Literature after 3.11 Today
INALCO / Institut National des Langues et Civilisations Orientales) Paris

June 21-22, 2018

Criticism of  3.11 authors or the critical mind in the 21st century. The case of Bungakusha no kaku • Fukushima-ron (2013)
Lisette Gebhardt (Goethe University Frankfurt)

While we have seven years after the disaster something like a shinsai bungaku / shinsaigo bungaku-canon, there are also main narratives by the media and by literary scholars on how literature after Fukushima should be read. There are obviously different kinds of approaches towards 3.11 literature and even conflicts of interpretation (Cécile Sakai 2016) – depending on the particular background of the interpreter, his / her scientific heritage or his / her sense of autonomy and intellectuality. The scholarly post-Fukushima-discourse is no neutral field but often shaped by a personal agenda and strategic intentions (L. Gebhardt 2017). Scholars or critiques with some experience in research on nuclear narrations avoid the official line that could be characterized in its majority by “consensus writing” and “consensus critique”. An example for a critical mind is Kuroko Kazuo with his criticism on Murakami Haruki’s well known “anti-nuclear speech” (hankaku supiichi). Kuroko’s arguments lead beyond the 3.11 mindset, and probably open up an open space for an intellectual debate on the literary representation of “Fukushima”.