LOVE, DENSITY AND CONCRESCENCE

I haven't written much if anything since 2017 about "density," when in the essay GOOD WILL QUANTUMS, I extrapolated a brief remark by Raymond Durgnat into a general principle, one applicable to all four of the potentialities. In that essay I wrote:                                                                                                                                                                                                   'density is the means by which the reader subconsciously rates one creator above another: because the reader believes that Creator A can better describe a set of relationships so "densely" that it takes on the quality of "lived experience."'                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                      Elsewhere in the essay and its follow-up, I qualified this statement by noting that all literary works, whatever potentiality they favored, were all *gestural" in nature, just to distance myself from associations with any criteria about fidelity to actual "lived experience." However, in due time I felt the need of a term that described the process by which such "potentiality density" came about, and for that purpose I freely adapted the term "concrescence" from Alfred North Whitehead.                                                                                                                                                                                                                 All that said, because density has a stronger association than does concrescence with the quality of some physical substance, it also proves somewhat better for describing the finished product. I might say, using my most recent emendations of my potentiality terminology, that "Dave Sim's work excels at dealing with didactic cogitations, while Grant Morrison's work excels at dealing with mythopoeic correlations." That quality of excellence can be metaphorically expressed as a given work's density, in that such density shows how thoroughly the author was invested in a given set of fictional representations (sometimes, though not usually, on a subconscious level).                                                                                                                                                                                                                                             Now, knowing that level of authorial involvement doesn't intrinsically make a given work, or set of works, engrossing to all members of a potential audience. In fact, tastes are so variable that one can practically guarantee that no works will be all things to all people, if only because we esteem (or do not esteem) all phenomena according to our respective abilities to relate to those phenomena in some way. And my carefully considered positioning of the word "esteem" brings me to the "love" part of the title.                                                                                                                                                                            Some setup: in chapter 40 of the romance-manga NAGATORO, main character Naoto, a high-school student, aspires to create good art. His senior Sana (the one clad in a towel) delivers the following critique of his recent effort, followed by her criterion for good art.                                                               

                                            

In the story the discussion is interrupted, and at no point in the series does this aesthetic credo get further articulated. Given that the author Nanashi devotes the bulk of NAGATORO to the dramatic potentiality, his main reason for having the Sana character make this statement is to imply a correspondence between the way a good artist is "in love" with his material, and the way Naoto specifically needs to invest himself in life, whether it's drawing his subject matter with passion, rather than with mere polished technique, or in his romantic relationship to the titular Nagatoro. I would tend to think that Raymond Durgnat, who was my original guide to the density-metaphor, probably would not have disapproved of Nanashi's use of "love" as a metaphor for artistic investment, for wanting to "know" a subject intensely (if not actually romantically).    

MYTHCOMICS: ["ON THAT DAY, I MET SENPAI"], PLEASE DON'T BULLY ME, NAGATORO, PTS. 140-144 (2023)

 One compensation for the conclusion of the NAGATORO manga is that as a critic I can now view it as a finished work. Had I never seen the ending for any reason, I believe my determination in this essay-- that the manga is principally governed by the dramatic potentiality-- would still have been valid. But viewing the actual conclusion gives me the opportunity to reinforce that opinion.

My title for the essay, SO THE DRAMA, SO THE MYTH, held a touch of irony, since I argued that the particular set of NAGATORO melodramas I had analyzed did not have the "long range" symbolic qualities that I seek in pinpointing literary myths.

Thus, when I search for a psychological myth, I look for an elaboration of symbolic resonances into mythopoeic concrescence, which is only possible when the author is a "long-range" mode. A dramatic concrescence can be formed from any number of "short-range" emotional states, but that concrescence does not depend on any abstractions as does the mythopoeic type. 

And now that I've seen the whole design of the series, aside from a forthcoming epilogue, I can assert that all of the NAGATORO stories I've looked at so far are at best "near-myths." Only in one section, about ten installments from the end of the main narrative, does author Nanashi develop his characters into deeper symbolic presences. But the symbolism does not involve the Buberian arguments I invoked in my last two essays, but an opposition that arguably is more central to Japanese culture: the conflict between instinctual existence and a disciplined, reasoned outlook.

