"In Whom I am Well Pleased"
Last year, namely in 2008, many prominent people died all over the world:
Edmund Hillary, George Habash, Suharto, Arthur C. Clarke, Dith Pran, Charlton Heston, Irena Sendler, Sydney Pollack, Alxander Solzhenitsyn, Hua Guofeng, V.P. Singh, Alexy II, and Paul Newman in addition to much more respectable persons.
( http://www.afpbb.com/article/life-culture/life/2550233/3615788 )
Yet, very symbolic might be the demise of Alxander Solzhenitsyn, a notable Russian author who refused to sell his soul to both the U.S.S.R. and the U.S.
SECTION I: Alxander Solzhenitsyn
When I was young, I read a few novels (of the Japanese-translated version) Alxander Solzhenitsyn had authored in his hardship under the communist regime of the Soviet Union.
In those days, a certain Japanese manga artist presented his work in which a main character said that it was better to be a shoe-shiner in Florida than a revolutionary hero in Siberia.
Indeed, there were many Japanese youths in those days who loved the Russian literature. I also read some humble works of Dostoyevskii. That may be a reason why I did not wish the all-out thermonuclear war between the U.S. and the U.S.S.R. at all.
(It was also last year that I got more accurate insight into the fate of Alxander Solzhenitsyn as I happened to see a TV program of Hitsory Channel which reminded me of a long forgotten old hero in my mind. I could then read some of the riddles about him. Alxander Solzhenitsyn had a brave wife he later however divorced.)
SECTION II: Shuichi Kato
The notable Japanese critic died in 2008.
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Shūichi Katō (19 September 1919 – 5 December 2008) was a Japanese critic and author. He is best known for his works in the field of literature and culture.
Born in Tokyo, Katō served as lecturer at Tokyo University (Dept. of Literature) and Yale University, professor at the Free University of Berlin and the University of British Columbia, guest professor at Ritsumeikan University (Dept. of International Relations), and curator of the Kyoto Museum for World Peace.
Katō had a degree as a Doctor of Medicine, specialising in haematology.
A convinced pacifist, Kato worked for the abolishing of nuclear arms. He formed a group with philosopher Shunsuke Tsurumi and novelist Kenzaburo Oe to defend the war-renouncing Article 9 of the Constitution of Japan. For almost 30 years, from 1980 until his death, he wrote a widely read column in the evening culture pages of the Asahi Shimbun in which he discussed society, culture, and international relations from a literate and resolutely leftist perspective.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sh%C5%ABichi_Kat%C5%8D_(critic)
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Shuichi Kato was truly an intellectual person who lived as such earning money for life as such.
His writing can be a good material for foreigners to learn and understand how intellectual Japanese think and feel inside.
But, no ordinary Japanese businessmen must not know anything about him nowadays.
If they belong to the upper echelon of a corporate hierarchy in a major company, such as Toyota, Sony, Panasonic, or Nomura or Mitsubishi UFJ, no ordinary Japanese businessmen must not have ever read or been impressed by any of works of Shuichi Kato.
Ordinary Japanese businessmen are "usually" not intellectual persons. Conversely, an intellectual student in Japan "usually" avoids working in an ordinary company, good or bad. Yet it is not truly Christian at all, in my view.
SECTION III: Mr. Kenzaburo Oe
Authour Mr. Kenzaburo Oe is still active as I watched him in an NHK TV program a few days ago.
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Kenzaburō Ōe (Ōe Kenzaburō?, born January 31, 1935) is a major figure in contemporary Japanese literature. His works, strongly influenced by French and American literature and literary theory, engage with political, social and philosophical issues including nuclear weapons, social non-conformism and existentialism.
Ōe was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1994 for creating "an imagined world, where life and myth condense to form a disconcerting picture of the human predicament today."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kenzabur%C5%8D_%C5%8Ce
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When Mr. Kenzaburo Oe won Nobel Prize, he frequently made TV appearances. Then I for the first time noticed that he tends to show a certain, too sensible reactive behavior sometimes, though not ill-like, that looks like having a deep root in his mental and physical composition.
That may be a reason why he has never thought of working like ordinary people among ordinary people. Probably he must have been able to only become a writer; and he actually became so, in my humble observation.
I learnt some from his words, nonetheless.
He said once, though on TV, that what one has learnt through his own profession would help him cope with even the most serious crisis he must encounter someday in his life.
I did not read his novels much. His line did not even look like aligning with a mainstream atmosphere of Japan as the world No.2 economic power, though Japanese Gross National Product was first evaluated as No.2 in the world (excluding the U.S.S.R.) in 1968.
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That is all for today.
I did not think ever I could be an author.
But, nowadays, I think I may be someday.
(How do you like the idea, my dear?
http://www.fukuchan.ac/music/j-folk2/soranihoshigaaruyouni.html )
Mar 1:8 I indeed have baptized you with water: but he shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost.
Mar 1:9 And it came to pass in those days, that Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee, and was baptized of John in Jordan.
Mar 1:10 And straightway coming up out of the water, he saw the heavens opened, and the Spirit like a dove descending upon him:
Mar 1:11 And there came a voice from heaven, saying, Thou art my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.