Originally posted on 22 December 2019 in Turkish here.
No, I’m not done yet.
I previously wrote about how Eiji found a new purpose in life after meeting Ash and getting to know his world, which helped him come out of the depression he suffered back in Japan. But what exactly is Eiji’s new purpose in life? It’s saving Ash from his very “different” world.
In the beginning of the story, we saw how devastated Eiji was when he found out that Ash was ready to use his one and only trump card (the capsule containing the Banana Fish drug) against Golzine, knowing full well that he wouldn’t win.
Ash had risked his own life to save Eiji’s when he didn’t know him at all and now Eiji doesn’t have the heart to let him walk to his death. It’s like he’s thinking to himself, “How can a boy my age find himself in such an impasse?” This is the first time we see Eiji rebel against the world Ash’s living in.
But Eiji does more than silently shed tears, especially once things get more complicated. For example, here he’s basically telling Ash to quit doing things that would put him in harm’s way.
Later, when it becomes clear that there’s no “quitting” in this world (because they simply won’t let you), Eiji comes up with a different suggestion.
And this offer is so unexpected that Ash doesn’t understand at first. Eiji simply asks him again if he would like to come to Japan with him. He is presumably surprised that Ash was so taken aback by such a straightforward question. Ash’s surprise is telling me that he never even thought it would be possible to leave this life behind.
Eiji’s offer also means this: I forgive you. Going to Japan to start a new life means that Ash won’t have to account for all the bad things he did in the past. Ash doesn’t believe there’s such a possibility or that he deserves such a chance. So he averts his gaze and comes up with an excuse. I just realized that there’s a pattern here. When Ash makes such excuses, he always puts himself down as if to say he’s not worthy of Eiji’s offer. But then, as you’ll see in the scene below, he realizes that this attitude only serves to embarrass Eiji, so he stops and apologizes.
What this scene inherently tells us is just how ashamed Ash feels about the things he was forced to do all his life. It is also a good example of the difference in opinion between Ash and Eiji—while Ash thinks so little of himself, Eiji thinks the world of him.
When Eiji repeats his offer to go to Japan together a second time, he can’t stay so calm.
Because by then, Ash gave himself up to Golzine as hostage in exchange for Eiji’s life, underwent an eating disorder, started a guerilla war, got raped and is still fighting against commandos as they’re having this conversation.
This time, Ash tells him what he really thinks instead of coming up with excuses. He says “My hands are dirty with other people’s blood,” implying that he doesn’t deserve a fresh start. “But you had to. Or you would be killed yourself,” replies Eiji, whereas previously, when they were quarreling before Ash’s one-to-one fight with Arthur, Eiji had yelled “You are not the kind of man who shoots defenseless people!” to his face. It seems that Eiji has learned the cruel ways of Ash’s world since then.
There is another reason why Ash is not taking Eiji up on his offer besides thinking that he doesn’t deserve a fresh start. Ash thinks he’s a troublemaker and will put those around him in danger no matter where he is (I talked more about this here). And as expected, he tells Eiji exactly that: “I’m bad news, Eiji. Doesn’t matter where I go… And you’ll get caught up in it. Like you are now.”
We know by now that Eiji never even once stayed silent when Ash said something to stigmatize himself. He always told Ash otherwise and explained why in a perfectly logical way. All this time, he calmly and patiently fought against Ash’s toxic mindset. But this time, he’s had enough.
This is the first time Eiji puts his emotions into words in such a raw way. He literally screams how much he cares about Ash. And a minute later, he indisputably proves just how much by pushing Ash away and taking bullet for him.
This incident resets all the progress Eiji’s so far made to change Ash’s self-loathing mindset. The fact that Eiji almost died because of him and later Lao’s tirade against Ash in front of all the gang members (“He ain’t human! He’s a goddamn monster!”) make Ash feel ashamed and disgusted at himself.
