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The other aspect that I thought was interesting related to this is going back to Robin being a
Mandarin-Cantonese speaker, which is a rarity in this 19th century pseudo-Oxford, right? Because
it's Eurocentric society, you know, people at the Babel who are already there are typically
fluent in like French, German, like that kind of like romance languages, Italian maybe,
and they're doing the translation between those languages and English, right? And that's their
specialty. And he brings in a huge element of diversity. I think in a book there's only like
two other Mandarin speakers other than Robin in this entire institute. Yeah, so there's Professor
Lovell and then there's Professor Chakravarty, who I think are the two that speak it.
Right, and neither of them are of Mandarin-speaking origin, like they learned Mandarin at some point,
whereas this is his native language. So the fact that he has this rare combination
of languages makes him invaluable. The author takes it from there to like him being
exploited, right? That kind of, the fact that his rareness is usually, and he never really did
fully integrate with the rest of Oxford. He always kind of confined himself to Babel.
Because of his rare origin, he never was able to fully assimilate, fully integrate.
Instead, his rarity was commodified and exploited as a labor force. And I thought that was also
really interesting, like what an interesting way to bring in colonialism in the conversation,
you know? And I think colonialism is not a new topic to be explored in a fantasy space,
but done in such a real way, because colonialism still exists. Hello! Surprise!
Oh, hello! I see you're still here.
So it really kind of like hits close to home in like a very visceral way, and
that also got me thinking, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's, I mean, you've just tied in nicely,
I think, at least one. I don't know if I'm going to go counting out the number of like threads.
Yeah, there are many. Like really clear, carried through threads for the plot. One of them is
03:04
obviously, as you pointed out, colonialism, the idea of our, you know, the Eurocentric nature of
these things, the general, you, it's not even, well, there's a wonderful way of how this book
is written, which doesn't hide these things, but in fact somehow spotlights them in a way
that they become more apparent, even though they are, in fact, kind of subtle pressures, right?
Yeah, yeah. It kind of, because it follows Robin and his perception of this world,
that the reader starts to see that unravel at the same speed as Robin does.
Right, and you see his same sort of like reluctance and challenge to take in bits of that reality,
right? Yeah, and you see Robin doing this thing where, you know, after many years in the West,
he realized, like, you know, towards the end of the book, he recalls many incidents that happened
very early in the novel and kind of finds a completely new meaning with this new perspective
that he gained as he develops as a character. We do that too in our normal lives, you know,
we look at the past differently with the new information and new understanding that we now have,
and that's why it's not too preachy, the whole colonialism conversation. It's not too,
yeah, it's not too preachy, it's not sort of simplified, and it doesn't really resolve
either, but that's what it means to wrestle with something like that, you know? And
something like colonialism. I think that part was very well handled by the author, in my opinion.
Yeah, it's like, you know, me, a Japanese person, so far operating in the Western world,
it makes me think, yeah, of a lot of things, like, you know, what does it mean? And
what am I doing here? And what does it mean for someone like me to occupy this kind of space?
A fairly male-dominated research space, and on top of my being somewhat of a rare instance of a
Japanese person living abroad for so long, my research field, conservation science, is
more established field in Europe and America, and like many parts of science, to be honest,
06:05
and, but the cultural heritage, the culture, our sample group comes from all over the place, and
how do I, like, what can I do to bridge that gap, to make sure that the research
surrounding Asian artifacts, Asian art practices are done correctly and shared to appropriate
audiences, not just being gatekept as, like, an academic interest, is kind of an important
thing for me, now that I think about it. Sure, I mean, you're, the, now that you think about it,
with all fairness, and with, I think, the book deals with in a very, I would say in a very firm,
but also, like, very aware of the challenge of this way, right, where you're surrounded by the
system, right? You're surrounded, we're all surrounded by the things that we need to sort of
live within, and it's hard to look at it, never mind objectively, but it's hard to look at it
outside of it when you're immersed in it, and so the book sounds like it acted as that. Yeah,
it's hard to have that, yeah, it's hard to have that kind of meta perspective, right, like,
from the above, yeah, and it's, it's also insidious, because, oh yeah, I'm not sure which
part you're talking about, but yes, probably, I mean, I mean, this whole wrestling with colonialism
and also benefiting from colonialism to a certain extent, right, like Robin and other
main characters, they're not, like, they're simultaneously people who benefited
and the victim of colonialism, like, they were given the opportunity to study and enhance
their knowledge through colonialism, but also they are the direct consequence of bad practices
that colonialism brought in, and it's like the same idea comes again, like, having two
truths in your, in your, and occupying both truths and both spaces, it's a lot of mental
gymnastics, it's, it's a lot of, it's, it's, it's a, it's a very brain-heavy, like, glucose-heavy
activity, so, yeah, I mean, I don't find myself thinking about it day and night, you know?
09:04
Yeah, I mean, if you were, that would, that would be exhausting, right, that's...
