscapes of Contemporary Japanese Women Writers: An Ecocritical Journey around the Hearth of Modernity [Hardcover]

Translated from Japanese, this study exposes English-language scholars to the complexities of the relationship between food, culture, the environment, and literature in Japan. Yuki explores the systems of value surrounding food as expressed in four popular Japanese female writers: Ishimure Michiko, Taguchi Randy, Morisaki Kazue, and Nashiki Kaho.Translator's Introduction Preface to the English edition Introduction PART I: A DISCUSSION WITH ISHIMURE MICHIKO 1. Interview with Ishimure Michiko: What have people eaten? 2. Analysis: Literary resistance to toxic discourse: Paradise in the Sea of Sorrow and post-Minamata literature PART II: A DISCUSSION WITH TAGUCHI RANDY 3. Interview with Taguchi Randy: Approaching the relational world of eating 4. Adoration and resistance: A literary practice revolving around food and contamination PART III: A DISCUSSION WITH MORISAKI KAZUE 5. Interview with Morisaki Kazue: The logic of eating together 6. Analysis: A diasporic intervention into modernity: A world of eating together PART IV: A DISCUSSION WITH NASHIKI KAHO 7. Interview with Nashiki Kaho: Foodscape on the boundaries 8. Analysis: A world of food and working with one's hands: Hybridity of a magic table

A fascinating study of the frequently fraught relationships among food, literature, the environment, and modernity, Yuki Masami's Foodscapes of Contemporary Japanese Women Writers is an innovative contribution to the growing body of writing on Japanese literature and the environment. The book's distinctive format, combining pioneering analyzes of creative work by Ishimure Michiko, Taguchi Randy, Morisaki Kazue, and Nashiki Kaho with transcripts of interviews with these key environmentally engaged writers, thus bringing to the table multiple voices, offers a bounty of resources for scholars and enthusiasts of Japan, Japanese literature and culture, food studies, and ecocriticism alike. - Karen L. Thornber, Professor of Comparative Literature and of East Asian LanguageslÃ(