JOYCEANS IN ASIA
The Kanto James Joyce Study Group 2007
Contents of This Page


  Tokyo Joyce
  "Asian Dining Cafe," 112 Tsurumaki-cho, Waseda
  
  
CONTENTS
   1  Tokyo JJSJ Conference 2004
   2  Seoul JJSK Conference 2004
   3  Culture Tour to Yeoju and Icheon 2004
   4  Welcoming Prof. Kiljoong Kim in Kyoto 2005
   5  The Kansai Joyce Study Group 2006
   6  The Kanto Joyce Study Group 2006
   7  Seoul JJSK Conference 2006
   8  Seoul: miscellanea 2006
   9  The Kanto Joyce Study Group 2007
  10  Seoul JJSK Conference 2008
  11  Seoul: miscellanea 2008
  12  Meeting Morris Beja and Ellen Carol Jones in Tokyo 2010
  13  Seoul JJSK Conference 2010
  14  Seoul: miscellanea 2010
  15  Gwangju JJSK Conference 2012
  16  Suncheon-si, Jeollanam-do (Post-Conference Tour) 2012
  17  2013 Shanghai James Joyce International Symposium
  18  Shanghai: miscellanea 2013

The Kanto James Joyce Study Group

Reading the ALP Chapter (Finnegans Wake, I.viii) Session

At Waseda University

27 January 2007

The Kanto James Joyce Study Group


  The Kanto Joyce Study Group currently has three different monthly sessions for reading James Joyce's works: 1. Intensive Reading Finnegans Wake Session, 2. Reading the ALP Chapter (Finnegans Wake I.viii) Session and 3. Intensive Reading Ulysses Session.  All of them are organized and directed by Prof. Shigeo Shimizu, Waseda University, who is the present president of the James Joyce Society of Japan.

1. Intensive Reading Finnegans Wake Session:
   It is the oldest session which can date back to about 1990.  Now (January 2007) we are reading Book IV.  The contact person is Prof. Shigeo Shimizu, Waseda University.  Normally the monthly session is held at Tokyo University of Marine Science and Technology, 2-1-6 Etchujima, Koto Ward, Tokyo.

2. Reading the ALP Chapter Session:
   It is organized for reading Book I, Chapter 8 (the ALP chapter) of Finnegans Wake.  The contact person is Mitoko Yamabe, Tsuda College.  Normally the monthly session is held at Waseda University, 1-6-1 Nishi-Waseda, Shinjyuku Ward, Tokyo.

3. Intensive Reading Ulysses Session:
   At present (January 2007) they are reading the 17th (Ithaca) episode.  The contact person is Katsuhiko Odai, Senshu University.  Normally the monthly session is held at Waseda University, 1-6-1 Nishi-Waseda, Shinjyuku Ward, Tokyo.

   Besides, it is noted that the majority of the members are also interested in Irish Studies and study some Irish fictions in associated annual summer camp.



Joyce Studies in Japan


  Japan, like Korea where all major works of James Joyce including Finnegans Wake have been translated, is one of the most developed countries in Joyce studies.
  
   James Joyce was first introduced to Japan by Yonejiro Noguchi's article about A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man in 1918 (Gakuto the literary magazine, March 1918 issue).  The next year Ryunosuke Akutagawa, one of the most famous novelists at that time, bought two books of James Joyce including A Portrait.  He was much impressed with Joyce's technique, especially the boy narrator of its first chapter: Later he tried to translate some fragments of the novel under the title "Dedalus."
  
  The first Japanese article about Joyce's Ulysses was published in Eigo-Seinen the literary magazine (English name: The Rising Generation), December 15, 1922 issue by Mirai Sugita.  In 1925 Daigaku Horiuchi wrote an article titled "Shosetsu no Shin-Keishiki toshiteno 'Naiteki-Dokuhaku'" ("Interior Monologue as a New Novel Form"), mentioning that the narrative style of Ulysses was influenced by Edouard Dujardin's Les Lauriers sont coupes (Shincho the literary magazine, August 1925 issue).  One of the earliest Ulysses influence can be seen in another famous novelist Tanizaki Junichiro's lesbian novel "Manji" (1928), in which Tanizaki had a woman narrator use a Joycean interior monologue.  (The interior monologue itself was already lectured in the English Department of Tokyo Imperial University since c. 1900 when some English professors lectured William James.  It became popular among some ambitious novelists through Joyce's works.  Riichi Yokomitsu's novel "Kikai" (literally "Machine") appeared in Kaizo the literary magazine, September 1930 issue.
  
