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Rating: 
Summary: Orientalism
Review: As an Asian, this book makes me uneased while reading it. Yeah, the author cites Edward Said's "Orientalism" couple times. But the tone of mighty American looking down the funny Japanese is running through lots of the pages. I really like to hear Japanese gays and lesbians's opinions on this book.
Rating: 
Summary: Personal Insights into Japanese Life
Review: For the reviewer from Mars: This book is a subjective account of life in Japan during the time of AIDS. This is not meant as a depiction of gay and lesbian Japanese life, no could it be. The Japanese misperception of American life is echoed in this review. I found this book soul-baring and intense. Well done!
Rating:
Summary: Reflexivity has a limit
Review: I realize that, for far too long, gay men and lesbians were marginalized or erased by the ubiquitous heterosexualization of scholarly discourse. I also realize that the crisis of subjectivity of the 1980's and 1990's caused many social scientists to critique the idea of the disinterested scholar and subsequently incorporate themselves into their research, making a veritable fad out of auto-ethnography. But enough is enough. This book is not about homosexuality, Orientalism, or Japan per se. It is about the author's personal experiences as a Western gay man living in Japan. You should consider writing an autobiography only if you 1) are famous; 2) have had REALLY fascinating experiences; or 3) can connect your experiences to greater social and political issues. Since Treat is not famous, and being gay doesn't count as fascinating anymore, he should really have concentrated on #3.
Rating:
Summary: Reflexivity has a limit
Review: I realize that, for far too long, gay men and lesbians were marginalized or erased by the ubiquitous heterosexualization of scholarly discourse. I also realize that the crisis of subjectivity of the 1980's and 1990's caused many social scientists to critique the idea of the disinterested scholar and subsequently incorporate themselves into their research, making a veritable fad out of auto-ethnography. But enough is enough. This book is not about homosexuality, Orientalism, or Japan per se. It is about the author's personal experiences as a Western gay man living in Japan. You should consider writing an autobiography only if you 1) are famous; 2) have had REALLY fascinating experiences; or 3) can connect your experiences to greater social and political issues. Since Treat is not famous, and being gay doesn't count as fascinating anymore, he should really have concentrated on #3.
Rating: 
Summary: Essentially Fascinating
Review: I really found this book to be a lot more provocative than I expected. Treat does a really effective job of presenting the attitudes towrds homosexuality and AIDS that he experienced while living in Japan at various times in recent decades. His "shapshot" style of presenting a scene from his life followed by a quotation from someone else followed by his discussion of someone else's ideas followed by another scene from his life did get confusing at times. But, overall, his ideas were interesting and really got me thinking about AIDS and homosexuality in a culture that I don't know too much about. I'll be going back to this book, I'm sure.
Rating:
Summary: Essentially Fascinating
Review: I really found this book to be a lot more provocative than I expected. Treat does a really effective job of presenting the attitudes towrds homosexuality and AIDS that he experienced while living in Japan at various times in recent decades. His "shapshot" style of presenting a scene from his life followed by a quotation from someone else followed by his discussion of someone else's ideas followed by another scene from his life did get confusing at times. But, overall, his ideas were interesting and really got me thinking about AIDS and homosexuality in a culture that I don't know too much about. I'll be going back to this book, I'm sure.
Rating:
Summary: Homosexuality, AIDS, and Japan
Review: I've been a big fan of Treat's essays since I read Contemporary Japan and Popular Culture, so I picked up this book with some understanding of his writing already. Anyway, I expected this book to be about gay life in Japan and Japanese literature, but it turned out not to be about that at all... or at least, not much. A lot of the book is a memoir/travel-diary that Treat apparently wrote on the side as he was living in Japan on fellowship money, working on Writing Ground Zero: Japanese Literature and the Atomic Bomb. Treat reflects on various lovers that he had in Japan, things they did together and places they went, what gay life is like in Tokyo and a few other places in Japan. And all that is interwoven into news stories about the growth of AIDS in Japan, stories from Japanese literature, and Treat's own experience being HIV positive and having to hide it during his stay. It's not, by any means, a comprehensive autobiography (Treat isn't so famous as to attempt that), but it's interesting in the way that stories about living in another country often are. On the whole, the book isn't so much about homosexuality and Japan as it is about AIDS and Japan. There are some very interesting sexual anecdotes in the book, all told with a kind of hyper-awareness of the historical relationship between the Occident and the Orient, and the roles the author himself, as a white man, plays in his sexual relationships. Despite being surprised about the main themes, I found it to be an interesting book, and all the personal anecdotes keep the theory from becoming too dry. The book is very honest and candid, and I came away from it with a greater understanding of John Treat as a person, which I liked. And I think a big part of Treat's intent with the book was to show how the "self" and "other" really have more in common than they think, and on that level he succeeded.
