/lit/ - Literature

>>13413973
The japanese sci-fi tradition is vast and I hope I accomplished showing that to you in that post.
I'd like to first emphasize how often we see female protagonists in japanese sci-fi fiction, in stories that mostly do not touch upon social justice, while still operating in certain gender tropes that characterize japanese girls, and at the same time a spirit of mystery and wander at a "magical" world.
So to start off with evidence, pic related is a variety of sci-fi books throughout the 2000s and 2010s with female protagonists. I have tagged the image with multiple markings indicating lesbian content, since this is what spun off the discussion, and cannot be ignored when discussing the place of lesbian romance in japanese SF, which occupies a niche perhaps tangentially similar to feminist science-fiction back in the 50s or so (I apologize if I get the time periods wrong). It is important to note that one of them is actually the translation of a western work, but I will elaborate on that later on.
One common theme you notice is that, in one way or another, most are covers involving a girl within the particular setting the novel takes place in. Most seem to be gazing at the reader with a bleak expression, or looking away from the cover, looking at the far horizon. I see this act as a representation for a yearn to find a distant, fantastical reality upon which one could endlessly explore. Japan often takes a few steps further and blurs the line between fantasy and science fiction, though not necessarily by introducing fantasy into sci-fi, but rather the romance of fantasy. Why are they all women? I believe this stems from two influences:
1 - The Only Neat Little Thing To Do, a short story by James TipTree Jr, the pseudonym of a female western science fiction writer, and
2 - Alice in Wonderland
"Sukoshi Fushigi" (少し不思議) is a japanese play with the SF abbreviation, meaning "a little bit mysterious". You may say that this "little bit mysterious" science fiction is a subgenre of its own. It involves women, often young girls, exploring some kind of fantastical universe possible thanks to technology. This technology, whether detailed or not in the book, typically possesses an air of mysteriousness, almost as if transient. Sometimes an elaborate fantastical world may have a scientific basis upon it, sometimes without explanation which blurs the line between SF and fantasy. Not all books in the picture necessarily follow this idea; there is a diversity of stories, but the centerpiece that could perhaps unify most is that a woman is on a personal quest in which she discovers and learns about the world as she experiences her surroundings.