That does it, I’m moving to Japan

I had lunch the other day with my friend Grace.

Like me, Grace is une femme d'un certain âge – a woman of a certain age. And that certain age is “older.”

Grace and I met in a writers group, and we’re both working on novels – Grace further along than I am. We both recognize that, at our certain age, it’s almost a certainty that our novels will remain in the drawer. We’re writing for ourselves, largely, and for our writers group cronies. Alas, if we’d wanted to be real writers, writer writers, we should have started in earnest, say, 50 years back.

Nevertheless, we persist. Which is, frankly, what us femmes d'un certain âge do.

There is always, the heartening example from the art world: Grandma Moses, who in her late 70’s got serious about painting.

And closer to writerly home, there’s Frank McCourt, whose Angela’s Ashes was published when he was 66.

The odds, Grace and I completely recognize, are against either of us taking the literary world by storm. Still, we can dream.

Anyway, I was, of course, delighted to read about the old geezer writers in Japan who are meeting with some success.

Aiko Sato is 95. In 2017, his “Age 90: what’s so great about it?” sold 1 million copies – Japan’s best seller for the year.

In 2018 the Akutagawa literary prize went to Chisako Wakatake, 63 at the time, for her debut novel “Live by Myself” with its 74-year-old protagonist, Momoko. (Source: The Economist)

These aren’t isolated instances. Makiko Uchidate’s is 70. Her book “The Finished Person,” was recently published.

There’s an audience of geezer lit in Japan.

Japan’s population has the world’s highest proportion of over-65s, at 28%. People are living longer and staying healthier, so many have at least 20-30 years of retirement, for much of which they are sprightly. And although the Japanese have been spending less on books, that is least true for the over-60s.

I’m guessing that in the US, the over 60s buy disproportionately more books, as well. (And, hey, I’m plenty sprightly.)

After all, we grew up when people read for pleasure, in that way long ago time when there were only three TV channels and no Instagram. We like to read, and we’ve got plenty of time for it.

In Japan, the audience for “wrinkly writers’ books” isn’t limited to wrinkly readers. Younger readers are snapping them up as well.

Some are preparing for their own old age or want to understand the increasing number of old people they see around them. Others find relevance in the themes explored, such as loneliness, a problem that stretches well beyond the silver-haired.

One interesting aspect of Japan’s grey haired literary renaissance is that “the vast majority of authors, and main characters, are women.”

That sisterhood, it’s plenty powerful.

If I had an infinite bucket list, and was wiling to pay for first class air travel, Japan would be a place that I’d like to visit. Sure, I’d probably freak out on the crowded trains, and curl into a fetal ball if I found myself in Tokyo’s bright-lights Ginza District. But I wouldn’t mind seeing cherry blossoms and Mount Fuji, and have some sort of Zen experience in a Shinto temple.

I could live without Hello, Kitty, and given that I’m half a foot taller than the average Japanese woman, I probably couldn’t find a kimono that would fit. But a Japanese woodcut or two? Nice…

I’m not daring enough to try blowfish, and saki will never cross my lips, but I’m down with veggie tempura and Kobe beef.

So I’m sure that I’d enjoy a trip to Japan.

And now that I know that they don’t just revere the elderly, but that they revere elderly writers? Well, Japan is looking pretty good if I decide to relo.

Okay, the only Japanese words I know, other than kimono and saki, are konnichiwa, sayonara, arigato, and yakuza. Still, the Land of the Rising Sun may be the land of opportunity for writers of a certain age. (Grace, are you with me?)