Costanza Reiser
Annotated Bibliography
- Westfahl, Gary, and Sharalyn Orbaugh. “Future City Tokyo: 1909 and 2009.” In Science Fiction and the Prediction of the Future: Essays on Foresight and Fallacy, 84-87. Jefferson, N.C.: McFarland, 2011.
This book includes a myriad of essays about futuristic literature among various scopes and cultures. This includes, Japanese futurism, which Hirato is famous for having begun. One particular essay in this book, which is written by Sharalyn Orbaugh, focuses on this particular genre and Hirato’s involvement with it. This provides information about the author and his extracurricular passions, which help us analyze and study his poetry further.
2. Renkichi, Hirato. Manifesto of the Japanese Futurist Movement. Tokyo, 1921
This is a translated copy of the Manifesto that Hirato is famous for writing. This manifesto included many of his ideas and provides insight on the genre of Japanese futuristic writing that arose in the early 20th century. In this manifesto Hirato, poses revolutionary and nuanced ideas like the one of the optimistic poet that is passionate about light, heat and power. Or it touches on the over-industrialized Tokyo of this futuristic reality. These ideas help further understand his poetry and provide insight into Hirato’s mind. At the end of this manifesto there is a lot of characters repeating and words varying in font size, same kind of style found in the poem. This source is valuable because it gives insight on the author’s mind, genre of poetry and individualistic style.
3. Shared source:
This picture transmits various sensations from the use of a muted color palette, the hazy and fogged background, and by the faint rain that blends in with the rest of the background as well. This piece of artwork uses incredibly similar imagery to that of Hirato’s poem. In both the artwork and the poem, a great emphasis is placed on the atmosphere and the environment, and the feelings that this brings out in living beings. As a group, we came to the conclusion that if we had to choose two words to describe both the piece of artwork and the poem, it would be sadness and nostalgia. The blue tones throughout the entirely of the artwork goes hand in hand with the “blue” feelings and the coldness in the poem.
