Tentative Topic for Final Research Project

It's been a difficult couple of weeks trying to figure out just what I'm most interested in writing about for this final research project.  But finally--I think--I have decided on a (tentative) topic.

As an English and Japanese double major, I am most unsurprisingly obsessed with literature in all its forms.  Although I have only taken two classes in Japanese literature, I have taken countless classes in British and American literature, which has provided me with a keen understanding of Western depictions of certain prevalent themes during specific literary periods.  It was during my first few encounters with Japanese literature, however, that I began to notice the startlingly high number of references to a single theme, a theme that seemed to span historical periods: Death.  But this wasn't natural death; it wasn't the typical conflict of murder or assassination or manslaughter usually depicted in our traditional tales of love, justice, or revenge--this was self-imposed, self-willed.  Voluntary self-destruction.  In other words, suicide.

My first thoughts were, Why is suicide such a popular theme?  Why do the Japanese seem to have such a fascination with self-destruction?

In Tanizaki's Quicksand, for example, a trio of lovers prepares for a communal suicide ritual by gulping poison.  In Mishima's Patriotism, a devoted soldier commits seppuku--a traditional samurai ritual that consists of disemboweling oneself with a sword.

As these works illustrate, suicide is a commitment to another human being, an expression of love.  It is also a pinnacle of honor and a mark of masculinity.

Overall, suicide appears to be a complicated concept, leaving me to wonder: What is the best way to approach this topic?  Perhaps, I thought, if I analyze it from both a historical/cultural lens and a psychological perspective, I will be better able to understand just why this theme of suicide has survived (pun intended) the ages and remains so prevalent in contemporary Japanese literature today.  And so I have tentatively decided that with this research project, I will attempt to use the resources of psychology and cultural history to grasp a better comprehension of the significance of suicide in Japanese literature.  

Wish me luck in my research! \(^o^)/ ありがとう！

Assignment 2: Ibsen vs. Bond

It's Assignment 2 time already!  For this paper, we're required to discuss the relationship between the audience and the author of a particular work/artistic piece.

Well, as an English major, I can say I knew almost instantly I'd want to focus on a literary work for my topic.  The trickier part, however, was trying to decide between two fascinating plays: 1. Saved by Edward Bond, a startlingly crude tale of violence and social morality, and 2. A Doll's House by Henrik Ibsen, an 1879 drama surrounding the internal plight of a young housewife.

What attracted me to both of these plays were entirely different reasons.

Saved is one of those preposterously macabre narratives, one undoubtedly psychological but also so primitively violent as to be unfairly defined by a single scene in which a gang of youths stone a baby to death.  This particular scene--indeed, the climactic crux of the play--nevertheless elicited some severe outrage following its premiere in 1965.

On the other hand, A Doll's House--released 86 years earlier than Bond's masterwork--is one of those thought-provoking visionaries with an emphasis on re-evaluating society's social and gender constructs in a time of relatively constricting expectations.  The so-called "problem" was in its controversial conclusion: Nora, the model wife and mother as well as keen heroine of the story, decides to abdicate these feminine-relegated functions by leaving her husband and children to seek outside fulfillment in her otherwise monotonous life.

Now, clearly, both of these plays offer room for discussion.  But which seems to evoke a greater sense of an ongoing discourse between the audience and the author?  From what I gathered in my research, I think it is safe to say that Ibsen's A Doll's House ultimately offers far more room for research and analysis.  Whereas Bond did not historically respond much to the negative criticism surrounding his play--or, at least, did not seem to find it alarming--Ibsen thoroughly defended his original ending, referring to any forced changes in it as "barbaric act[s] of violence."  Ibsen, fearing that translators and others would butcher his work, was nonetheless forced to construct an alternate ending to his play, in which Torvald guilt-trips Nora into staying with him for the sake of their children.

Now, what is probably perhaps most fascinating is how Ibsen responded to his audience's negative reactions to the ending in A Doll's House.  Instead of complaining or continuously defending his artistic liberties, Ibsen decided to take a far more interesting route--by composing a follow-up response play entitled Ghosts.  The play was released in 1882, just three years after A Doll's House, and follows a woman named Helen who has led a stiff life of disappointment: Her husband had several affairs in spite of her wishes to reform him and her son struggles with syphilis contracted directly from his father.  Is this the punishment that would await Nora if she were to continue to conform to these Victorian values of strict morality?

The questions of society, roles, gender, and values are too irresistible for me to pass up.  For this assignment, I plan to tackle these elusive ideas and decode just how the audience responded to Ibsen's work, why, and whether or not I believe Ibsen's choice in producing Ghosts was an intelligent and pragmatic response to this criticism.