It would be very exhausting, but at the same time, it never leaves me, you know,
I'm not free from wrestling from that, and I have to keep this critical perspective at all times
in order to navigate through this, survive, and kind of keep my mental health intact at the same time,
so it's, it felt like, you know, obviously a lot of it was, you know, dramatized and
exaggerated in this novel, but a lot of these kind of mental struggles of coming,
that comes with the privilege to be able to occupy two or more linguistic worlds,
was, I think, very well sort of portrayed in this novel.
It sounds like it really resonated with you, I think that's, in any case, right, of the two of us,
I'm certainly glad to hear that, like, this hit in a way that did speak to some of those parts
and pieces, because I have it from, like, you know, yeah, sure, I'm learning another language,
yippee, right, I've gone, I've gone one step out of the way that 90% of Americans go,
don't at me, people in the U.S., so, but, and also, actually, I shouldn't be that mean right
now, there's a lot happening there, take it easy, if anybody's listening, but, like, this is
somewhat separated, right, my experience and my awareness as I read the book only comes from
the fact that I understand and try to empathize with the situations that I, in my case,
am mainly benefiting from, right, I'm not necessarily at a disadvantage as a result of
these, I'm benefiting off of the sort of... There I say, this is not a necessity to your survival,
it's, like, it's surely something that is, that you will like to acquire, this, the ability to
speak Japanese as you live in Japan, but, like, it's not like you cannot function at all in that
society if you don't speak Japanese, and, like, your current job position is not done in Japanese,
like, the whole point of you being there is to teach English, right, which you're good at, so,
yeah, some days, but, yeah, that's another visceral thing that's different, I also had a
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choice, yeah, which is, yeah, the thing to link back, yeah, yeah, yeah, yep, yeah, like, you,
if you decide to be an asshole, okay, I shouldn't say that, if you decide to be an asshole,
um, you have a choice as an American who lives in Japan, at least for now, yeah, to not actively
pick up Japanese, like, you can say it's too difficult, I'm not doing it, and this is not a
black and white situation where, like, if you don't try to pick up a language, you're bad,
right, it's not like that, no, but, yeah, as a Japanese, I appreciate you putting genuine effort
and trying to, you know, keep at it, not giving up on it yet, and doing that, and a lot of
English speakers, because they don't, they frequently don't have to be able to do that,
many of them opt not to bother learning the local language, and they, that's okay,
they can still survive in that place, even when you're given a choice, you choose to
do the hard thing and learn a new language, so, you know, pat on yourself.
I'm over here, nobody can see, but yeah, I'll just, I'll just take a minute,
just sort of, like, reach over my back and pat myself, yeah, a little, a couple,
a couple little pat-pats, um, the, okay, so the learning of a language, we, we, we bounced all
around these themes and stuff, but the learning, or the having of a language, and the, the human
valid worth, or fulfillingness of having a language, and then learning of, or already
having a culture and language, and then, like, learning more about it, right, all of these
are sort of intrinsically growth, development, connectivity with, like, the world, and the
things around you, later they can help you to see how something is perhaps broken, or abusing
some systems, because you see things from different ways, and the way that you exist in that system,
and if we're to loop this into, you know, the educational thing that's, that's kind of bouncing
around with learning a language, there probably should be less of the general gatekeeping, and
one version is the correct version-type-ness that exists in, you know, colonial and empire-based
spaces, um, which the book does by having an entire, uh, Hermes society as their rebellious group,
you know, taking information out and attempting to have it more accessible and gained to people all
around the world, right, this sort of delocalized, like, access to information-type thing, um,
in a light overrun of what, you know, Hermes also happens to be a part of, right, but there are,
15:03
in, in, I think, the very clear analogy, that's an essence of it. Yeah, yeah, like, sort of power
lies in the dissemination of information, then gatekeeping of information, yeah, that, that was
definitely, it was, like, it was, the, the society clearly existed as a foil to the Bible as an
institution, but, um, like, yeah, I, I agree, I agree with that, yeah. I think now that we've
mentioned this, there was something we didn't quite touch on, but it was in the, in the positions
of privileged spaces, right, you know, what do you do with that? Me, this is, this is me, right,
this is the, like, this isn't Robin, this isn't Raimi, this isn't, it's not, it's none of them,
right, this would be Len, because I had the privilege as a starting point, right, and, like,
yeah, if that's the case, there are a lot of ways that, you know, people believe morally one should
act here. One that I think is helpful for more than it is, like, than some of the other options
that are, you know, sort of touted as moral is trying to use the privilege in a way that benefits
others that are not privileged and or being abused by a system, like, even at the baseline of speaking
out against it, right, if that thing that is happening in front of you should not be happening,
and you, me in this case, right, are much more protected, insulated by the system, yes,
yes, well, then you may as well point it out, like, nothing is probably going to happen to you,
and it can benefit the other person, right, and if it does, if it does, you can probably still
come back, yeah, exactly, to the same level of privilege, because society enables you, right,