For almost eighty installments, Nanashi keeps the reader in the viewpoint of the male protagonist Naoto, a.k.a. "Senpai." There are two or three exceptions where the viewpoint is Nagatoro's-- she has a nightmare, she talks with her sister-- but the reader is never privy to Nagatoro's thoughts, while Naoto's thoughts are ever-present. As Naoto is drawn out of his protective shell by his "kohai's" teasing and demands for attention, he becomes more interested in learning more about her life apart from him. After Part 80, Nanashi begins developing parallel plotlines for the two protagonists with respect to the avocations they have pursued: Naoto with respect to becoming a better artist, and Nagatoro's with respect to mastering the sport of judo. Both avocations will become pathways to general career goals, as indicated by the final episode. But the paths followed also indicate the process by which each protagonist has assimilated aspects of the other's "strong points," with the tightly wound Naoto becoming more open to following his instincts, while Nagatoro becomes more focused, more disciplined.

Episode 140, the one from which I take my umbrella-title, is the first one to delve into Nagatoro's thoughts. Previous episodes have revealed to Naoto that though Nagatoro had been practicing judo since elementary school, she abandoned the hobby after suffering a humiliating defeat at the end of her last middle-school year. Up to that point, Nagatoro's judo depended on her innate abilities-- her superlative speed and her instinctive mastery of techniques. But a rival, one Orihara, was so frustrated by Nagatoro's superiority that she trained until she reached Olympic levels of accomplishment, and so handed Nagatoro her first real defeat.

During Nagatoro's first year at high school, she and her friends accidentally encounter Naoto, and get a look at the fantasy-manga he draws. In the first episode, the reader has no idea why Nagatoro chooses to bully Naoto far more than her friends, though it's soon evident that it's wrapped up in a physical attraction that she won't admit to others and barely admits to herself. According to her mental dialogue, her judgment of her senpai's art is ruthless, calling it "awkward" and "delusional." Yet at the same time, she senses that "he tried his best," and that appeals to her on some level-- an instinctual one, since Nagatoro, though she reads manga, does not have any interest in art as such.

There is, without doubt, a classic bullying-angle to her aggression: because of a failure in her own life, Nagatoro is moved to humiliate someone weaker than herself. But because Naoto becomes solicitous about her having abandoned her passion for judo, she forces herself back into the fray. In fact, Nagatoro's meditations on the past take place in the middle of a climactic battle with her rival Orihara at a school-sponsored judo tournament, with Naoto cheering her on. 

Nagatoro wins her match with Orihara. Yet while Naoto is glad for his almost-girlfriend, he feels that she's assumed a dominant role in their relationship once more. Amusingly, he imagines her as a malicious horned oni-demon, complete with an iron club and a tiger-skin bikini (which sounds more like Lum of URUSEI YATSURA than any traditional Japanese folk-myth.) And though in reality she presents no physical danger to Naoto, his fears are justified by the fact that she still loves to harangue him, presumably as a cover for her own feelings. Not surprisingly, Naoto flashes back to his first encounters with his kohai, when she attacked him with demonic sadism.

Thus, when the young fellow overcomes his trepidations in order to confess his feelings, he becomes far more outspoken than ever before, admitting that his first encounter with her was like a meeting with a wild beast. This doesn't exactly please a cute high school girl, and she retaliates that she thought of him as a "really really gross wharf roach." Yet Naoto simply rolls with the insult, admitting that her bestial attack served the purpose of dragging him out of "the shadows" and into "sunlight." 

Then, once Nagatoro works through all of her protests about Senpai's "grossness," she's finally able to admit that when they met, she was just as purposeless and adrift as he was, once she surrendered her passion for judo.

And so the young lovers reach a rapprochement as they finally become a couple, though once again, Nanashi reminds his readers that even if Nagatoro doesn't wield an iron club, she still has a lot of "the oni" in her.

After I selected this section of NAGATORO as the serial's only concrescent myth-discourse, I did a little research and learned that when Nanashi created his prototypical version of the series, in the form of a five-part webcomic, he ended that comic on a scene parallel to this one, with the Naoto-prototype confessing to the Nagatoro-prototype. I have not read the webcomic and from what summaries I've seen, it didn't go into a lot of character depth but rather portrayed its Nagatoro as a thoroughgoing sadist. This might make for an interesting comparison somewhere down the line, but as far as the series proper is concerned, the protagonists' struggle between the instinctive life and the life of premeditation remains the "master trope" of the narrative as a whole.

