[No. 280] Michiko Mamuro's bookshelf "All I do is read" by Kaori Ekuni / Chikuma Shobo
Known as the "original charismatic bookseller," DAIKANYAMA TSUTAYA BOOKS, who recommends books in a variety of media including magazines and TV.
In this series, we take a peek into the "bookshelves" in the mind of our most popular concierge.
Please enjoy it along with his comments.
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"All I do is read."
Kaori Ekuni/Chikuma Shobo
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Kaori Ekuni's latest essay on books. I always get excited thinking about how I wish I could read books like this. I have many favorite book essay writers, such as Riku Onda, Sachiko Kishimoto, and Kikuko Tsumura, but only Ekuni makes me think this way.
I know it's pointless. If I want to write, sing, run, or act like someone else, I can start by copying, or study vocalization, muscle training, etc. But I want to read. It's like seeing someone eating delicious food and thinking, "I want to eat like that." It's impossible. My tongue is different.
And the point is that I can't add "I wish I could read it." I'm scared of what will happen to me if I read it as much as she does. Do I have different eyes than Ekuni-san? My head? Something called sensitivity? No, maybe it's the location.
In "Inside and Outside Stories" (Asahi Bunko), there is a line that strikes me as it says, "In other words, the time I spend in stories is far longer than the time I spend living in reality."
In my opinion, Ekuni-san should be in the book and would prefer not to appear outside again if possible.
"Women who read" have been the subject of many novels, movies, and paintings for a long time. There are not many "men" in them. Ekuni-san's own work has one in which a man who reads books all the time appears, but the dazed atmosphere when he is absorbed in the book and the reluctance when he is brought back to reality are somewhat missing, so it is unlikely that you will be thinking, "I want to paint him" or "I'd love to make a film about him!"
In that respect, a woman absorbed in a book is picturesque (in books and in movies, of course). It's wonderful to see how her whole body seems to be taken away, as if she's here but not there, her soul being taken away.
For me, Ekuni-san is at the top of that list, someone who has reached a place that no one else can reach. Rather than an adjective, I think of the adverb "far away." I have an image of being beyond the sea or in the stratosphere.
Getting back to the point, Ekuni reads authors just as she reads books.
"Ogawa Yoko doesn't make anything stand out... For example, what the protagonist wears, the way she speaks, what she eats. She never employs the novelistic method of making some detail stand out and make an impression."
"In Hitomi Kanehara's novels, the current times always flow through every corner like fresh blood. This inevitability is where her physicality resides."
Furthermore, they are reading "reading" itself.
"When I read Atsuko Suga's books, I don't know why, but I feel like it's raining," he said. "The feeling of being trapped and the darkness on a rainy day... The inside and outside of the book, the inside and outside of the story, are almost continuous on a rainy day. To read certain books is to read a rainy day."
Even more strangely, I also "read" my own work before it is written.
"A Town with a River" was published in February of this year. If you turn to page 19 of this book, you will understand that Ekuni "reads before he writes!"
Leaving me alone, whose position in life is inside the story... Ekuni's reading essays seem like charming winks from the inside to the outside. I don't want everyone to worry, so I'll tell you a little about what's going on here. Just me and the book. That contented solitude overflows from "All I Do Is Read."
I know it's pointless. If I want to write, sing, run, or act like someone else, I can start by copying, or study vocalization, muscle training, etc. But I want to read. It's like seeing someone eating delicious food and thinking, "I want to eat like that." It's impossible. My tongue is different.
And the point is that I can't add "I wish I could read it." I'm scared of what will happen to me if I read it as much as she does. Do I have different eyes than Ekuni-san? My head? Something called sensitivity? No, maybe it's the location.
In "Inside and Outside Stories" (Asahi Bunko), there is a line that strikes me as it says, "In other words, the time I spend in stories is far longer than the time I spend living in reality."
In my opinion, Ekuni-san should be in the book and would prefer not to appear outside again if possible.
"Women who read" have been the subject of many novels, movies, and paintings for a long time. There are not many "men" in them. Ekuni-san's own work has one in which a man who reads books all the time appears, but the dazed atmosphere when he is absorbed in the book and the reluctance when he is brought back to reality are somewhat missing, so it is unlikely that you will be thinking, "I want to paint him" or "I'd love to make a film about him!"
In that respect, a woman absorbed in a book is picturesque (in books and in movies, of course). It's wonderful to see how her whole body seems to be taken away, as if she's here but not there, her soul being taken away.
For me, Ekuni-san is at the top of that list, someone who has reached a place that no one else can reach. Rather than an adjective, I think of the adverb "far away." I have an image of being beyond the sea or in the stratosphere.
Getting back to the point, Ekuni reads authors just as she reads books.
"Ogawa Yoko doesn't make anything stand out... For example, what the protagonist wears, the way she speaks, what she eats. She never employs the novelistic method of making some detail stand out and make an impression."
"In Hitomi Kanehara's novels, the current times always flow through every corner like fresh blood. This inevitability is where her physicality resides."
Furthermore, they are reading "reading" itself.
"When I read Atsuko Suga's books, I don't know why, but I feel like it's raining," he said. "The feeling of being trapped and the darkness on a rainy day... The inside and outside of the book, the inside and outside of the story, are almost continuous on a rainy day. To read certain books is to read a rainy day."
Even more strangely, I also "read" my own work before it is written.
"A Town with a River" was published in February of this year. If you turn to page 19 of this book, you will understand that Ekuni "reads before he writes!"
Leaving me alone, whose position in life is inside the story... Ekuni's reading essays seem like charming winks from the inside to the outside. I don't want everyone to worry, so I'll tell you a little about what's going on here. Just me and the book. That contented solitude overflows from "All I Do Is Read."
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DAIKANYAMA TSUTAYA BOOKS Literature Concierge
Michiko Mamuro
【profile】
"The original charismatic bookseller" who recommends books in various media such as magazines and TV. Has serials in magazines such as Fujingaho and Precious. Active as a book critic, her paperback reviews include "The Pale Horse" (Agatha Christie/Hayakawa Christie Bunko), "Motherhood" (Minato Kanae/Shincho Bunko), "The Snake Moon" (Sakuragi Shino/Futaba Bunko), and "Staph" (Michio Shusuke/Bunshun Bunko).
