[KineJapan] Hasumi's Ozu book

Sun Nov 26 22:59:48 EST 2023

Dear Ryan,

You must be right, and I genuinely thought some months ago that maybe
Cahiers du cinéma would reissue the book on this occasion (even dreamed of
a new version with the added three chapters), but they prefered to reissue
a book by Jean-Michel Frodon instead, what is definitely a good idea but,
as shameful as it is, I haven't read yet - as Stephen Sarrazin suggests,
one can think that he quotes Hasumi in it, so my former post must have been
wrong about publications in France this year. My bad!
NB : Schrader's book was translated to French some years ago, and I still
can remember that the person in charge told me it was a welcome
contradiction to Hasumi's views.

Best,
Mathieu Capel

Le lun. 27 nov. 2023 à 12:30, Ryan Cook via KineJapan <
kinejapan at mailman.yale.edu> a écrit :

> I imagine that the relatively weak influence of the French translation, at
> least today, is in part a product of the fact that it has long been out of
> print? I referred to the French here and there to see how that translation
> team tackled certain things, but it was not that easy to get my hands on
> it.
>
> Ryan
>
>
> On Sun, Nov 26, 2023 at 5:18 PM stephen sarrazin <stephensarra at hotmail.com>
> wrote:
>
>> Ryan,
>> Mathieu Capel is correct about his remark concerning the influence
>> Hasumi’s book, in French, had at the time or since on Ozu scholarship in
>> France. I remember clearly its release, one title among Cahiers’s Auteurs
>> collection (several of which would warrant an English translation as well),
>> and being interviewed about it back then.
>> I’d venture that Hasumi’s essays in Trafic did not make a noticeable
>> impact either, although Frodon and Mathieu in particular championed him.
>> As for Schrader being castigated by Hasumi, well one again thinks of
>> Yeats’ Second Coming; this titan of a writer- director was not the only one
>> Hasumi felt compelled to chasten…
>> Still, would love to hear your blurb story!
>> And look forward to the book and discovering the new chapters!
>> All best,
>> St.S
>> Tokyo
>>
>> On Nov 27, 2023, at 11:51, Ryan Cook via KineJapan <
>> kinejapan at mailman.yale.edu> wrote:
>>
>> 
>>
>>
>> I’m not sure if I should comment publicly about this, Markus. Haha
>>
>>
>>
>> On Sun, Nov 26, 2023 at 4:48 PM Markus Nornes via KineJapan <
>> kinejapan at mailman.yale.edu> wrote:
>>
>>> At least Jean-Michel and Bernard wrote very nice, even useful, blurbs.
>>> Schrader, in contrast, phoned it in. But then he surely hates the book, if
>>> he got past the first section that castigates him. I know from an awkward
>>> conversation that he stands proudly on the position he staked out in *Transcendental
>>> Cinema!*
>>>
>>> Ryan, how did the Schrader blurb come about? I'm curious.
>>>
>>> Markus
>>>
>>>
>>> ---
>>>
>>> *Markus Nornes*
>>> *Professor of Asian Cinema*
>>>
>>> Department of Film, Television and Media, Department of Asian Languages
>>> and Cultures, Penny Stamps School of Art & Design
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> *Homepage:
>>> <https://www.google.com/maps/search/105+S.+State+Street+%0D%0A+Ann+Arbor,+MI+48109-1285?entry=gmail&source=g>
>>> http://www-personal.umich.edu/~nornes/
>>> <http://www-personal.umich.edu/~nornes/> *
>>> *Department of Film, Television and Media *
>>> *6348 North Quad *
>>> *105 S. State Street
>>> <https://www.google.com/maps/search/105+S.+State+Street+%0D%0A+Ann+Arbor,+MI+48109-1285?entry=gmail&source=g>
>>> **Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1285
>>> <https://www.google.com/maps/search/105+S.+State+Street+%0D%0A+Ann+Arbor,+MI+48109-1285?entry=gmail&source=g>*
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> On Mon, Nov 27, 2023 at 11:42 AM Ryan Cook via KineJapan <
>>> kinejapan at mailman.yale.edu> wrote:
>>>
>>>>
>>>> Thanks very much for the gracious endorsements and interest in this
>>>> translation (a product of a lot of time spent at home during the
>>>> pandemic...).
>>>>
>>>> Mathieu: yes, this is based on the definitive edition and includes the
>>>> three chapters that were added in 2003 (there is also a Chinese
>>>> translation). The new English edition does include the interview with
>>>> Atsuta that appears as an appendix in the Japanese. (There is a French
>>>> translation of this interview that appeared somewhere at some point long
>>>> ago, but it is completely rearranged and hardly resembles the original.)
>>>> Unfortunately we were not able to print the interview with Yukiko Inoue
>>>> that also appears in the Japanese edition due to what I understood would be
>>>> a strict word limit. I also decided against asking Hasumi to write a
>>>> foreword for this reason, though in retrospect I wonder if we couldn't have
