Lettow writes a novel!

[Lettow77]

 I'd like it to be a visual novel eroge, actually, but I am prepared to go forward with it as just my own work if I can't get art assets. Coding and writing can be taken care of, though. It all depends.

Anyway! HERE IS WHAT I HAVE.

The setting would be Vietnam, 1943-1945, and protagonist-kun is a Japanese soldier in the occupation force. Occupation of indochina is comparatively peaceful, but the shame of being far from the front is never far from your mind.

Lassitude and sickness, along with senseless and seemingly self-defeating drills, are the order of the day. The humidity is stifling, and so is the oppressive military culture. Vietnam is about to burn for thirty years, at the mercy of policymakers in Washington, Tokyo and Paris. As one man, your fate is completely subsumed into the inferno of WW2, and your attempts to find love and meaning in life seem frail and foolish as the destruction of a world looms ominously over you. Francophone Indochina is a doomed construct, and as traditional order in Asia burns around you, the flickering illusion of the Co-Prosperity Sphere promised to replace it seems increasingly ephemeral, a mirage of militarism that won't even outlive the brave young men sacrificed in droves in it's name.

First heroines i've conceived:
French Colonial Administrator's daughter- Ojou, literate, resents the decline of French as a world language, knows vietnamese, has only ever lived in Vietnam; Saigon is the big city.
Gone-with-the-wind type character, knows her world is gone no matter how the war goes, and hates the Japanese for it. Bit of a drinking problem.

Vietnamese plantation owner's daughter- eldest daughter of a widower with no sons, handles all her father's business affairs. Social climber with aspirations on the colonial class's land; courts the favour of local Japanese garrison because she anticipates having much to gain in the event of the french having to sell off their ownings to the natives. A materialistic, independent and driven woman who views the Japanese as a stepping stone to her own economic security.

Certainly more- a comfort woman feels obligatory.


   I'd like to write about the relationship between asia for the asiatics rhetoric, Japan's shockingly good relations with the french colonial regime that was allowed to continue largely unobstructed, (unique in Japanese WW2 occupation!) and the triangular interplay between Vietnamese nationalists, the French colonial regime, and the Japanese occupiers.

It is felt this project will contribute to the development of the sonnet project rather than obstruct it.

[Habbaku]

I'd pick the one with a good balance between sluttiness and breast size.

[Barrister]

It's an intriguing setting but you'd have to do a ton of research to try and get it right.  You're also going to have to fight hard to prevent it from turning into imperialist apologism.

You know most advice for first time writers starts with "write what you know".  If you're going to write a novel why not place it in the modern day south?  You have no shortage of inspiration to draw from...

[Lettow77]

 One of Dazai's best works was written about a greek legend- I think it's possible to write what you don't know as long as you have a healthy respect and interest. Besides, I am not completely ignorant on the subject- it's been a special field of interest for awhile now, and I am reading increasingly specific books. You are right I'd want a vietnamese advisor though. And I can't write the modern day South- it'd be too depressing and crushing to have to live it in my mind. Plus, speaking of apologism, I positively couldn't help myself if that was the subject. I'd castigate and glorify the South simultaneously and never get anything else done.

  As for apologism, visual novels have many branching paths. I think it is possible protagonist-kun may reject his country and military obligations in at least one of them, but this is an incredible step for a man of his times and place to take. No matter what he does, it will likely end poorly; the best ends would be said surrender, deciding like Anatoly Sergievsky from Chess that his heart was his greatest obligation rather than any country's loyalties, and that he wanted to live for the sake of his own aspirations. Milling in a camp with others, mostly vietnamese and Japanese who had been wounded/unconscious at the time of surrender, both groups avoiding him for obvious reasons, he'd be at his darkest hour in doubt at the decision he made, when he received a letter from the girl he had pursued, an acknowledgement that her affection for him extended even in the absence of Japanese occupation of Vietnam.

Alternatively, another "good" end would be his decision that his time in Vietnam had been worthwhile, and that he'd found beauty and happiness while he was stationed abroad. Acknowledging the beauty and value of his experiences, he could face death more readily, and be one of the empire's countless falling blossoms in its darkest hours. 

Alternatively alternatively, he could repudiate the affections of any women while in Vietnam, but this would only increase his restless misery. Searching for something intangible to place his ambitions and hopes in, he'd find an enthusiasm in army life he never knew before, and become only more fervent, restlessly stalking Saigon in impotent rage as the allies finally close in on Vietnam, reinforced from other theatres in preparations for an apocalyptic final struggle.