Then comes the wretched hospital scene… This scene is drenched in symbolism, but it actually serves to make us understand one simple fact: Similar to how Eiji can’t survive in Ash’s world, Ash will never be accepted in Eiji’s world. Eiji’s not capable of protecting himself in Ash’s world. He’ll always be vulnerable as long as he stays there. And in Eiji’s world, Ash will never be accepted by others in the way Eiji accepts Ash. He’ll ultimately be seen as a criminal rather than a victim and will have to answer to the law for what he did.
So Ash enters the hospital. He’s been reminded in the most painful way that he can never be part of Eiji’s world and has come to say goodbye to his friend one last time. Eiji vaguely hears Ash’s accented “sayounara” and crawls out of bed with great difficulty to stop him from leaving (Ash can’t pronounce the second syllable long, but instead says “sa-yo-na-ra”). But just then, Charlie and Ibe-san notice Ash and come after him. Eiji knows that even if they have good intentions now, eventually Ash will be found guilty. And, for the first time in his life, Eiji tells Ash to leave him. He screams “Go!” with all his might. The anime adaptation did a wonderful job showing us how difficult this must have been for Eiji to do.
I think Eiji inherently knew that this was the last time he would see Ash. But he refused to believe it, because that would mean that he himself had surrendered to the fatalistic mindset that he was trying to liberate Ash from. So what does Eiji do next? What he does best, of course.
Remember when Eiji wanted to pass a message to Ash through his gang members when Ash tried to send him back to Japan without telling him? He asked Bones and Kong to tell Ash to “take care of his life” and that he would “always wish him luck” even from far away.
So this time, Eiji writes a letter to Ash in case he can’t see him before going to Japan. He pours in all that he feels. The letter ends up being the most earnest summary of everything Eiji has been trying to make Ash understand.
… You said to me before, “We live in different worlds” … We are friends. Isn’t that enough? … But I never felt scared of you, not even once … Actually, I always felt that you are hurt, much more than me—that your spirit is wounded … I always wanted to protect you … I think I wanted to protect you from your future … You can change your fate …
Eiji wants these words to accompany Ash while he’s away: “You are not alone, Ash. I am with you. My soul is always with you.” The one-way ticket to Japan he encloses with the letter serves as a reminder of his invitation. We know that Eiji had every intention of seeing Ash again from his thoughts on the plane. What didn’t cross his mind at all was without a doubt that Ash would draw his last breath as he read Eiji’s heartfelt words.
When it comes to Ash’s death, I feel overwhelmed with a series of unanswered questions as I previously indicated hereandhere. For example…
When Sing can’t get Ash to say anything to Eiji, he can’t bear to face Eiji empty-handed so he sees him off with a few made-up parting words in Ash’s stead (Aww, isn’t he precious?). Does Eiji ever realize this? Can he tell that Sing made up Ash’s parting words? I think he can. So does he ever confront Sing about this before or after Garden of Light? Who knows.
And just how much does Eiji know about Ash’s death? He knows that his letter distracted Ash, so he didn’t see Lao coming. But does he know that Ash had read part of his letter by then and started running to the airport? Does he know that Ash went back to the library after getting wounded to read the rest of his letter? Does he know that Ash laid his head on his letter and died with a smile on his face?
I really wish for a “yes” to these questions.
To me, the story of Banana Fish is more antagonistic towards Eiji than Ash. Yes, all the bad stuff happen to Ash but he’s never shocked that they do. The leopard has learned how harsh the ascent can be. Eiji, on the other hand, believes he can save Ash from this shitty world. He is proven wrong a number of times but he never stops believing that. As I mentioned in the answer to this ask, if you think about it, in the end Ash dies just like he knew he would.
He is stabbed by a street thug who held a grudge against him and dies just like that. In the end, he couldn’t change his fate like Eiji tried to make him believe. In the end, the leopard couldn’t climb down the mountain. But what’s remarkable is that Eiji never surrenders to Ash’s fatalistic mindset even after his death. Not even once. He never says things like “He was right after all and I was wrong. He couldn’t change his fate and trouble never ever left him alone.” Instead he says this:
I want to talk a little bit about this visual here. This is the print on the Hagoromo Clear Clutch Bag which was released in February 2021. It shows a bird with a stem of rye in his beak, and a lynx holding a letter in his mouth.
