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11 - Literary culture

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 January 2010

Yoshio Sugimoto
Affiliation:
La Trobe University, Victoria
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Summary

The relationship between literature and society/culture is complex. The act of writing is not a process of recording. Literary works interact with our sociocultural reality; they challenge, question, or sometimes reinforce our everyday values and assumptions. Reading modern Japanese literature means reading individual writers' experiences and their multifaceted interpretations of society and culture. In principle, therefore, any attempt at generalisation will fail. At the same time, however, literature is not created in a vacuum; writers' experiences are woven within a social and cultural fabric, and certain common literary features emerge during any given period in history. The individual writer's words are taken from, and the chain of words he or she creates is once again incorporated into, that very fabric. Sometimes these words may cause a tear or rip; or when they regurgitate the experiences of everyday life, they may be absorbed with little resistance, often becoming commercially successful in the process. This metaphor may help explain the distinction between so-called pure and popular literature in modern Japanese literary history. The two genres have been commonly differentiated by the way they are received in the literary market: pure literature for those readers who 'seriously' enjoy reading literature and who have the ability to appreciate its 'literary' value; popular literature for the broader public who read for entertainment.

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Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2009

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  • Literary culture
  • Edited by Yoshio Sugimoto, La Trobe University, Victoria
  • Book: The Cambridge Companion to Modern Japanese Culture
  • Online publication: 28 January 2010
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CCOL9780521880473.012
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  • Literary culture
  • Edited by Yoshio Sugimoto, La Trobe University, Victoria
  • Book: The Cambridge Companion to Modern Japanese Culture
  • Online publication: 28 January 2010
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CCOL9780521880473.012
Available formats
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Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

  • Literary culture
  • Edited by Yoshio Sugimoto, La Trobe University, Victoria
  • Book: The Cambridge Companion to Modern Japanese Culture
  • Online publication: 28 January 2010
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CCOL9780521880473.012
Available formats
×