Janice Valerie Young
Janice is from Toronto and made Japan her home in 1998, with brief stints in Finland and Singapore.
In addition to Sweet Daruma being shortlisted in 2005 for both the Norumbega Fiction Award and the Gorsky Press Fiction Award, her short stories have appeared in Jungle Crows; a Tokyo Expatriate Anthology, Inscribed, Muse Apprentice Guild, The Square Table, Moth Magazine, Shore Magazine, Terrain, The Ultimate Hallucination, and Faces in the Crowds; a Tokyo International Anthology. Her novella Muskoka was a finalist in the 2003 New Century Writer Awards
Modern Japan and the art of humourous pathos
An interview with the author
Q1) Your book has in intriguing title. Can you tell us about it and how the idea came about?
I wanted the title to reflect the element that ties all the characters and the narrative together. There's an idea in the story that Japan needs something new, but not another disconnected high-tech gadget. Instead an idea, a gift to society, if you will, that connects the old with the new, the folkloric with the modern. I've always been enchanted by darumas and find the whole idea of daruma apartments not only feasible, but fantastic. And I felt the need to point out that the novel is a satire, lest readers take the events in the story literally!
Q2) The novel confronts the timely and controversial issue of youth prostitution in Japan. What prompted you to focus on this?
The more I learned about this issue, but more perplexed and disturbed I became. The thought of a girl prostituting herself to buy a designer bag was really beyond the scope of my imagination, but there it is, happening in Tokyo, in my city! This got me to thinking, and though some may say the idea of teenage urine sellers in my story is too much of a stretch, it's not. A friend of mine actually heard a couple of men discussing it on the train. So I decided why not take it a step further? And I did, which you'll read about at the end of the book. I wanted readers to ask themselves, "What is more disgusting: underage sex for a bag, or urine and 'number 2' selling?"
Q3) The characters in your book are struggling with their place in Japanese society. Do you see this as a naturally more difficult issue for non-Japanese?
I think twenty or thirty years ago my answer would be an unequivocal "yes". Of course, it is more complicated for non-Japanese to resolve identity issues in Japan. But today I believe it is just as challenging and more traumatic for young Japanese to determine where they fit in. The paradigms that server their parents and grandparents have shifted and crumbled. The security is gone. My hope is that this is viewed more as an opportunity than a negative. I can't wait for more young, open-minded voices to be heard!
Q4) Obviously, humour is one of the main techniques you employ in the book. But it's often a humour with pain. Would you agree?
Yes. I was aiming for a humourous pathos. To me that's what really touches the nerve centre, the soul. Whether you're a Westerner or a Japanese, an animal or a gangster, you can relate to sympathetic pity, and sometimes the only thing you can do is laugh... if you don't want to cry!
Q5) Was it difficult to write from the point of view of so many diverse characters?
No, and it was the most enjoyable part of the story to write. I've heard from many readers that Part II was their favourite because they could really identify with the characters on various levels. I attempted to portray the situations of both men and women, Japanese and non-Japanese from various angles, including the entertaining and disturbingly warped views. Also, as there hasn't been nearly enough discussion about Western women in Japan I wanted to explore, debunk, and clarify a few things about us.