Furui Yoshiaki - Modernizing Solitude

This book about solitude was not written alone. The writing of it was made possible by a network of teachers, friends, and family across the Pacific between the United States and Japan. It was written, to use my own phrase, in networked solitude.

At Emory, I am particularly grateful to Benjamin Reiss for the generous support and vigorous guidance he gave me by reading through and commenting on a countless number of drafts. This project benefited from his sharp intellect and remarkable insight, which I greatly admire. The books foundations were also established through dialogue with Barbara Ladd, who initiated me into the practice of bringing historical insight into my reading of literature, and Jonathan Prude, who introduced me to the study of American history as a discipline. I was also blessed to be acquainted with Shoshana Felman, from whom I learned an important lesson: literature should be not subservient to theory. While widely recognized as a literary theorist, she is the best close reader of literature Ive ever known. I would also like to thank the students of my American Solitude class for their inspiration. It is I, the teacher, who learned a great deal from them. I am grateful for the generous funding from the Laney Graduate School of Emory University, the Fulbright Scholarship Program, and the Yoshida Scholarship Foundation.

I am equally indebted to David M. Henkin at UC Berkeley for his generosity in taking the time to comment on an early version of the manuscript. Without his groundbreaking scholarship, some of this book could not have been written. Special thanks also go to John L. Bryant, Samuel Otter, Elizabeth Renker, and Elizabeth Schultz for their invaluable comments on my previous work.

I would like to express my sincere gratitude to my mentors in Japan who trained me as a literary scholar both at the University of Tokyo and Waseda University: Takaki Hiraishi, Motoyuki Shibata, Tomoyuki Zettsu, Koichi Suwabe, Masaki Horiuchi, and Koji Toko. What I learned from each of them constitutes the basis of my literary analysis. Their teaching ingrained in me the importance of reading and writing aboutliterature with respect, love, and passion. For the publication of the monograph in the United States, I must single out Tomoyuki Zettsu and thank him again for his continuous moral support throughout the entire journey.

Since I returned to Japan, I have been fortunate to be part of a vibrant academic community. I offer sincere thanks to Michiko Shimokobe and Takayuki Tatsumi for their inspiration and guidance. In addition, I want to acknowledge the generosity of Michiko Amemiya, who read through the entire manuscript with remarkable care and insight. I am also most grateful to my former and current colleagues at Aoyama Gakuin University and Rikkyo University for helping me finish this project.

Parts of this book have appeared previously in scholarly journals. Chapter 1 was originally published in Texas Studies in Literature and Language 58, no. 3 (2016). Portions of chapter 3 appeared in Leviathan: A Journal of Melville Studies 19, no. 2 (2017). I am grateful to the University of Texas Press and the Johns Hopkins University Press for permission to reprint my previous work.

I have been most fortunate to work with the staff at the University of Alabama Press: Dan Waterman, who first saw promise in my project; Joanna Jacobs, who shepherded the project; and Jessica Hinds-Bond, who helped clear up my writing. In preparing the final manuscript, I greatly benefited from the detailed and sharp comments of the anonymous reviewers. During the final production process, I had the honor to be awarded the Fukuhara Prize by the Fukuhara Memorial Fund for the Studies of English and American Literature, which assisted in the completion of the book. This work was also supported by JSPS KAKENHI Grant Number 18K12324.

Finally, my greatest debt is to my family for supporting me with patience and love. I wish to thank my mother, Emiko Furui, for her understanding and steadfast encouragement. I owe my deepest gratitude to Mirai and Emily, both of whom were by my side through the entire process of writing this book, both in the United States and Japan.