  The first influential academic introduction was done by Prof. Kochi Doi (Tohoku Imperial University)'s "Joyce's Ulysses" in the Kaizo magazine, February 1929 issue, in which Doi introduced and analyzed the structure of the novel and its relationship with A Portrait.  Kochi Doi was said to have known Ulysses in 1922 when he stayed in Boston but it was 1923 in Edinburgh that he got the copy and read it.  Since then, many Japanese scholars including Junichiro Nishiwaki, Yukio Haruyama and Kazutoshi Fukunaga began to argue Ulysses, sometimes comparing with Marcel Proust, Virginia Woolf, etc.
  
  The first Japanese readers could enjoy the first Japanese translation of Ulysses in 1931, even earlier than most American readers did.  The first legal American edition (Random House, January 1934) was made available after the famous Judge John M. Woolsey's decision, and British readers were able to buy the first legal British edition (Bodley Head, September 1937).  The 1931 Japanese translation was probably the third one after the German translation (1927) and the French translation (1929).  This doubtlessly proves that there have been many Japanese people who read Ulysses even a little earlier than in Europe and in America.  The second translation of Ulysses (by Sohei Morita, Nahara Hirosaburo, Naotaro Tatsuguchi, Takehito Ono, Ichiro Ando and Eitaro Murayama) was published by Iwanami-shoten, Tokyo in 1932-1935.  However, according to Joyce's existing letter to T.S. Eliot (dated 20 June 1932), both of the first and the second translations were "pirated editions" ("13,000 copies have been sold to date" as Joyce investigated) before Joyce and Paul Leon brought an accusation against the two Japanese publishers, although they just did not know the Berne convention.  The first complete translation of Dubliners by Sadamu Nagamatsu was published by Kinsei-do, Tokyo in 1933.  The first complete translation of A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man by Matsuji Ono and Tomio Yokobori was published by Sogen-sha, Tokyo in 1932.  The first partial translation of Finngans Wake (the ALP chapter) by Junzaburo Nishizaki was published by Daiichi-shobo, Tokyo in 1933.  Since then, many different translations of Joyce's works have been published by dozens of people.  Finally in 1993, Naoki Yanase published the first complete Japanese translation of Finnegans Wake by Kawade-shobo-shinsha, Tokyo.
  
  The James Joyce Society of Japan was founded in 1989.  The foundation greatly owed to Prof. Shigeo Shimizu, Waseda University, and the first president was Prof. Masayoshi Osawa, Chuo University.  It has an annual symposium and publishes the annual magazine Joycean Japan around Bloomsday in June.  Now the number of the member exceeds 130 (March 2006).
  
  The James Joyce Parlour Japan, another Japanese Joycean society, was established in 1988 and directed by Prof. Tsutomu Hamada, Tokyo Agricultural University.  It continues to publish The Abiko Quarterly, edited by Laurel Sicks the curator, about once a year.
  
  Many Japanese students and scholars have been publishing essays on Joyce in numerous academic magazines and in book form.  Thus it is no wonder that a great many Japanese people have been reading and researching James Joyce.
  

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Tokyo Joyce
      These pictures below were taken at "Asian Dining Cafe" (112 Tsurumaki-cho, Waseda, Shinjyuku Ward) near the Okuma-kodo (Okuma Lecture Hall) of Waseda University after the reading the ALP chapter session at Waseda University on January 27, 2007.  This is the farewell party for Shinya Kawahara who has been an important member of this group and will teach at Seinan Gakuin University, Fukuoka from April 2007.
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 (Saturday 27 January) At "Asian Dining Cafe" after the reading the ALP chapter session at Waseda University on January 27, 2007
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 (Saturday 27 January) At "Asian Dining Cafe" after the reading the ALP chapter session at Waseda University on January 27, 2007
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 (Saturday 27 January) At "Asian Dining Cafe" after the reading the ALP chapter session at Waseda University on January 27, 2007
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 (Saturday 27 January) At "Asian Dining Cafe" after the reading the ALP chapter session at Waseda University on January 27, 2007
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 (Saturday 27 January) At "Asian Dining Cafe" after the reading the ALP chapter session at Waseda University on January 27, 2007
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 (Saturday 27 January) At "Asian Dining Cafe" after the reading the ALP chapter session at Waseda University on January 27, 2007
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 (Saturday 27 January) At "Asian Dining Cafe" after the reading the ALP chapter session at Waseda University on January 27, 2007
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 (Saturday 27 January) At "Asian Dining Cafe" after the reading the ALP chapter session at Waseda University on January 27, 2007
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 (Saturday 27 January) At "Asian Dining Cafe" after the reading the ALP chapter session at Waseda University on January 27, 2007
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 (Saturday 27 January) At "Asian Dining Cafe" after the reading the ALP chapter session at Waseda University on January 27, 2007




        


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