CrayonKant

One of the occasions when I strongly feel like my opinion is at odds with other people’s is when Doumeki’s jealousy comes to the surface. I am not sure if maybe this is a result of how unacquainted I am with romance literature or portrayals in media of romantic relationships, heterosexual ones mostly, since I have always been very impatient with those tropes. And that’s maybe what it is, that many readers of Saezuru are more comfortable or acquainted with straight romances and are used to read jealousy or possessiveness from the male partner as a sign of interest and proof of affection or love. I can’t take it like that tho, personally, honestly I can’t see a man being jealous of his partner or potential partner as a positive. Jealousy is a sign of insecurity for me and men being insecure? Potentially bad news, my alarm bells are going off and I don’t get any enjoyment from that part of the story. So is Yoneda Kou using Doumeki’s jealousy uncritically and just as a romantic motif?

Replying here so that I have more space to elaborate on this. I completely understand your feelings about the abundance of sex scenes that can be a characteristic of bl manga: people are expecting them, even complaining when the story takes its time to develop a believable world building and a plot, what an outrageous thing to do! When a story becomes popular then a lot of people will start to pay attention and have something to say, but I think there are many different nuanced approaches and people having varying expectations and being invested to different degrees.

From my perspective, Yoneda has an unique sensibility. There is the hot read you can do, as soon as a chapter is out, that will have your immediate reactions and all the good or bad or conflicting emotions that a sex scene can evoke in us. I usually go through a stage of repulsion. You see, I identify a lot with Yashiro. Sex is a place of trauma but not a taboo for me too, so I have my contradictions. My peers, society, they say that sex is a wonderful place full of pleasure and love, but my earliest memories and experience warned me of other ugly, scary and unpleasant things. But in Saezuru there is much more than “sex with feelings”.

The care Yoneda puts into this manga is priceless for me. The subtle expressions, as we were saying, the masterful use of shading to bring out emotions so beautifully. There is a second read you can do, a colder one, when you think about the scenes and the progression. These characters are driving the story more than any genre conventions. These two characters don’t understand each other, they had very different fears and expectations. The manga plays into their sexual attraction but also doesn’t let making love be the solution, as we see how the sex caused more conflict. But also, Yashiro, especially, but Doumeki too, they had to confront themselves with things they were not ready to face. Doumeki to me is more close to a younger reader: he thought by falling in love and giving himself fully to another person he could escape his past and lack of direction after being severely disappointed by life. But Yashiro couldn’t possibly carry both of them towards some sort of happiness. At the start of chapter 27 we see this: Yashiro being re-traumatized and also be the one to console Doumeki, by putting his hand on his cheek and trying to reassure him. And I completely understood that the best thing to do was leaving.

Frankly, I am glad that other readers, especially younger readers are taking this story in a less complicated way and taking it romantically. Missing the deeper details related to a type of trauma I don’t wish for anyone else. This manga is still saying them that yes love can motivate you greatly into facing your own unresolved issues, but you need to work on yourself. And maybe you won’t be on the same page with the other person. You take your time.

In the previous chapters since their reunion and when they had sex in Doumeki’s apartment, Yashiro kept having intrusive thoughts about Doumeki and a woman, an imaginary one first and Izumi after he met her. This is another compelling element that clearly states “here is your sex scene” but also “here is a character confronting all the unsolved issues he carries”. [By the way, understanding what Yashiro is facing here is very interesting and engaging to me].

I don’t think you can say that this is exactly playing out uncritically the idea of romantic love. Gratuitous sex scenes are everywhere in bl manga, even crazy set ups for characters to have sex in the first chapter (or you won’t have enough readers to publish). But Yoneda managed to find the perfect balance for me. How these characters act and think is pretty believable to me. And that she has this sensibility and also those skills in storytelling and building a scene is so special and fortunate to have. Yes, we don’t know how the story will end, but I am trusting this particular author and I don’t really trust people easily lol I only hope she doesn’t grow tired on gets pressured into rushing to the end. But the recognition that Saezuru continues to have should help her stay faithful.

A Greek philosopher* once said that you can only determine whether you've had a happy life on your deathbed; similarly, there is a lovely wisdom story in the Chinese tradition that builds a sequence of "good" and "bad" outcomes all starting from the same event, with the same implied moral that you cannot really put a value judgement on something until the very end:

A man lost his horse on the mountain - what a misfortune, said his friends. The next day his horse came back with a mare - what good luck, said his friends. The man's son rode the mare and broke his leg - terrible! if only the horse had never found her! But then the emperor's envoys conscripted all able-bodied young men in the village, while the lame son was allowed to stay - what good fortune...

... and so the story goes on for as long as the storyteller's skill can stretch it.

I wish I had the fortitude to quit reading Saezuru until it is completed, because the serialization is skewing how I react to and interpret the story. I'd like to add another measurement mark to your reading scale: hot, cold, and 'freezing cold'. If the 'colder' engagement you describe so eloquently is one where the reader has emerged from the fictional world and can see the story as a work of art to be appreciated as such - for the skill with which it is put together, the technique used to create different effects, the way in which it compares with other works of its kind, etc. - the 'freezing cold' state is one where the reader becomes so detached emotionally from the fictional world of the work that they can no longer enter it; the work does not affect them anymore, and, in consequence, any interpretation they are now capable of becomes miserly and narrow.

For all that Yoneda Kou deserves all our praise as an 'auteur' (I don't mean it sarcastically, somehow I think the French captures the meaning better that 'author'), there is an undeniably commercial element to the serialization itself and the promotion of each chapter on twitter. I'm pretty sure that Yoneda Kou did not compromise her artistic vision because her editor commented "there isn't enough heat in this chapter, how about you draw Doumeki without clothes for a change?" - I put my trust in her just like you did :) But I am a lot more cynical about the choice of panels for the sneak peak, or the choice about whether to publish something every 2 months or skip an issue and present a longer chapter that articulates a full movement from the symphony that is this story. And I find that the way I perceive the context of the work, its presentation, pushes me in the 'freezing cold' zone.

Off the soapbox now! I was spoiled to discover this manga last year and be able to read in one sitting up to chapter 52. It was an intense experience that moved me to seek a community for dialogue - I felt that there is so much meaning in this work that I don't fully grasp. That feeling has not changed, though I have postponed trying to understand before the story ends.