現代に通じる名作の価値を伝えたい

　Walking into Robert Campbell's house in Tokyo is like stepping into a vast library, as visitors are overwhelmed by the extensive collection of books, overflowing from wall to wall and floor to ceiling.

　Some of these works are fragile, dating to the Edo Period (1603-1867).

　"There's a lot of Edo literature that still remains unread in Japan," said Campbell, a University of Tokyo professor specializing in Japanese literature from the Edo to the early Meiji Era (1868-1912).

　"People in the Edo Period put a lot of time and passion into making books which are all handmade and are a little bit different from each other," he added, referring to the huge volume of documents he obtained from many old bookstores across Japan and which he went through with a fine-toothed comb.

　Campbell said the great depth and perspective conveyed in the literature of the Edo Period appeals to him. One author was able to write in four or five styles, he said, "from classical Chinese style to very casual, off-the-cuff funny style."

　Writers were so dexterous that "they could adjust their pen to the object they were writing about or the people they wanted to deliver their message to." In contrast, modern Japanese seems very flat and close to the spoken language, so "the difference is like watching a movie with or without 3-D glasses," said the 53-year-old bibliophile.

　Born and raised in New York as a descendant of Irish immigrants, Campbell wasn't exposed to Asian culture until he moved to San Francisco in his high school days.

　His interest in old Japanese literature dates to his first visit to Japan in 1979, when he was a junior at the University of California, Berkeley, majoring in economics and East Asian languages.

　After taking intensive courses in Japanese at two U.S. colleges including UC Berkeley for three years, Campbell took one year off and came to Japan to put the finishing touches on his advanced modern Japanese language study at the Inter-University Center for Japanese Studies, a private school located in Tokyo at that time and operated by 11 U.S. and Canadian universities.

　While taking what Campbell recalls as "rigorous language training similar to a military boot camp," he quickly noted that however well-educated or sophisticated they are, most Japanese today are cut off from their cultural backgrounds.

　"Most Japanese can't read fluently anything that was written in Japanese more than, say, 120 to 130 years ago. That's very interesting as well as strange to me," said Campbell, who later returned to the United States to pursue graduate studies in Japanese literature at Harvard University.

　Existence of such a strong division between the modern and old Japanese languages made Campbell aware of the necessity to have fluency and literacy in the language that people used in the past.

　"My goal was to be able to read anything that was written in Japanese," said Campbell, adding that he wanted to ensure that he could work on the same level as Japanese writers such as Natsume Soseki, Mori Ogai, or Futabatei Shimei did.

　"Those writers of older generation had a very rich inventory in their own language and were able to read anything 300 or 400 years before, in addition to classical Chinese," he said.

　Campbell's appearances on TV as a commentator and panelist in quiz shows have put him firmly on the Japanese media map, but he is more in his element on the NHK educational program "J-Bungaku," which he has hosted since April 2009.

ひと味違う文学講座

　Campbell selects authors from an extensive field in Japanese literature, and explains the fascination of each guest's work in layman's terms, with the focus on the excerpts that he regards as the most exciting parts. The original Japanese texts and their English translations are presented in parallel fashion.

　"The program is very successful because a lot of young readers have started to read older literature," he said.

　Campbell assembles the lineup by mixing modern and old works, and little-known as well as famous writers from different genres, to show that there's still a lot to be discovered in Japanese heritage and is relevant even today.

　Considering the complex nature of old Japanese literature, Campbell pointed out that it is much easier for many Japanese to rely on English translations than dare to read it in its original form.

　"People know of Higuchi Ichiyo, a female writer on the 5,000-yen bill, but most Japanese today cannot read her masterpieces 'Nigorie,' or 'Takekurabe' in the original," he said.

　"I suggest you think of old Japanese literature as something like a foreign language," he added. "Rather than going straight into the original, you should spend some time in reading the English translation and make good use of it as a steppingstone before switching to the original."

　Today, Campbell often sees Japanese around him feeling embarrassed by or envious of his profound knowledge of the Japanese language. But he rejects such attitudes of embarrassment and envy as a symbol of shiko teishi, where people give up making further efforts to explore their rich cultures and traditions.

　"What's important is the next step," he said. As long as you are studying English, "thinking about old Japanese as a foreign language is a next step you should take to delve into literature belonging to previous generations.

　"Japanese people are not shy about studying a foreign language. If that's true, perhaps older Japanese is something they could be interested in."