I SENPAI AND THOU NAGATORO PT. 2

 By the time of installments 22 and 23-- which I'll give the collective title of "Senpai, Let's Go to the Beach"-- the Naoto-Nagatoro relationship has settled into a rough routine. Naoto tries to remain aloof, and Nagatoro tries to pull him out of his shell. In this project she receives some ambivalent help from her girl-buddies Gamo and Yoshi, who also find Naoto amusing, though they're also entertained by Nagatoro's increasingly evident affection for her "victim."

So the foursome's trek to the beach to escape summer heat begins with the three girls mocking Naoto as usual. 

But being at the beach also highlights some sexual aspects overshadowed at high school, which involve Nagatoro seeking to get her share of "the male gaze" from Naoto.

Despite this exposure to nubile female flesh, Naoto refuses to gambol in the waves with the girls, remaining on shore. However, after a while Nagatoro can't resist ringing his chimes again. And in truth, Naoto hasn't totally distanced himself from the possibility of innocent fun, for Nagatoro soon learns that he's wearing swim trunks despite having claimed no desire to go swimming. 

Up to this point, despite having teased Naoto as an "it" (specifically, a sea louse), she's clearly trying to relate to him as a "thou" (a fellow being who needs to get out of his own way). But Naoto still plays hard to get. Nagatoro wants to apply sunscreen to his pale skin so he'll have no excuse to stay on the beach, and Naoto comes up with the excuse that only "lovers" rub lotion on each other's bodies.

This results in an extraordinary sequence. Since Naoto rejects her "thou" offer, Nagatoro rather easily slips back into "it" mode. Since the young student claims that he doesn't want to get lotion administered via her hands, she squirts some on him and then begins rubbing it in with her foot. Author Nanashi does not stint on showing that Nagatoro is clearly stimulated by making Naoto her footstool, and he doesn't show any desire to resist her rough ministrations. However, when her two friends try to join in, rationality asserts itself, and she tries to make them desist. 

Despite this display of teenage hormones, Naoto is fully slicked down with SPF, and he allows himself to join the girls at their seaside games. And the episode ends with Naoto admitting to himself that he enjoyed the idyll at the beach, even with all the teasing involved. With episode 24, Naoto will begin thinking that he shouldn't let Nagatoro take the initiative in their strange relationship all the time-- which becomes an important trope for the remainder of the series.

I SENPAI AND THOU NAGATORO PT. 1

I AND THOU, first published in 1923 (though it became a college favorite in the 1960s), was written by a philosopher who had renounced the practice of the Rabbinic tradition but nevertheless incorporated that tradition into his philosophy.  I AND THOU, rather than offering a series of reasoned arguments, puts forth a concatenation of incantatory meditations, centered upon Buber’s two schemas of human relationship: the “I-thou” and the “I-it”... Buber calls his two schemas “word pairs.”  By this he meant that even though he was well aware that all three words—“I,” “thou,” and “it”—were independent words, he believed that in terms of human relation it was impossible that any “I” could exist apart from its relationship to other phenomena.  Only two relationships were conceivable to Buber: either one's "I" related to a "thou" or an "it."   Thus he regards his two schemas as “word pairs” that are existentially insoluble. -- PERSONAS OF GRATIFICATION.

I should get some sort of points for originality, for I hypothesize that I'm the only NAGATORO fan who would seek to gloss the appeal of a 21st century Japanese teen humor comic by referencing a 1920s Jewish philosopher. Yet for me, the key to NAGATORO's uniqueness lies in the process by which the character of Naoto, or "Senpai," goes from being an "it" to a "thou" in the eyes of the titular girl-bully.

For many if not all translations, the full title of the manga is PLEASE DON'T BULLY ME, NAGATORO, and I strongly suspect that the commercial translation ditched the word "bully" lest anyone think that the publishers were advocating the practice of bullying, particularly in the context of high-school student interaction. Yet understanding the dynamic of bully and victim is important to seeing how the relationship of the two main characters evolves.