We already know that Eiji is often depicted as a bird in the series and that Ash envies him because he can fly, he’s free. So the bird is definitely Eiji. The stem of rye in its beak must be a reference to The Catcher In The Rye, and this is one of the many references that Banana Fish makes to the famous literary title. The final episode of the anime is entitled The Catcher In The Rye. The second ending of the anime shows Ash and Eiji in a rye field at sunset. And there’s this beautiful cover of the TV Animation Official Guide “Moment.” I talked about how I thought the “catcher in the rye” in Banana Fish was Eiji in this meta here and this visual works perfectly with that interpretation.
Now for the lynx, it is obviously Ash, as he’s is known in the streets as “Ash Lynx.” By the way, I wonder how he got that nickname… And how did ‘Aslan’ become ‘Ash’ in the first place? Because his father calls him Ash too? Anyway, besides his nickname being “lynx,” Ash is likened to a variety of wild cat species throughout the story but always by his adversaries (Golzine, Yut-Lung, Foxx, etc.). This is important. I don’t remember any of his friends or allies ever making that allusion. Certainly not Eiji, who as we all know, thinks of Ash as a teenager like himself, which is kind of the whole point of the story. And finally, Ash himself draws a parallel between himself and the leopard in Hemingway’s “Snows of Kilimanjaro.”
As for the letter in the lynx’s mouth, it is clearly Eiji’s letter. I really like how the lynx is only slightly facing the bird like he’s trying to make up his mind about what he just read in the letter. And the bird looks like he just landed next to the lynx at the last minute before he has to take off again to offer him a stem of rye (the ticket to Japan maybe?), symbolizing a life where he can heal.
Anyway, there you have it. Banana Fish explained by a simple but very meaningful visual. Now I feel like everything I’ve written so far was redundant. I should have just posted the photo and the reference link because the image just speaks for itself.
I’m interested in how Aslan became Ash too! Her mother called him Aslan, Griffin called him Aslan, Jennifer though called him both Aslan and Ash and James called him Ash. What I think is that since Aslan was a name chosen by the woman who left him, James decided to call his boy in a different way. So Ash ended up with two names.
As for Lynx, Skipper says that it’s the perfect name for his boss because he’s a free spirit. Lynx is said オオヤマネコ aka the Great Mountain Cat in Japanese.
Be aware as well that mountain cats are associated in Japanese folklore with nekomata 猫また, evil spirits. The nekomata was described as a mountain beast: according to the Meigetsuki, “They have eyes like a cat, and have a large body like a dog.” The essay Tsurezuregusa from the late Kamakura period (circa 1331) asserts, “In the mountain recesses, there are those called nekomata, and people say that they eat humans…”
As for how Ash got that name, my headcanon is that it was a sort of stage name at Club Cod because “cathouse” is slang for “brothel”. Once he left the house he became a “wild cat”.
Also, there’s this Japanese proverb:
猫に木天蓼お女郎に小判
catnip for cats, gold coins for prostitutes
(everyone has their favorite, pick the right thing to please someone)
And in Japanese it’s called a thieving cat someone who “steals” a partner.
“Max Lobo’nun Anıları”yla ilgili diğer hayranların yazdıklarından öğrendiğim kadarını daha önce derlemiştim. Banana Fish’in mangası bittikten birkaç yıl sonra çıkan bu 4 kitaplık seri Akira Endou imzasını taşıyor. Yani bu kitapların yazarı Banana Fish’in yazarı değil. Bunu tekrar belirtmiş olayım. Dolayısıyla bu kitapların içeriğini canon (esas hikayenin bir parçası) kabul edip etmemek size kalmış.
