Raymond Williams: Wales - Japan 2

Dai Smith and Daniel Williams were in Tokyo at the end of September attending a conference on Raymond Williams. ‘Fiction as Criticism / Criticism as a Whole Way of Life’ took place on Saturday, September 25th. In his opening remarks Shintaro Kono noted that the event was a development of the CREW conference ‘Raymond Williams In Transit: Wales – Japan’ that took place in October 2009. Yasuhiro Kondo delivered a paper on Williams’s neglected novel Loyalties, offering a close analysis of the concept of history informing Williams’s intricate novel. Yuzo Yamada drew on Williams’s criticism to offer a fascinating comparative account of Gwyn Thomas and the mother turned poet, writer, and activist, Ishimure Michiko. During the ensuing conversation Dai Smith drew attention to a further connection between what Yamada referred to as the ‘far West’ of Europe and Japan, in the figure of American photographer William Eugene Smith. Eugene Smith’s famous photos of south Wales in the 1950s were a prelude to his more famous photos of the effects of Minamata disease in the 1970s which was the major subject of Michiko’s work. There are certainly grounds for further comparative work here….

In the afternoon Tony Pinkey of Lancaster University delivered a lecture on the role of Utopia in Williams’s thinking, with particular reference to the third volume of the Welsh trilogy, The Fight for Manod and in relation to William Morris’s notions of Utopia. Daniel Williams discussed Williams’s defense of realism against the poststructuralists in the 1970s, and used that debate to explore Williams’s claim that Border Country was an attempt at writing ‘against the grain of the form’. Dai Smith concluded the day with a spirited account of the exceptionalism of the south Walian industrial experience and of Williams’s own understanding and analysis of it.

On the previous Thursday, September 23rd, Hideaki Suzuki, Fuhito Endo, Takashi Onuki and Shintaro Kono all delivered terrific papers on Raymond Williams’s thought and invited responses from Tony Pinkney, Dai Smith and Daniel Williams. This again was a stimulating and intellectually lively session.

Both events were primarily arranged by Professor Yasuo Kawabata and took place at Japan Women University, Mejiro Campus. It is hoped that further events and projects will develop from in the future.

The symposium was hosted by Raymond Williams Kenkyukai (the society for Raymond Williams Studies in Japan) with the support of the Faculty / Graduate School of Humanities, JWU, and the JSPS/MEXT Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research.

The information for the event can be found here.
http://www.jwu.ac.jp/grp/lecture_news/2010/20100925.html

Bu Dai Smith a Daniel Williams yn Tokyo ar ddiwedd mis Medi yn mynychu cynhadledd ar Raymond Williams. Cynhaliwyd y gynhadledd ‘Fiction as Criticism / Criticism as a Whole Way of Life’ ar Ddydd Sadwrn 25 Medi. Yn ei sylwadau agoriadol nododd Shintaro Kono fod y digwyddiad yn ddatblygiad ar y gynhadledd ‘Raymond Williams In Transit: Wales – Japan’ a gynhaliwyd ym mis Hydref 2009. Cyflwynodd Yasuhiro Kondo bapur ar y nofel Loyalties gan ddadansoddi’r cysyniad o hanes yn nofel gymhleth Williams. Tynnodd Yuzo Yamada ar feirniadaeth Raymodn Williams i gynnig dadansoddiad cymharol, hynod ddiddorol, o Gwyn Thomas a'r fam a ddaeth yn fardd, llenor, ac ymgyrchydd, Ishimure Michiko. Yn ystod y sgwrs a ddilynodd tynnodd Dai Smith sylw at gysylltiad pellach rhwng yr hyn y cyfeiriodd Yamada ato fel yr 'Gorllewin pell' yn Ewrop a Siapan, yn ffigwr y ffotograffydd Americanaidd Eugene William Smith. Tynnodd Eugene Smith luniau enwog o dde Cymru yn y 1950aumac yn 1960au a 1970au fe dynnodd luniau enwog o effeithiau clefyd Minamata a oedd yn destun pwysig yng ngwaith Michiko. Mae testun gwaith cymharol diddorol yma....Yn y prynhawn traddododd Tony Pinkey o Brifysgol Lancaster ddarlith ar rôl Iwtopia yng ngwaith Williams meddwl, gan gyfeirio'n benodol at drydedd gyfrol y ‘drioleg Cymreig’, The Fight for Manod, ac at syniadau Iwtopaidd William Morris. Trafod ‘realaeth’ Raymond Williams wnaeth Daniel Williams, gan archwilio honiad Williams fod Border Country yn ymgais i ysgrifennu 'yn erbyn graen y ffurf'. Daeth y gynhadledd i ben wrth i Dai Smith drafod neilltuolrwydd profiad diwydiannol de Cymru a dealltwriaeth Williams, mewn theori a ffuglen, o’r profiad hwnnw.

Ar y dydd Iau blaenorol, Medi 23ain, cyflwynodd Hideaki Suzuki, Fuhito Endo, Takashi Onuki a Shintaro Kono bapurau hynod ddiddorol ar Raymond Williams, gan wahodd ymatebion gan Tony Pinkney, Dai Smith a Daniel Williams. Roedd hon eto yn sesiwn ddeallusol fywiog. Trefnwyd y cyfan gan yr athro Yasuo Kawabata a cynhaliwyd y ddau ddigwyddiad ym Mhrifysgol Merched Japan, Campws Mejiro. Y gobaith yw y bydd rhagor o ddigwyddiadau a phrosiectau yn datblygu o hyn yn y dyfodol.Trefnwyd y digwyddiadau gan y Raymond Williams Kenkyukai (y gymdeithas ar gyfer Astudio Raymond Williams yn Siapan) gyda chefnogaeth y Gyfadran / Graddedigion Ysgol y Dyniaethau, JWU, a ‘JSPS/MEXT Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research’.
Ceir y wybodaeth am y digwyddiad yma:
http://www.jwu.ac.jp/grp/lecture_news/2010/20100925.html