The story A First-Rate Material made me feel really uncomfortable from the beginning. In this world, people wear sweaters made of human hair, and even plan to wear a wedding veil made of human skin. Everything seems normal to them, and no one thinks it’s strange. The scariest part isn’t the use of human materials, but how calmly everyone accepts it. They talk about it like it’s completely normal. When the character finally puts on the wedding veil made from her father-in-law’s skin, this is so strange and disturbing that I could hardly imagine it. This story made me think about how thin the line is between what we call “civilized” and what we call “barbaric.” What’s considered normal just depends on what society agrees to believe.
In The Missing One, the huge salamander that was eaten and then spat out really stayed with me. I keep wondering does that counts as being reborn? Kikue leaves her hometown and then returns; it’s just like that salamander. It feels like saying that even when we think we’ve escaped a place or a time in our lives, those experiences are already part of our soul. The idea of rebirth here seems more symbolic to me; maybe it’s about continuation rather than renewal. But I’m still trying to figure out exactly what it means.
What moved me most in On High was when Tomihime stood high up in the Castle, watching the tourists wander below. These people are full of curiosity about history, but they feel nothing about its pain. They come searching for a past, but most of them miss the real sorrow and loneliness that once existed there. Tomihime herself has become part of this consumption of history, and this way of being seen feels really sad, because she still exists, but no longer as a person. She has been reduced to a symbol. But she begins to awaken. When she says to Himekawa about it’s time to go, I didn’t feel that as a disappearance. It felt like a gentle release. She finally realizes she has a choice. She can leave behind the role of being watched and consumed, and reclaim her own sense of self.
What impressed me most in The Cage of Zeus was how it shows the gender topic. The R-types are neither male nor female; they exist in between. It made me think of how, in real life, people who don’t fit into the usual gender boxes are often pushed aside. For me, I feel like the author seems to ask, “Who gets to decide what’s normal?” In the story, humans use like ethics and order to hide their fear and how they want the need for control. It reminded me that even when we say we value diversity, we still draw invisible lines and call some people “abnormal.”
The Place of Shells feels like a dream. The sea and memories blend together until all boundaries disappear. What touched me most was how the story makes memory feel physical, just like something you can hold or smell. The shells are like containers of time, holding traces of past lives, just as our bodies hold memories. When the main character picks up a shell, it’s like touching her own past, as memories like footprints in sand may fade but never truly disappear.
When I finished Self-Reference Engine, I didn’t really understand it. I’m so lost. The story reads like an academic paper about the origin of Japanese writing, calm and emotionless, but strangely haunting. The researchers try to rebuild a vanished Japan from symbols and notes, but the more they search for truth, the more it feels like an illusion. But I liked the “post-Japan” mood, like a world where only fragments of a lost civilization remain. It made me think that maybe our need to study, name, and create knowledge is just a way to believe the world still has meaning.
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