Bu kitaplardan birinde Max’ın yıllar önce ölmüş olan Ash’e yazdığı bir mektup var anladığım kadarıyla. Twitter’dan @enta_jinnai ve @nakimooshi, sağ olsunlar bu mektubu İngilizce’ye çevirmişler. Ben de istek üzerine Türkçe’ye çevirdim.
Açıkçası bu yaptığım çeviriden pek memnun değilim. Çevirinin çevirisi olduğu için zaten biraz güvensizce çevirdim. Japonca metnin görüp çevirimi kontrol etmeyi çok isterdim. İlerde elime geçerse bunu yapıp gerekirse bu çeviriyi güncelleyeceğim. Ama gördüğüm kadarıyla daha önceden postaladığım özetteki ana fikirlerle çelişen bir şey yok.
Buyrun…
Ash, huzur içinde bu dünyadan göçüp gittin. Kimse fark etmeden aramızdan ayrıldın. Şimdi Boston dolaylarında bir mezarlıkta annenin yanı başında yatıyorsun. Griffin, Banana Fish’in etkisiyle o hale¹ geldikten sonra onu bulup geri getiren sen olduğun için annenle ilgili meseleyi muhtemelen biliyordun².
Annen seni doğurduğunda hem zihnen hem de bedenen çok yıpranmıştı. Uyuşturucu, cinsel özgürlük hareketi ve topluluk halinde göçebe bir hayat sürmek onu tüketmişti. En sonunda annenin Boston’da yaşayan anne babası onu yanlarına aldılar³, ancak bundan kısa bir süre sonra annen hayata veda etti. Öldüğünde daha reşit bile değilmiş. O zamanlar onun gibi çok insan vardı⁴, diyecek olursan… Ne diyeyim, haklı olursun.
Bence bu kadar uzun süre insanlık dışı koşullarda yaşayabilmen adeta vahşi bir hayvanın doğasına sahip olman sayesinde mümkün oldu. Ama sen vahşi bir hayvandan ibaretsin, demek istemiyorum. Gözlerimin önünde endamının vahşi bir güzelliğin vücut bulmuş halinden nasıl korkutucu bir hale büründüğünü hatırlıyorum.
Aslına bakarsan etrafındaki herkesin seninle ilgili düşünceleri birbirinin aynı hale geldi. Hepimizin ayrı ayrı güçlü kişilikleri olmasına rağmen sizlerin gözünde Ibe, Charlie ve ben birer “moruk”tuk⁵. Sen aramızdan ayrılalı on yıldan fazla olmasına rağmen benim gördüğüm kadarıyla arkadaş çevrenin sana duyduğu güven ve takdir duygusu yayılmaya devam etti. Oğlum Michael da bu yeni nesle dahil oldu. Onunla görüştüğümde sahip olduğu yeteneklerin kendini göstermeye başladığını, onun da bu yeteneklerini yaratıcılıkla kullandığını görüyorum.
Sing Soo-Ling’e seninle ilgili anıların tümünü bir yerde toplamak istediğimden bahsetmiştim. Bunun üzerine bu fikri destekleyen birçok mesaj aldım. İnsanlar bana yanlarında olmadığım bu süre zarfında olanları anlatmaya başladı. Bu anı defterini onlar sayesinde tamamlayabildim. Kalem tutmayalı uzun zaman olmuştu.
Arkadaşların senin izinden giderek kütüphaneyi kullanmaya başladılar. Bilgisayar kullanmayı da zaten senden öğrenmişlerdi. Böylece şu an hepsi bu çağın bayrak taşıyanları oldular. Cain büyük emek sarf edip avukat oldu. O bücür Sing şu an 1.90 boyunda bir dev. Bir yandan üniversiteye devam ediyor, diğer yandan da Chinatown’da kendi işi var; bir ticaret şirketi işletiyor. Yut-Lung, Hong Kong’da birçok şirketin başında ve işleri giderek büyüyor. Onun bilmece gibi karakteriyle ilgili anlamadığım çok şey var ama ilginç bir kişilik olsa gerek.