Most ends would be pretty bad though, and end negatively not only for Protagonist-kun, but also the woman indiscrete enough to give her affections to him.

It's really intended to be a branching story with many paths and no true one, and no path more "right" than others. If it ends up being nothing but a mere novel though, i'd go with the French Ojou as the canon heroine, and a tragic ending that ends in the ruin of both parties as the canon ending. A visual novel would afford the reader opportunities to grasp at the slender prospects of a "happy" ending, though, whether happiness is interpreted as betrayal of country and ideology for enduring love, or meeting death in the service of your country with a happy outlook and fond memories.  One of the main goals of this work is to communicate mono-no-aware to a western audience.

[Barrister]

And I can't write the modern day South- it'd be too depressing and crushing to have to live it in my mind. Plus, speaking of apologism, I positively couldn't help myself if that was the subject. I'd castigate and glorify the South simultaneously and never get anything else done.

No offence, but that sounds much more interesting than anything else you have talked about in your post.

[Admiral Yi]

Is Ojou supposed to be a Vietnamese chick's name?

[11B4V]

MLK day is just around the corner...cheers

[Lettow77]

Ojou is a character archetype.
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/Ojou
Protagonist-kun is almost certainly from tottori, and a poor rural family.

I know you say it'd be interesting, but I have no interest in writing about the South. Not necessarily ever, but probably not soon.

An idea I liked for a story, but ultimately scrapped:
Two mormon missionaries in Japan, protagonist-kun and his mission companion and lifelong friend. protagonist-kun has homosexual feelings for his mission companion, but is a pious mormon. His mission companion is cynical and rejects the church's teachings, but went on mission anyway because it's social suicide not to do so for his entire family in rural Utah where he lives. One is jaded by mormon culture and more interested in secular Japan weeaboo crap and its glittering temptations, while the other struggles with his forbidden love and is agonized by his friend(?)'s loss of faith, knowing that any move he made on him would only make it worse.

Any ero content would result in a bad end, and the best end would be seeing the one person you succeeded in baptizing attend church service for the first time, after you successfully denied self-temptation and reinforced your best friend's belief in heavily father's plan. Themes would be self-delusion, self-denial and the optimistic pursuit of a greater good and sublimation of the individual.

[Razgovory]

And I can't write the modern day South- it'd be too depressing and crushing to have to live it in my mind. Plus, speaking of apologism, I positively couldn't help myself if that was the subject. I'd castigate and glorify the South simultaneously and never get anything else done.

No offence, but that sounds much more interesting than anything else you have talked about in your post.

Indeed.

[Lettow77]

 Haven't y'all heard enough about the South from me in one lifetime? Why is the peanut gallery not sick of that one? The South makes *me* sick. I don't like to think about it. It's a horrible, conflicting thing i've shoved deep into the recesses of my being and would rather have be something that unconsciously effects everything I do rather than something I openly consider.

[Drakken]

Haven't y'all heard enough about the South from me in one lifetime? Why is the peanut gallery not sick of that one? The South makes *me* sick. I don't like to think about it. It's a horrible, conflicting thing i've shoved deep into the recesses of my being and would rather have be something that unconsciously effects everything I do rather than something I openly consider.

That seems exactly what a self-loathing, crazed Japanese otaku thinking America is like the world of Superman and Spiderman would say about Japan and Japanese society.

[Lettow77]

 Right-  unpleasant accusations about my understanding of Japan aside, I'd love a Japanese otaku to do for me what I can't do for myself with regards to the South. I've even met one like that.

However, I am more comfortable writing Japan.

[Tamas]

And I can't write the modern day South- it'd be too depressing and crushing to have to live it in my mind. Plus, speaking of apologism, I positively couldn't help myself if that was the subject. I'd castigate and glorify the South simultaneously and never get anything else done.

No offence, but that sounds much more interesting than anything else you have talked about in your post.

Yes.

[Capetan Mihali]

I agree.  You should write about what you know, as the cliche goes.  So write about going around pretending to be blind at UT-Martin, growing up in Memphis obsessed with the Confederacy, mew, squee, etc.  You clearly already have a literary style. 

[Admiral Yi]

Lettuce: have you read Confederacy of Dunces?