o ya, i think both meteor garden and hyd r so successful b/c mainly of the story/plot. i hven't watch meteor garden yet though but i think i saw a part of it long ago.

i just spent two days watching hyd 1 and 2. no sleep for me and i hve school too. this is my first fav j-drama, i hve hyd 1 and 2 they were the only two jdramas that i actually finished. i only liked tvb and kdrama at first but now im also adding jdrama to my addiction. how do i stop? uhh it's a good addiction and a bad one too. i just finished reading all of these comments (hhaha, they're were long but interesting). i lve ur site and thanks so much for all the fans that sub for addicts like me. im gonna go to bed now. man, this is bad, watching and watching. o ya i like ur new polls! i visit ur site everyday. it's 322 am already. oops. o ya, i lve hui too and i saw him in haha kimi first (i finished that drama too). im starting to like jdramas and music!!

#18 javabeans: Sure. I wasn't imagining you'd like Ishiguro as some sort of Japanese novelist in disguise. It's not just that he writes only in English, but he has always seen himself as an English novelist (Pleeeeze not 'British', in this context: there are no "British" novelists.)

But what fascinates me about some of his novels, above all precisely those with a purely English setting and "cast" -- Remains of the Day and Never Let Me Go -- is that they are persistently misread (or under-read) by Anglophone critics as being centrally, maybe even provincially, about England and things English. And the Merchant-Ivory mothball-scented costume-drama movie of Remains didn't help there at all.

But Ishiguro isn't a five-foot-six Trollope with Oriental features. As he himself has often said, what drove his imagination in Remains was not the niceties of English country house life in bygone days, nor English class-consciousness, nor even the alliance between "old" aristocracy and new Fascist barbarity in Europe. Of course, being Ishiguro, he doesn't really ever more than hint at what was in his imagination behind that beautifully executed foreground. But it's not too hard to see the same basic forces that get transmuted into the themes of so much East Asian fiction and drama, both high- and middlebrow. A traditional order under threat, not just from forces of historical change generally identified with "the West" (even in Remains, the new employer whom the butler-narrator so deeply despises despite his great kindness to him, is a "Western" intruder, a rich American who thinks he can buy into a European tradition) but, more importantly and dangerously, from its defenders, who are so unclear about just what is and isn't of worth in their old order that they in fact betray the values they believe they are defending.

And "Never Let Me Go". Although nearly all readers are captivated by its atmosphere and technical mastery, even otherwise canny critics express bewilderment at just why these young people accept their extraordinary lot with such composure, even dedication, despite being so aware of their situation and role. Or try to convince themselves that Ishiguro wants us to see those young people, and the narrator in particular, as contemptible, rather than pitiful, in their acceptance of those things. But the novel is much less puzzling, and much more resonant, when seen as reflecting a culture based on group conformity and socio-cultural consensus which is powerful because it is so deeply internalised (though only imperfectly perceived and understood) by all those who uphold it. Westerners don't inhabit such a culture. But despite the massive "Englishness" of the surface, the characters in Never Let Me Go live and breathe a culture of that kind -- for the limited and harrowing span allowed to them by their "elders".

And that, briefly (scoff not: believe me, I write a whole lot more than that when I'm not trying to be "brief" by my eccentric standards) is why I thought Ishiguro might send a spark jumping between your interests in Japanese fiction and the more "comedy of manners" side of Eng Lit.

Incidentally, since quite a few readers of this blog seem to have had the experience of being transplanted in childhood from East Asia to a Western culture which they then, more or less, made their own, a now rather old radio interview (1990 ISTR) with Ishiguro, streamed on-line at
http://media.woub.org/ramgen/wiredbooks/KazuoIshiguro.rm
might be of some interest.

Please don't be put off by the first five minutes or so, which because of the host's obvious anxiety about actually getting around to talking about Ishiguro's work, plus Ishiguro's lack of interest in self-promotion, consist of tedious chit-chat about comparative roadworks in NYC, London and Houston. The segment immediately following is fascinating stuff about a bi-cultural and (partly) bilingual childhood.

In spanish we would call his voice "baja panti" figure that one out hahaha

he's so pretty............

forgot to listen to song... oh well, have to play it again...

I liked it, probably will take a few watches to understand the video concept but initial reaction; soothing, laid-back feel. Normally not my cup of tea but actually sat through the entire thing and enjoyed it, which for me is a definite plus since most things I don't like get shut off in 5 seconds.

Liked the ending with the wings but I don't really understand my attraction to that particular part of the video. Meh.

I like the lead singer's voice, somehow it's quite unique. But I especially like how "Waffle guy" looks especially in his suite. lol ^_^

This is off the subject about books, When is AZN going to put any new shows on?
I don't have time to read. So I watch TV. Less brain power when you had a busy day. Let me know if there is a most read!