In the first installment of the series proper, the reader knows little about either Naoto or Nagatoro except that he's a bookish-looking second-year high schooler, while she is a mischievous first-year student who's seen doing one athletic feat, doing a kung-fu high kick. But despite being younger than Naoto, Nagatoro instantly assumes a dominant attitude. Not for over a hundred episodes will readers learn what caused Nagatoro to pick on Naoto, whose name she never uses in the entirety of the series. But in the first episodes, the reader is given to understand that "Senpai" is an "it" to the young girl, a subject for inordinate mockery. 

Not much changes in the second installment. Nagatoro, having tormented Naoto so much that he breaks down in tears for the first time in his experience, beards him in the young fellow's lair: a school "art club" of which Naoto is the only active member. On the pretext of apologizing for the previous day, Nagatoro insists on providing the artist with a model, though he expresses no desire for one. Because Naoto has been so cut off from interactions with his peers, he can't draw an attractive female sitting right in front of him, and so she mocks his lack of sexual experience (though technically Nagatoro is no more experienced; she just talks a good game). Naoto breaks up again, and to add to his humiliation, he can't even shield his face because she's able to pry his arms apart.

The third installment, however, shows the first movement away from Nagatoro being in an "I-it" relationship with Naoto. A genuine bully is only too happy to continue treating his or her victim as a thing to suffer torment, and jock-bullies are notorious for believing that it's their privilege to dominate those who are weaker. Nagatoro's jock-credentials will be more firmly established in later stories, but after her third foray against Naoto's ego, she's genuinely surprised that he refuses to get angry at her taunts.

Up to this point, the reader also doesn't know why the young artist is so reserved. He then mentally reflects on all the bullies he's known before, and on how he simply kept his head down and refused to interact. In a sense, all previous bullies were also "its" to Naoto, as signified by the fact that he doesn't even recall the faces of his foes. However, he isn't able to distance himself from Nagatoro-- and because he's too reserved to even show obvious sexual stimulation, my conclusion is that he's fascinated by her being in most ways his utter opposite: extroverted where he's introverted, rash where he's hesitant. (One of his more significant observations later in the series is telling his girl-bully, "Everything's like a dare to you.")

In the rom-com genre there are countless stories in which two people start off in an acrimonious relationship ("I-it") and quickly progress to a mutually supportive one ("I-thou"). There are a smaller number of rom-coms in which it's a given that the contrary natures of the romantic pair will result in continuous off-and-on fights. But something about artist Nanashi's approach seems to suggest an attitude that I think compares with Buber's: the sense that both the "it" impulse and the "thou" impulse are integral to human beings generally, and remain so even when true romance blooms-- as I'll show with one more example from the early years of the series.

 

THE END OF NAGATORO

 

Since I don't follow any manga forums, I had no idea that this popular manga -- usually rendered in English as DON'T TOY WITH ME, MISS NAGATORO-- would have its conclusion published in Japan this June. Thus, the final episode, #154, was translated into English online this week in July.

Now, though I didn't know specific end-times, I was fully aware that the series would conclude soon. In many teen humor serials, the characters never age and never leave high school, ranging from ARCHIE to URUSEI YATSURA. But from the first stories, NAGATORO's author Nanshi hinted that his story would be time-centric. The male lead Naoto is introduced to the reader as a second-year in high school, while the titular Nagatoro is his junior by one year. She seemingly fixates on Naoto the first time she meets him, sarcastically using the respectful term "Senpai" toward him while in actuality she shows him no respect, at least in the earliest stories. Though I don't recall that Nanashi specifies the passage of time, once the series passed its hundredth installment it was clear that Naoto was going to graduate, for he was began studying to pass the mock exams for college. This factor became an impetus for the Naoto-Nagatoro romance, since once Naoto graduated, he would no longer see Nagatoro every school day. Nanashi set the reader up for the expectation that all the high school hijinks would have to come to an end as the protagonists left high school and began entering the world of adult work.

