New article by Asano Atsuko, author of No. 6!
This article was printed in the Nikkei evening edition, and the following image of it was posted on Twitter. In the article, Asano hints at a potential continuation for the story of No. 6 (!!!). @aowyn translated the article and kindly granted us permission to post the full translation, so you can see for yourself!
I've always loved chocolate. Probably, this is because of a memory.
A long time ago, I received a large chocolate bar from a relative. I split it with my older sister. While that's not much of a memory, I remember the sweetness of the chocolate bar and the feeling of how it slowly melted in my mouth. When I reached adolescence, however, hearing tall tales like if you eat too much chocolate you get acne, gain weight, etc took me in, and I left chocolate behind for a while.
Now, though, I eat chocolate nearly every day. It's just a little bit of high cacao chocolate, but it's my dessert at lunch.
I choose chocolate anywhere between 80%-90% cacao. It's bitter, but I love the sublimity of the bitterness mixing together with the sweetness that comes from behind.
Especially when spinning a tale about boys, I eat more bitter chocolate. That was the case when I wrote "Battery" and when I was tackling the world of No.6. Why, I wonder? Even I don't know. It may just be a matter of preference. But when I try and draw out a stronger, denser relationship between two boys, or face individual differences that won't be reconciled, I always end up wanting chocolate that is more bitter.
When the protagonist of the novel is a girl, this becomes strangely unnecessary. Even if I eat it as an after-meal dessert, I don't feel a strong desire for it. It's really strange. Compared to strong girls who shape their world to their will, boys carry a certain peril somewhere behind their toughness. I wonder if that's just me feeling that way, though. Hm, I'm not sure. I wonder how that boyish peril is tied to the flavor of chocolate. I really don't know.
This year, a new No.6 series began. Bitter chocolate is lined up on my desk. As the bitterness that lingers on my tongue gives me a push forward—"Now, write!" it says—I'm face to face with the boys.
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