From: hirota@sluggo.sdsc.edu (Bryan Hirota)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.japan,soc.culture.asian.american
Subject: Rising Sun
Date: 27 Aug 1992 04:27:29 GMT
Organization: San Diego Supercomputer Center
NNTP-Posting-Host: sluggo.sdsc.edu
Keywords: Nuclear Winter, All Fall Down


A while back someone asked about the Michael Crichton book called,
"Rising Sun".  I heard was it being made into a movie.  I also heard
it was going to be starring Weseley Snipes, Sean Connery, and Tia
Carrere. (Maybe we'll get to see some super (tropical) jungle-fever.

Anyways,  I remember an article in the LA times about the book,
actually I had it taped to my closet door.  Well, I got off my ass, 
took it down, and now, I'm going to share it with you.

Hopefully, the original poster is still interested.


Bryan Hirota	-	hirota@sdsc.edu		-	bhirota@ucsd.edu

BEGIN ARTICLE

COAST LETTER
Robert A. Jones

Japanese Bashing - a Novel Tack

Flu smitten, radiating fever and self-pity, I have spent the first quarter of
February lying under a pile of quilts, looking like something from Currier
and Ives.  But an invalid's life does have its advantages.  With time
to burn, I have become the first on my block to finish reading the new
basher-thriller, "Rising Sun."

You have become acquainted with the stink over "Rising Sun?" Yes, Gaijin? If
not, you soon will.  This book, by Michael Crichton, seeks to do for the
Japanese what "JFK" did for the CIA and the Mafia.  That is, make them 
responsible for every ill that besets America except, perhaps, the clinging flu.

While others have preceded Crichton in the role of demonizer of the
Japanese, he is the first to offer the whole package in the form of a
detective thriller laced with economic theory.  I predict that "Rising
Sun" will push Crichton to the top rank of the demonizers in spectacular 
fashion.

What's more, the Crichton version contains a new twist, one that will
intrigue all of us homeboys and homegirls.  Crichton conceives of the
economic war between Japan and the United States as having a geographic
center.  A capital of sorts, a place where the war will be won or lost.

That capital is Los Angeles.  In fact, "Rising Sun," more than anything, is a 
novel - and moral lecture - about Los Angeles as the symbol of a defeated
nation.  Chrichton invites us to fear and loathe our conquerors even as we are 
encouraged to wallow in our own spiritual squalor.

=====

As the story begins, two LAPD detectives arrive at an evening soiree thrown
by a major Japanese corporation.  A bit of trouble has turned up in the
boardroom.  A beautiful young woman lies dead on the mahogany table.

This may sound familiar.  And boring.  But not to worry.  The real story
here has little to do with a mere murder.  Crichton quickly leaps to his 
real purpose:  the unmasking of the Japanese economic war on all of us.

As the detectives leave the high-rise where the murder took place, two elegant 
women join them in the elevator and discuss their hosts at the soiree. "They're
buying up Orange County now," says one.

"Of course," remarks her equally high-fashion friend. "They already own Los
Angeles."

As the group exits the building, the elevator chirps a good-nigh. In
Japanese.

Everywhere the detectives turn in their search for the murderer, the
Japanese hand is felt.  The victim - a kinky Texas girl - turns out
to have lived in a Westwood apartment building operated by wealthy Japanese
men as a private flesh den.

When the cops start to get close to the perpetrators, the pressure is
turned on.  The chief of police tries to order the investigation cut short.
He has fallen under you-know-who's influence.  A professor at USC, trying to
help our boys, gets stopped cold by his institutional superiors.  USC,
you see, depends heavily on Japanese financial support.

And finally the L.A. Times joins the conspiracy.  A reporter, described as
the Japanese "plant" at the newspaper, carries out a smear campaign against one
of the cops, trying to pin him with a bogus child molester rap.

If this all sounds like the kind of Commie thriller J. Edgar Hoover would
have loved to read in the 1950s, I think you get the idea.  it is the same
thing, transposed to another time, another enemy.

=====

In case the story itself does not convince strongly enough, Crichton lets
go with a lecture every page or so.  We have been debased, his characters
say, by 25 years of Japan's insidious design.

The Japanese now regard us with contempt, his worldly detective John
Connor observes.  "The Japanese think everybody who is not Japanese is
a barbarian.  They mean it, literally: barbarian.  Sinking, vulgar, stupid 
barbarian."

And like "JFK" Crichton's book likely will be believed all too often.  Many will
accept the idea that a university would aid Japanese corporations in the
cover-up of a great conpiracy.  That newspaper tolerate stooges who carry
out the orders of their Japanese puppt masters.

For a book so heavy on moral issues, "Rising Sun" raises one of its own.
Do you think that Crichton, who lives here, wondered if his book just might
encourage the kind of violence and hatred that has been occasionally directed 
toward the Japanese for nearly a century?  Do you think he discussed this
prospect with his editors?

Or do yu think they talked about timing, and whether the market was ready for
just this sort of thing?  And did they congratulate each other when L.A.
turned down the Metro Rail contract with Sumitomo because it meant that
the timing, in fact, was very good?

An idle question, I suppose.  Just thought I would ask.