2011-10-19

御神酒天神, or Gods Enjoying Alcohol



Saw this commercial the other day, featuring Demon Kakka and Karina. Does Demon Kakka and what happens to his face remind you of anyone I've introduced you to before?

Yes, the からくり人形 mechanical puppet representing a god/spirit whose face gets red when he drinks! Well, you probably got the joke even without that extra bit of knowledge, so I can't take credit for teaching you anything...

...unless I teach you something more right now, that is. I learned a bit more about this sacred-sake loving spirit - he's called 御神酒天神・おみきてんじん by the way, but we'll just call him Mickey. This karakuri 'mechanism' started off as a hanging scroll constructed like so. When you put out sacred sake for the gods, you pulled a string on the back of the scroll. This released the red paper, causing the god's face appear to have reddened with drink, as if he'd enjoyed your offering. 

Mickey also has a pretty sweet song about him getting a little tipsy (at least, that's what it sounds like to me). 



A New Blog for All Your Japanese Literature News

My friend Will of Wednesday Afternoon Picnic has started a new blog about high Japanese literature, called Junbungaku:
This is a place for news on what is going on in the contemporary Japanese literary world. Because to my knowledge, there isn’t a site like this out there for English speakers. A consolidated source for news, reviews, commentary, analysis, and more.
Sounds like a good time, am I right? His latest post (just made today) is about one of the Kikuchi Kan Prize's latest winners, Tsumura Setsuko.

I look forward to his first book reviews on the new site!