Rating:
Summary: Homosexuality, AIDS, and Japan
Review: Reading everyone's comments of this book, I realize how controversial this piece must be and is in reality. That NO ONE rates this book anything but a 1 or a 5 speaks to its strong nature. You either love it, find meaning in it; or are repulsed by it. Speaking as a white American lesbian who has been studying queer culture in Japan and has also visited Japan, I am completed horrified by the certainity with which Treat dabbles in topics of enormous proportion. Why write a memoir if you are supposedly addressing so many key issues of social concern unless you are actually going to address them?! Besides that fact, he never once seems to apologize or doubt his masculinist and racist grip on his material. He is always a spectator, always the man behind the controls. It is sickening really. I have only read half of this book, but as I read, I read to see how much more I can become baffled at his arrogance of subject matter. His treatment of each subject, at best, leaves me cold and wondering why he even bothers to make it seem like he cares. It seems like a completely narcissistic attempt to get through some clearly lingering white suburban American guilt. I don't think the fact that queers in America have become involved with Asian Studies because is it an Orientalist gaze get's to be made into a "duh" statement or be left unquestioned. It is NOT ok, and DOES need to be discussed, not just left for stereotyping or pigeon-holing. The only part of this book that I can remotely enjoy is references to a country that I miss and experiences that may seem similar, but do not somehow excuse themselves as "boys will be boys" or some crap like that. Very disapppointing perspective, yet almost predictable from a white gay male with so much arrogance.
Rating:
Summary: lying on the fence of pleasure and distrust
Review: Reading everyone's comments of this book, I realize how controversial this piece must be and is in reality. That NO ONE rates this book anything but a 1 or a 5 speaks to its strong nature. You either love it, find meaning in it; or are repulsed by it. Speaking as a white American lesbian who has been studying queer culture in Japan and has also visited Japan, I am completed horrified by the certainity with which Treat dabbles in topics of enormous proportion. Why write a memoir if you are supposedly addressing so many key issues of social concern unless you are actually going to address them?! Besides that fact, he never once seems to apologize or doubt his masculinist and racist grip on his material. He is always a spectator, always the man behind the controls. It is sickening really. I have only read half of this book, but as I read, I read to see how much more I can become baffled at his arrogance of subject matter. His treatment of each subject, at best, leaves me cold and wondering why he even bothers to make it seem like he cares. It seems like a completely narcissistic attempt to get through some clearly lingering white suburban American guilt. I don't think the fact that queers in America have become involved with Asian Studies because is it an Orientalist gaze get's to be made into a "duh" statement or be left unquestioned. It is NOT ok, and DOES need to be discussed, not just left for stereotyping or pigeon-holing. The only part of this book that I can remotely enjoy is references to a country that I miss and experiences that may seem similar, but do not somehow excuse themselves as "boys will be boys" or some crap like that. Very disapppointing perspective, yet almost predictable from a white gay male with so much arrogance.
Rating:
Summary: a personal journey worth sharing
Review: Reading this book brought me back to Japan. So much of what the author indicates resonated with my experience that I found myself nodding in agreement with many of his observations. Is it accessible, therefore, for others outside of this circle of experience? I believe so. The author's writing style is so open and it brings the reader in with its power. I think the reader will learn and experience on many levels: intellectually, spiritually, physically.
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