Eiji… Onun o çocuksu hali tamamen kayboldu. Hüzünle doldu taştı, adeta inzivaya çekilmişçesine durgun ve sessiz bir insan olup çıktı. İki yıl hiç antrenman yapmadığı için sırıkla atlamaya tekrar başlayamadı. Ama sonra greencard aldı ve şimdi New York’ta yaşıyor. Şu an çok saygın bir fotoğrafçı. Bu kitaptaki fotoğrafların hepsi onun. “Eiji Okumura” imzasını taşıyan fotoğrafların hüzünlü, nostaljik ve kendine has bir duygu barındırdığı söylenir. Ama ben o duygunun ne olduğunu biliyorum. O duygunun kaynağında sen varsın, Ash. Eiji hala senin bir gün çıkagelmeni bekliyor. Gözleri sonsuza dek seni arıyor olacak.
Ekipten bazıları sivil toplumda çalışıyor, bazıları dünyanın dört bir yanında bağlantılarını güçlendiriyor, bazıları ise uzay araştırmaları yapıyor. Çoğu hala yakın arkadaş. Hatta adeta bir aile gibiler. Gelecekte ne yapacaklarını görmeyi iple çekiyorum ve hepsinin uzun bir hayat yaşamasını diliyorum⁶. Onlar için hayatın merkezinde hala Ash Lynx var. Hala sen varsın.
Ha, beni mi soruyorsun?
Oğlum Michael’dan ayrı kaldığım zamanı telafi etmek için zamanımı onu yetiştirmeye adadım. Jessica’nın çalıştığı zamanlarda da onun yerine Michael’a ben baktım. Okul Aile Birliği başkanı bile oldum. Şimdi Michael liseye gidiyor. Artık benimle takılmaktansa Eiji’nin sergi hazırlıklarında görev almak daha çok ilgisini çekiyor. Onun için ben de yeni bir şeylere başlamayı düşünüyorum. Aslında bir süredir çevremdeki insanlar yaptığım gönüllü işlerden dolayı bir sonraki seçimlerde belediye başkan adayı olmamı söylüyor. Sanki siyasetçilerden nefret etmezmişim gibi! Ama sorunları olan bir toplumun üyesiysen, çözebileceğin sorunları görmezden gelemezsin. Toplumun sana ihtiyacı varsa, senin de gereğini yapman gerekmez mi? Sence?
Neyse, tekrar genç olamayacak bir “moruk” olarak herkesin senin benliğini yaşattığını izlemeye devam etmek istiyorum. Sen hep bana yaşlı bir adammışım gibi davranırdın. Onun için baba oğul gibi olmamız kaçınılmazdı herhalde. Halbuki ben daha gençtim. Dışardan bu kadar ukala bir oğlumun olması zoruma gidiyormuş gibi yapsam da aslında içten içe hoşuma gidiyordu ve seninle gurur duyuyordum.
Doğru duydun. Hep seninle övünmek istedim.
Notlar:
¹ “Sakat” demek istemedim. “Engelli” de kulağıma hoş geldi. Max, Griffin’in Banana Fish’in etkisiyle ne hale geldiğini gören ilk kişi neticede.
² Burada ne kastediliyor, asla anlamış değilim. Annen de madde kullanımının etkisiyle en az Griffin kadar kötü durumdaydı mı demek istiyor acaba?
³ Kendi çocukları olduğu için velayeti zaten onlardadır diye varsaydım. Burada “custody” daha mecazi anlamda kullanılmış sanki. Kol kanat germek gibi.
⁴ Banana Fish’in mangası 1985-87 yılları arasında geçiyor. 1985 yılında 17 yaşında olan Ash, 12 Ağustos 1968 doğumlu. Yani burada bahsedilen “o zamanlar” hippi hareketinin yaygın olduğu yıllar.
⁵ “Old man” için Japonca’da “ossan” dendiğini düşünüyorum. Türkçe’de günlük hayatta ‘moruk’ kelimesini kullanan var mı? Sadece tercümelerde kullanıldığını düşündüğüm bir kelime bu.
