![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
oirancut-tags: This is related, but it's really only peripherally about spoilers. But, I've gotta say, I love cut-tags.
I use cut-tags to talk about Buffy and Angel, shows that have completed their runs. I do this because I do know there are at least a couple people on my flist who are even farther behind with the Jossverse than I am and who might like to be surprised when they see eps that I have already squeed over.
I use cut-tags to talk about various aspects of my life that I doubt are terribly interesting to other people. I use cut-tags to obscure large images, since I know that many people (me among them) are bizarrely fussy about having our f-list "messed up" by giant images that bump the formatting out of whack.
I use cut-tags as "teasers" for those same aspects of my life that I doubt are terribly interesting to other people, but that I'd actually like to have some sort of dialogue about anyway. You know, things like sprouting glamour spuds. A few people have told me that they find my cut-tag wording intriguing or interesting. Thus, cut-tags provide yet another way for me to manipulate people and twist them to my will ;)
I cut-tag for all the reasons I wish other people would. I don't do it because I am afraid of anyone else's wrath; I do it as a selfish "good example." Perhaps it’s a fine line to some, but I do see a difference between doing unto others, etc., etc. and selling out to The Man. When I first got to LJ, one of the first things I learned was the cut-tag code. I was envious of the cool lead-in phrases people could put in their tags and I had a deep desire for a tidy page. The cut-tag is fabulous code: it gives you both the ability to appear nice and to use formatting as part of your message.
Viva la cut-tag!!!!
Sakende Yaruze: translates to "I Shout For You." Downloads of scanlations can be found here: Neoterica.
Most of the manga I read are pure trash with just enough plot to justify drawing pretty men having sex. Or, with disturbing frequency, they have just enough plot to justify drawing a pretty man and a self-described "18-year-old college freshman" who appears to be approximately age four having sex.
There are very few true "keepers," in my multigigabyte manga folder and most of those elite volumes do not involve anyone, pretty boy or not, having sex. One exception is Sakende Yaruze. This is a five-volume series that has already ended in Japan. The translation into English is currently about three chapters from completion, and fortunately the translator works quickly, putting up a new chapter every week or so.
For anyone who likes anime or drama CDs, the story has an especially interesting premise: a voice actor meets the teenage son he never knew about after the death of his high-school sweetheart. His son wishes to live with him, so the voice actor decides to take on more jobs in order to support the two of them. This includes yaoi roles! Yay! Porn!
There are love entanglements galore, but the focus of this series is definitely on the relationships and not the sex, per se. But when people finally do have sex, it's ridiculously affecting and romantic (at least for me!).
Some of the characters start out as assholes, but as you get to know them over the series, you learn their quirks and come to like them. The son, Nakaya, gets the best lines and has a tendency toward incisive, heart-rending speeches and I love him very, very much.
I don't read this series with the idea that a fandom shall spring up around it, or that one even ought to. I just adore it. I love the characters, the story, and the brushstroke-wispy art. If you're intrigued by yaoi manga but really want a *story* with your mansex, this series would be an excellent choice.
the mangaverse: Okay, so I know that manga are not real, and I realize that the contrived plots are just that, but I do have a couple questions about Japanese culture based on reading about six thousand four hundred and two mangas in the past couple of months.
I use cut-tags to talk about Buffy and Angel, shows that have completed their runs. I do this because I do know there are at least a couple people on my flist who are even farther behind with the Jossverse than I am and who might like to be surprised when they see eps that I have already squeed over.
I use cut-tags to talk about various aspects of my life that I doubt are terribly interesting to other people. I use cut-tags to obscure large images, since I know that many people (me among them) are bizarrely fussy about having our f-list "messed up" by giant images that bump the formatting out of whack.
I use cut-tags as "teasers" for those same aspects of my life that I doubt are terribly interesting to other people, but that I'd actually like to have some sort of dialogue about anyway. You know, things like sprouting glamour spuds. A few people have told me that they find my cut-tag wording intriguing or interesting. Thus, cut-tags provide yet another way for me to manipulate people and twist them to my will ;)
I cut-tag for all the reasons I wish other people would. I don't do it because I am afraid of anyone else's wrath; I do it as a selfish "good example." Perhaps it’s a fine line to some, but I do see a difference between doing unto others, etc., etc. and selling out to The Man. When I first got to LJ, one of the first things I learned was the cut-tag code. I was envious of the cool lead-in phrases people could put in their tags and I had a deep desire for a tidy page. The cut-tag is fabulous code: it gives you both the ability to appear nice and to use formatting as part of your message.
Viva la cut-tag!!!!
Sakende Yaruze: translates to "I Shout For You." Downloads of scanlations can be found here: Neoterica.
Most of the manga I read are pure trash with just enough plot to justify drawing pretty men having sex. Or, with disturbing frequency, they have just enough plot to justify drawing a pretty man and a self-described "18-year-old college freshman" who appears to be approximately age four having sex.
There are very few true "keepers," in my multigigabyte manga folder and most of those elite volumes do not involve anyone, pretty boy or not, having sex. One exception is Sakende Yaruze. This is a five-volume series that has already ended in Japan. The translation into English is currently about three chapters from completion, and fortunately the translator works quickly, putting up a new chapter every week or so.
For anyone who likes anime or drama CDs, the story has an especially interesting premise: a voice actor meets the teenage son he never knew about after the death of his high-school sweetheart. His son wishes to live with him, so the voice actor decides to take on more jobs in order to support the two of them. This includes yaoi roles! Yay! Porn!
There are love entanglements galore, but the focus of this series is definitely on the relationships and not the sex, per se. But when people finally do have sex, it's ridiculously affecting and romantic (at least for me!).
Some of the characters start out as assholes, but as you get to know them over the series, you learn their quirks and come to like them. The son, Nakaya, gets the best lines and has a tendency toward incisive, heart-rending speeches and I love him very, very much.
I don't read this series with the idea that a fandom shall spring up around it, or that one even ought to. I just adore it. I love the characters, the story, and the brushstroke-wispy art. If you're intrigued by yaoi manga but really want a *story* with your mansex, this series would be an excellent choice.
the mangaverse: Okay, so I know that manga are not real, and I realize that the contrived plots are just that, but I do have a couple questions about Japanese culture based on reading about six thousand four hundred and two mangas in the past couple of months.
- Is it actually very common for high-school students to live alone? The young boy living all by his lonesome in an apartment is a very common set-up for a yaoi/BL manga, and this allows him, of course, to have other boys over at odd hours without any pesky parents or siblings getting in the way of the explicit sex. In the U.S., it would be quite unusual for a high school student to live away from adult guardians of some sort, but because I know that high schools are much more specialized, and entrance to a school is much more competitive in Japan, it seems possible that a student might need to live separate from family, even in another city, in order to attend a high school of choice.
So. Is this just total manga bullshit, or is it plausible for a small but significant segment of high school students to live independently, more or less as adults? - Do culture festivals really feature that much male-to-female crossdressing? And how is that part of a "culture festival" anyway? Kabuki and Takarazuka aside, I'm not aware that there's that much crossdressing in Japanese culture. Or maybe that's enough. It's more than we have here in the States, I suppose…
- And about the reading of manga: I've seen what seem to be stock photographs of Japanese men on the subway trains reading very explicit bondage manga…but what about women? Do people in general read sexually explicit manga in public in a very casual way? And, if so, is it both men and women, or just men?