and you have multiple layers of, you know, cushions to catch you, safety nets, yeah,
it's a way that I think works, and I say this because I think it's important around this
discussion, but I also was wondering, is there a point anywhere in the novel where somebody
in the position of, like, relative privilege actually helps? So, because I'm trying to work
I think was the frustrating part of the book, because they otherwise handle this tension of
colonialism and losing your own sensitivities to your mother tongue, like, that part was very
visceral and very well done, but, like, there was basically no example of somebody who used privilege
in that way until, like, the very, very last moment when, okay, the Latin professor, yeah,
we're thinking of the same person, yes, yeah, yeah, yeah, can listeners tell that we're really
18:04
bad at remembering names, but I, man, I had them, but it's been a little while, you know,
I know, it's been, like, two weeks, and now all of my information, I know,
I only remember the others because I saw them pop up, so, yeah, well, like, she appears, like,
one time, Professor Craft, Professor Craft, I got it, yep, it appears, she appears one time,
and then, and then she appears again at the very end of the book, when, like, the chaos is ensuing,
that's, like, the closest thing to a privileged person, yeah, she's, like, the only one using
the privilege, but, like, even then, it's more an act of defiance than act of protection,
she's not trying to be negotiating the people who are barricading themselves in the Bible
to the outside power, like a parliament, yeah, she's not doing that, even though she could have
given her position and protections, like, she decided to barricade with the rest of them,
which is an act of defiance, but not an act of effective intervention, and the book ends in a
way that it ends, and, like, I think Leti was the one person who could have served that role,
who had the most amount of interaction with people with less privileged background in hers,
and there's, like, semblance of struggle of her, like, kind of tormented, but, like, if she did,
it was not very well portrayed, like, we didn't see her struggle that much, we, like, we just see
her being just kind of crying from her privileged point of view, and none of the rest of the main
characters can sympathize because she fails to recognize her own privilege, and when she does
notice the difference, she just decides to use against them, and, like, that's, I mean, that's
a character that exists, I'm not saying that that's not realistic, but, sadly, it kind of
happens to a lot of the, you know, privileged people I encounter, but of all the characters,
she had the most chance to be that person who uses her privilege for others, and she didn't.
Not only that, for the majority of the book, she, like, refuses to recognize that she's privileged,
like, she thinks that she's poor, thinks that she is not being given the same opportunity because
she's a girl, that complicates the intersectionality of it all, does complicate her narrative that's
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going on in her head, but still, I think maybe that's what an institution like the Oxford that's
being portrayed here does to you, like, they make, they kind of give you this weird protection level
to the privileged people, because they don't have to be aware of their privileges anymore, like,
Oxford is the ultimate privilege, and everyone is less than Oxford, so, like, they, all of a sudden,
don't have to exercise all these powers that comes with privileges, but can do whatever the
fuck they want to do with it. Yeah, maybe, I don't know, but that was frustrating. Oh my god, Leti,
come on. Yeah, I can, I think the frustration is echoed. I did feel this, and I think you've,
I am glad you connected it there, because I, I guess I had sort of forgotten that she,
she could have been the hope, right, to demonstrate that, right, I mean,
tries to give her a lot of, yes, right, yeah, instead, she's used as a demonstration that
there's, there's something important here, and I don't have the words I would like for it,
so let me, let me go to Professor Craft for a moment, because Craft, I think, is this kind of,
Craft doesn't have, even in the space of this time, any semblance of her being a minority or
anything. She has the position of, she is, she's a woman, but that's it, she just worked hard like
everyone else, and there is no difference. She is the, yeah, I put blinders on when it comes to
the idea of difference, there is no such thing as difference, that's what Professor Craft, yeah,
she, she's the gender-blind, color-blind approach, you just work hard, right, the fact that you don't
have to see is a privilege, yeah, but that itself, but because of the act they do, they're unable to
see the privilege, right, like, and that, now, in her case, she gets one attempt at sort of,
I think salvation is a bit strong of a word here, but like, she gets this attempt to get this
opportunity to get it right, and she looks at it and says, no, actually, like, I could tell I was
turning a blind eye, but that itself crosses a line, and because it crosses this line internally,
I've made a stance, right, it's still a privilege that she has this line inside that has to hit a
certain marker, and like, it had to be revealed, you know, she didn't, like, go out of her way to
uncover it, but when presented with the line that was crossed, there was a, there was a choice,
right, yeah, okay, I give you something for that, yeah, still didn't do anything else, right, but,
24:00
but again, being forced into the system, some minimal street creds are given, right,
Professor, and that is a, that's a situation that can occur, right, and then, like you said,
you could have also perhaps been able to recognize that your privilege would get you even more, but
then, human nature, scared, uncertain, don't know what to define, yeah, that was, that was as far as
she could do, yeah, ready, that's it for the show today, thanks for listening, and find us on X at
Eigo de Science, that is E-I-G-O-D-E-S-C-I-E-N-C-E, see you next time!