Nanashi made the transition just as entertaining as any of the early craziness, with lots of humor and heartache, but I puzzled over how he would wrap things up. Even in the later chapters, he introduced a handful of interesting characters, and suggested the evolution of possible subplots, such as:

(1) Is Gamo-chan really crushing on Nagatoro's older brother Taiga, and will anything come up of that possible affection?

(2) Following Nagatoro showing her commitment by being a nude model for Naoto, a teacher suggests that it would be viewed as a crime for an underage girl to expose herself that way, even for art. Would there be complications because of the romantic commitment between the two?

But no, Nanashi tamped down on further chaos in the end. When he introduced a subplot about both Naoto and Nagatoro volunteering to give year-end speeches for their respective classes, I thought that was just a minor fillip. Instead, Nanashi used the speeches as a means of describing how the two protagonists would continue their real-world aspirations, even while presumably maintaining their long-term romance until both are old enough to marry.

So the speeches they both give are descriptive of their experiences with one another, though worded as if they were more generalized descriptions of school life.

First, Nagatoro:

And then Naoto:

These are, as I said, very restrained for the NAGATORO series, and I don't know how I feel about the conclusion, even after having heard through one source that there may be an epilogue. However, the final chapter should make it possible for me to finally organize some of my thoughts on the series as a whole for a forthcoming essay. In that essay, I plan to discuss reasons why this simple-seeming teen romance comic should grab me so strongly-- much more so, I believe, than others I've celebrated here, such as NISEKOI and LOVE HINA.

QUICK SELF-MASTERY POST

From a fairly recent issue of NAGATORO. It's by no means unique among manga on the theme of characters mastering their own weaknesses rather than simply conquering other opponents. But this sequence is interesting since the context is that of a fine artist honing his skills.

SO THE DRAMA, SO THE MYTH

 I mentioned in PROBLEMS VS. CONUNDRUMS some examples, mostly from Classic TREK, wherein certain episodes emphasized one potentiality more than any other. But it occurs to me that it would be interesting to show in greater detail how a given story works out a dramatic "short-range" problem in a hyperconcrescent fashion, but does not venture into the deeper level of abstract thought that would promote a mythopoeic "long-range" conundrum, particularly in the realm of a psychological epistemological pattern.

The manga NAGATORO is my subject this time, and for the most part its principal emphasis is that of the dramatic potentiality. One of this manga's most interesting aspects is that author Nanashi is as careful as any novel-author to introduce dramatic problems early in the manga that are not "solved" until they appear again in a much later arc.

Here is a key scene from the third installment of the official NAGATORO manga. The set up is that, after the young woman has emotionally bullied the introverted young man whom she calls (with subtle sarcasm) her "senpai," he finally forces himself to ask her what her name is.

Now, an American reader might not know that in Japan it's customary for high school students not to call each other by their first names as casually as do Americans of the same age. First name address between male and female implies the familiarity of boyfriend and girlfriend, so using a surname, as Nagatoro does here, is common. Nagatoro does not even offer her given name, and before the young man can offer either of his names, she shuts him down, asserting that she prefers to keep calling him "Senpai." Even much later, after the young girl has heard other persons use Senpai's full name, she declines to call him that.

Nothing more is said about the matter of names until Nanashi finally begins a full arc on the subject in Chapters 61-62. When Nagatoro stays out of school with the flu, Senpai visits her at her home. Nagatoro accuses him of trying to snoop on her secrets:

While Nagatoro brings up the subject just to rag on him about his supposed perversions, Senpai blurts out that he wants to know "your name... and stuff." Nagatoro is mildly flummoxed to realize that she never did disclose that information to him.

Without going into specifics about how this scene plays out, Senpai does find out that Nagatoro's given name is "Hayase." That said, even though he feels mildly stoked by having that knowledge, he doesn't start using the given name since that would imply a possible romantic connection. 

Then in Chapter 66, Senpai gets sick with the flu he caught from her, and she visits him at his home. However, he falls into a semi-delirium in which he imagines a new familiarity with Nagatoro-- and he actually thinks he's dreaming when he calls her "Hayase" to her face. 

Senpai then promptly passes out, and Nagatoro becomes stoked by this indirect expression of intimate feeling, so much so that she almost kisses him in his sleep-- only to get interrupted by exigent circumstances. 