>>>> stretched the word limit since we seem to have blown through it anyway.
>>>> Maybe we can find another venue for Hasumi to comment in English on the
>>>> occasion of the translation, which comes just about 20 years after he last
>>>> expanded the book, on its 20th anniversary (and the Ozu centenary).
>>>>
>>>> Ryan Cook (the translator)
>>>> Honolulu
>>>>
>>>> On Sun, Nov 26, 2023 at 4:25 PM Mathieu Capel via KineJapan <
>>>> kinejapan at mailman.yale.edu> wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> This English version is long overdue, needless to say, since the book
>>>>> was only translated to French and Korean, if I am not wrong (all apologies
>>>>> if I am).
>>>>> Actually, there are some embarrassing mistakes in the
>>>>> French translation, even though it was reviewed by Hasumi himself (and,
>>>>> according to French speaking Japanese friends, it is far from good, to what
>>>>> I would agree to some extent...). And if I were to add an ironical kind of
>>>>> mixed-feelings remark, despite what Frodon and Eisenschitz says, I am
>>>>> pessimistic somehow how far Hasumi's view has changed in depth the way
>>>>> French viewers see Ozu's films: if you check the literature that was
>>>>> published this year related to the 60th/120th birthday events, I can't
>>>>> remember one quote of Hasumi's text, and most texts etc. seem to rely upon
>>>>> the same old clichés...
>>>>> Anyway, is Ryan's version based on the Japanese definite edition ?
>>>>> Even Cahiers du cinéma Publishing, who don't seem to care so much about the
>>>>> book actually, have apparently not a single clue that there are three
>>>>> chapters missing in the French version (the interviews at the end of the
>>>>> original book were also scrapped from the Cahiers du cinéma translation).
>>>>>
>>>>> Best regards,
>>>>>
>>>>> Mathieu Capel
>>>>> Tokyo
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> Le lun. 27 nov. 2023 à 10:58, Markus Nornes via KineJapan <
>>>>> kinejapan at mailman.yale.edu> a écrit :
>>>>>
>>>>>> Erice wrote a lovely blurb for the cover.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Markus
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>> ---
>>>>>>
>>>>>> *Markus Nornes*
>>>>>> *Professor of Asian Cinema*
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Department of Film, Television and Media, Department of Asian
>>>>>> Languages and Cultures, Penny Stamps School of Art & Design
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>> *Homepage: http://www-personal.umich.edu/~nornes/
>>>>>> <http://www-personal.umich.edu/~nornes/>
>>>>>> <https://www.google.com/maps/search/105+S.+State+Street+%0D%0A+Ann+Arbor,+MI+48109-1285?entry=gmail&source=g>*
>>>>>> *Department of Film, Television and Media *
>>>>>> *6348 North Quad *
>>>>>> *105 S. State Street
>>>>>> <https://www.google.com/maps/search/105+S.+State+Street+%0D%0A+Ann+Arbor,+MI+48109-1285?entry=gmail&source=g>
>>>>>> **Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1285
>>>>>> <https://www.google.com/maps/search/105+S.+State+Street+%0D%0A+Ann+Arbor,+MI+48109-1285?entry=gmail&source=g>*
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>> On Mon, Nov 27, 2023 at 10:50 AM LCE via KineJapan <
>>>>>> kinejapan at mailman.yale.edu> wrote:
>>>>>>
>>>>>>> This is indeed a difficult book in Japanese, as are all of
>>>>>>> Hasumi-sensei's essays about film. In the description of the author, they
>>>>>>> omitted his close ties to Spanish director Víctor Erice (the two men
>>>>>>> communicate in French). I have been with them in Japan.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> I'm rooking forward to this translation when it appears in March.
>>>>>>> Thanks for the notice.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> On Sun, Nov 26, 2023 at 6:53 PM Markus Nornes via KineJapan <
>>>>>>> kinejapan at mailman.yale.edu> wrote:
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> We get so few translations in American film studies, it feels like
>>>>>>>> a grand occasion when a classic like this appears:
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> https://www.ucpress.edu/book/9780520396722/directed-by-yasujiro-ozu?fbclid=IwAR2dmRTnFeQhALbmMCromyUU-BVXWlFXXadXuSFJVDOmRvq1iR5R6mKcgnY
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> As anyone who has cracked this book knows, it was a bear to
>>>>>>>> translate. Kudos to Ryan!
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> Markus
>>>>>>>> _______________________________________________
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>>>>>>>> KineJapan at mailman.yale.edu
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>>>>>>>>
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