Thinking About Kayo's Fear In Umi Bozu Again And What It Means For Her Character

Thinking about Kayo's fear in Umi Bozu again and what it means for her character

How the fear of missing out she rattled off was an idealized version of the general life path that's open to her as a young peasant woman of her time, and that she is probably scared of missing out on that ideal, but not in the sense of not getting married at all, but in the sense of doing that whole song and dance but ending up trapped in a marriage to a terrible man, or giving birth to children who are going to get caught up in the cycles of violence she was abruptly made aware of with the fall of the Sakai clan (either as the one doing the violence or the one suffering under it, or both, creating a monster regardless)

How, if Kayo's meant to be taken as a character with her eyes to the future, that the bakeneko incident shook her certainty in it in a way that she had never had a reason to question before, having her beliefs of being a fairly ordinary person rattled to see what atrocities the "ordinary people" around her helped to commit, atrocities that very well might never have come to light without the divine intervention that was the mononoke and the medicine vendor coming to slay it

Anyway, just contemplating Kayo tonight

And the fourth story, Fuguruma Youbi, is done! This one feels like an imposter syndrome callout post, except you have to be good to have imposter syndrome right? Anyway, this one really did hurt my feelings a lot, but for being based around a yokai that from what I can tell was a throwaway thought, it sure is an interesting take

Also, fun fact, looks like Tamenaga Shunsui, the POV character for this story, was an actual author of the late Edo era going into the Meiji Restoration, and one of his stories was among the first to be adapted to English after the isolationism policies ended

Anyway, standard legal stuff, I don't own this book or anything associated with it, you can buy a copy of the raw version from the link in my pinned post, I'm just making a fan translation because there isn't an official one, all that good stuff

For content warnings, we've got:

-Mentioned ablism and possible elder abuse -Brief mention of child abuse -Depictions of identity theft and catfishing -Let me know if I missed any pertinent ones

And finally, here's the link to the doc:

Google Docs

Mononoke Book Translation Fourth Story: Fuguruma Youbi

As usual, hope y'all enjoy!

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Yuzen-painted furisode. About 1990-2000, Japan. A large rinzu silk furisode featuring yuzen-painted ‘oshidori’ (mandarin duck) on a stream, and classical designs such as fans, ‘ume’(plum blossoms) and 'botan’(peony). Gold glaze and embroidery highlights. The rinzu (damask) silk base has woven peony motifs. 56" from sleeve-end to sleeve-end x 66" height. This kimono was designed by the famous Japanese designer Kansai Yamamoto under his workshop Kansai Super Studio. Kansai Yamamoto was at the height of his career during the 1970’s and 80’s. He is also known for his avant-garde kimono designs, including ones worn by David Bowie in his Ziggy Stardust Tour. This kimono bears the stamp of his studio. The amount of labour and workmanship to create this furisode is remarkable. The Kimono Gallery

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