This arc more or less concludes in this same chapter. Senpai recovers from the flu and goes to school the next day, confused as to his memories of his "dream." But Nagatoro not only remembers everything that happened, she suddenly shows extreme resentment of the feelings he invoked in her. She punishes him for her own reactions by kicking him, and her line, "You're just Senpai" is clearly her attempt to thrust him back into a completely subsidiary relationship. 

This arc appears to conclude the whole "what's your name" business. The most current installment of the series, Chapter 104, depicts a closer relationship between the potential romantic couple, but they still address each other as "Senpai" and "Nagatoro." IMO Nanashi just wanted to explore the drama of two young people with considerable ambivalence about their feelings toward one another. 

But is there any way in which Nanashi's insight into teenaged psychology could be deemed what I would term a psychological myth? 

It might be argued that Nagatoro and Senpai's feelings for one another are being channeled through a matrix of cultural expectations; that of the expectation that only possible romantic partners use first names with one another. However, in my estimation this custom has no deeper resonance. The name-custom is the equivalent of a "stop-sign." Such a sign has one meaning, and one meaning only, so the custom doesn't compare, say, to a more multivalent custom. For instance, the idea of an enduring relationship between a samurai and his leader may be said to be based in custom. But it's a custom that can take on a range of meanings in literature, and thus manga as different as DANCE IN THE VAMPIRE BUND and ROSARIO + VAMPIRE can use that resonance for very different purposes.

Thus, when I search for a psychological myth, I look for an elaboration of symbolic resonances into mythopoeic concrescence, which is only possible when the author is a "long-range" mode. A dramatic concrescence can be formed from any number of "short-range" emotional states, but that concrescence does not depend on any abstractions as does the mythopoeic type. 

TENDER LOVING SADISM PT. 1

 I've taken on many ambitious projects on the ARCHIVE over the year, but one project I'll never attempt is to figure out the role that fictional sadism plays in Japanese pop culture, even though I've often pointed examples of manga that were particularly engaged with this psychological concept. Still, I can point out some interesting variations on the theme.

I've finished a still-in-progress manga with the wordy title of PLEASE DON'T BULLY ME, NAGATORO, in which a minor form of sadism is used as a means of improving a potential romantic partner's intestinal fortitude. The premise begins with second-year high schooler Naoto, an extremely withdrawn young man who loses himself in the school's art club-- of which he's the only member-- in order to avoid engaging with his peers. His life changes, largely for the better, when a first-year student, a girl named Nagatoro, notices him and makes her mission in life to constantly torment the fellow, constantly insulting him for being a "virgin" and committing minor acts of physical abuse on Naoto's person.

Given that Nagatoro is a comely damsel despite her aggressiveness, Naoto is not entirely unhappy with her bullying. Even though she's being sarcastic when she calls him her "senpai"-- allegedly her superior in age and stature, with her being his "kohai"-- she brings Naoto out of his shell, sitting for him as his model so that he stops painting safe subjects like flowers and fruit. As of this writing the relationship is still in flux, with Naoto asking Nagatoro on their first date. But one particular episode is worth examination.

Because Nagatoro is one of the "cool kids" at the school, some of her female friends become interested in making fun of Naoto as well, though not with Nagatoro's personal motives. Since Nagatoro constantly calls Naoto a "pervert," the other girls in her pack do the same but with a significant difference.

In the story "Senpai is a Quiet Pervert," Nagatoro's peer calls Naoto a "herbivore," meaning that he has no sexual nature whatever. Nagatoro is quick to correct this misimpression:

The two girls argue, and Nagatoro offers to prove her judgment of Naoto's "quiet perversion" by searching out one of the erotic manga he keeps in the art room. Naoto alone knows that though he has an erotic manga nearby, it's not in the art room, so Nagatoro's quest is doomed to failure. But because he'd rather be thought a sex-obsessed loser than a sexless loser, he covertly gets hold of the manga and brings it into the art room-- thus supporting Nagatoro's vision of him.

It's not clear as to whether Nagatoro realizes what Naoto has done, but either way, she doesn't spare him her scorn. But in comparison to the opinions of the other girls, Nagatoro's insults will in future act as a goad, encouraging him to take a shot at finding a non-manga girlfriend.