⁶ Max burada henüz kendinden bahsetmeye başlamadı. Japonca’da özneler birbirine karışabiliyor, onun burada Max’ın hala Ash’in çetesindekileri kastettiğini düşünüyorum ama emin değilim tabii. Bu şekilde çevirmek bana daha mantıklı geldi sadece.
In response to a recent ask I got about Yoshida Akimi’s interviews, I thought I’d dedicate a post to one interview in particular and that’s the Fujimoto Yukari interview published in The Soul of Shoujo Manga (少女まんが魂) in 2000. Almost all the buzzworthy stuff Yoshida said about Banana Fish are from this one. @pekorosu translated part of this 20-page interview and posted a summary here. I found scans of two excerpts on Twitter user @Matryoshka3’s account (1,2). I’m reposting the images here because tweets tend to disappear after a while, and I want this one to remain for archival purposes and because fans eventually hear about this interview and want to find out more.
This part was recently translated by @pekorosuhere. I think the keyword that causes confusion here is きっかけ (“kikkake”) which can be interpreted to mean “reason”, “occasion”, “motive”, “excuse”, etc. They’re all similar in meaning but at the same time slightly different. So Yoshida’s line becomes “They would have had sex, but there just wasn’t any ‘kikkake’ so they ended up not doing it.”
I vaguely remember a Twitter user (enta_jinnai, I think?) commenting on this part of the interview and saying something like “Ash and Eiji never got to have sex because they simply never got around to it. But if they had the chance (maybe more time or more favorable circumstances), they would have eventually done it.” I might be wrong though. Unfortunately, the original tweet is no longer available, but maybe it’s being reposted somewhere and fans who read it get curious about what Yoshida actually said in the interview. But as @pekorosu mentioned, Yoshida wasn’t specifically talking about Banana Fish here and I only just realized that because I never read the part of the interview that led up to this point.
We all know how heavily Yoshida was influenced by Midnight Cowboy from various interviews and what she wanted to explore in her works was the connection between two characters that was on a more spiritual level, rather than romantic or sexual. I think what she’s saying here is that she wanted to portray an aspect of the relationship between her characters that didn’t necessarily focus on sex, but also didn’t exclude the possibility of it altogether.
Here’s another part of the interview that, uhh, gets a reaction from fans every time and, unlike the previous one, it directly mentions Ash and Eiji. @brickme posted a partial translation here. When I read this part of the interview (or rather its translation), I had no idea about the myth that a unicorn, a wild and untamed creature, could only be captured by a virgin. Now that I’ve read a little bit about it, this interview makes much more sense. Ash, who’s depicted as a wild beast more than once in the story, is drawn to Eiji’s innocence. I really like how Yoshida’s drawn a parallel between this myth and the pure, transcendent bond between the two.
I’ll roughly translate the remaining part that’s included in the scan but not in the translation.
Fujimoto: I see. So Ash is the unicorn? Yoshida: That’s why he’ll allow only Eiji to touch him. Fujimoto: He has a pure and innocent nature, right? Yoshida: Exactly. And people like that are the most dangerous and troublesome ones, aren’t they?
Please correct me if there are any errors in my translation. The word Fujimoto uses when referring to Eiji is 無垢 (“muku”) and, again, it has many meanings: pure, innocent, unspoiled, immaculate, etc. But it literally means “without dirt.” And Yoshida, in turn, says that the pure and innocent nature of Eiji makes him dangerous and also a nuisance, which is interesting to hear, although I understand where she’s coming from.
Come to think of it, it could be said that it was Eiji who brought Ash’s demise. Eiji himself believes so in Garden of Light. Ash was drawn to Eiji’s innocence like moth to flame and although he tried to distance himself from Eiji many times, in the end, it was Eiji’s letter that distracted Ash enough to get stabbed and killed. This, of course, doesn’t mean that they would wish never to have met each other. Ash was happiest when he was with Eiji, as he says to Blanca, and Eiji was grateful that he could spend time with Ash however briefly, as he says to Sing.
