Don’t ask me to pronounce that.
In all seriousness, I’m grateful for the warm reception I’ve received so far from the aniblogosphere. To be perfectly honest, I started this blog just to collect some of my thoughts on the anime of 2013 for 12 Days of Anime. 2013 was an important year for me (in more days than one). It was the year that I started following currently airing anime, the year I started regularly watching anime, and the year where I started the unholy habit of anime marathoning (“Only 12-26 episodes? Let’s do it!”). It was also the year where I started watching anime socially with friends and was pleasantly surprised to find out that yes, there are people around me who geek out about anime just as much as I do.
Anyways, Anime Monographia’s been nominated for the Liebster Award. I received three nominations and would like to take a moment to thank Froggykun from Fantastic Memes, Moira and Austinatious from Just Another Heaven, and somebritishguy from Anime Blog Jr. for their nominations.
The Liebster award is intended to give some exposure to small blogs with less than 200 followers. The rules are as follows:
- Link back to the blogger who nominated you
- Answer the 11 questions given to you by the blogger who nominated you
- Nominate 11 other bloggers with less than 200 followers
- Go to the blogs you nominated and notify them of your nomination
- Give your nominees 11 questions to answer.
As I’m still very new to the aniblogosphere, I had some trouble coming up with eleven awesome blogs. Here are eleven blogs that caught my attention. Apologies in advance if you’ve all already received Liebster award nominations.
Atelier Emily – Her prose is breathtakingly gorgeous, her thoughts seamlessly weave critical analysis with emotive appreciation into exquisite, miniature tapestries of interpretation. ajthefourth’s posts, though never short of eloquence, are refreshingly humble in scope. I particularly enjoyed her thoughts on Akemi Homura.
Draggle’s Anime Blog – Dude, Haruto x L-Elf forever was enough to sell me. I am an easy guy to please.
Fantastic Memes – froggykun‘s my amphibian-inclined aniblogging senpai. I always value his feedback and his blog is one of the ten sites I visit every day.
Lost My Thesis – The Severing Crime Edge didn’t receive a ton of love when it aired–probably because it vacillated between being too creepy or abruptly comical. Lost My Thesis does a good job of exploring the discomfort of the audience’s reaction to the sensuous act of Kiri’s hair-cutting fetish. Also cool blog title.
Shiizumi’s Anime Blog – I love his Natsume Yuujinchou diary project. He writes simply but elegantly.
Shinsei’s Anime Blog – Despite his disclaimer for offering nothing but “shallow opinions on anime,” I find his seasonal observations particularly on point.
The Cart Driver – I feel like it’s cheating to add such an incredibly popular blog but as it was the first anime blog that I started lurking about regularly, and ultimately Scamp’s call to arms for 12 Days in 2013 that spurred the formation of Anime Monographia, I’m very much indebted to them. Also, I’m digging the poetry they’ve got going on this season (ranging from very poor to quite palatable) and applaud their literary efforts.
The Japanator‘s Annotated Anime Series – By mere coincidence, I was intending to name this blog “Annotated Anime” (I have a thing for alliteration) before I realized that it was already taken by this blog. Hence the hasty name change to Anime Monographia, which in retrospect is a better fitting name.
The Null Set – We have the same WP theme! I particularly enjoyed steelbound’s 12 Days of Anime from last year.
Too Old for Anime – You can never be too old for anime. I’m envious that this guy has probably watched more anime than I will in an entire lifetime.
Wrong Every Time – I have a pretty bad habit for indiscriminately liking every Urobuchi work, so it’s always valuable to read a piece that picks apart the disturbing implications of the Urobuchian philosophy that so characterizes his works. “Denial of self”– some deep stuff going on there.
I picked eleven of my favorite questions from their lists to create a finalized list, which I have answered below.
1) What got you into the world of blogging? I believe I’ve answered this question already earlier in this post, but tl;dr. I’ve liked anime for quite some time but consumed it as a fairly casual (though intense) watcher. College happened and suddenly I figured out that liking and talking about anime didn’t make you weird, but interesting. Saw Scamp’s 12 Days announcement and then, boom, this blog was born.
2) Pick an anime character to be for the rest of your life…And GO! This is surprisingly difficult to answer considering that most of my favorite characters tend to suffer. A lot. But if I had to pick, I would probably pick Natsume Takeshi from Natsume Yuujinchou. It would be cool to hang out with spirits. I really admire his optimistic view of life as it’s something quite similar to my own. Despite having been hurt by people (and spirits) in the past, he always takes the higher road by giving them the benefit of the doubt. He makes himself vulnerable but that’s precisely what gives him strength.
3) Create a haiku about anything that starts with W.
What is life you ask?
Pompoms of laughter, spun dreams
Pearl string chains undone
*crickets chirping* Uh…next question.
4) Fess up. How many filler episodes of Naruto did you watch?
I treat Naruto and Naruto Shippuden as two different shows (no anime should be more than 300 episodes long). For Naruto, I’ve watched every single filler (100+). For Shippuden, I started skipping fillers after Asuma died. So that works out to maybe 20-30 more fillers.
Dear God. So much time wasted.
5) Do you have an anime OTP (One True Pairing)? If so, what is it?
Yami Yugi x Yugi Muto. I’ve been puzzleshipping long before it became a thing (what I like to think anyway, but I didn’t get into Yu-Gi-Oh! until 2000).
Also, Lelouch x Suzaku. And the mentioned Haruto x L-Elf. I have a thing for deuterogonist pairings. It’s also a fundamental law of shonen that a smoldering look exchanged between two males is an automatic indicator of TRUE LOVE.
6) “Death Note is better than Code Geass.” Agree or disagree?
How dare you pit two of my favorite shows against each other. I think Code Geass edges out just because Lelouch is less of a douche than Light. Code Geass is also just a lot more rewatchable.
7) Have you ever cried watching an anime?
No, but I have cried during a Doctor Who episode (Season 1, Father’s Day). I don’t cry when I watch anime, but I do emotively respond in other ways. Jaw-dropping, facepalming, yelling, throwing things at the wall.
8) What anime would you suggest to people to try to get them hooked on anime as a medium?
Funnily enough, I’m the go-to person for anime picks for my friends, probably because I’m familiar with and enjoy mainstream titles. (No anime elitists here on AM.) Fullmetal Alchemist (not Brotherhood) is usually the choice I offer as it perfectly balances strong characterization, solid world-building, makes you think and is pretty accessible to people not familiar with anime. Depending on the person, I also have recommended Death Note, Ouran High School Host Club, and Sword Art Online. Attack on Titan has been surprisingly well received among casual watchers so it’s another title I recommend, especially for people who mistakenly believe that anime is nothing but ridiculous amounts of moe.
9) Favorite Shakespeare play?
Despite having specialized in Renaissance-Elizabethan British literature, I actually haven’t read that many Shakespeare plays (before you boo, I will say that I studied mostly poetry). MacBeth is the undisputed favorite of the eight I’ve read and/or seen, though I do have a soft spot for Twelfth Night (what can I say? Crossdressing is funny)
10) Judging purely from the pictures below, which of these two shows would you rather watch? (You’re not allowed to say neither!)
As someone who gravitates toward shonen fare, none of these shows look particularly appealing…oh wait, are those girls air-guitaring with their brooms? Huh. That’s interesting.
11) What does true happiness mean to you?
I’m still figuring this out but I believe that true happiness is a journey rather than a destination. Or that the journey is the destination. Happiness is something you not only work towards but something that you live by. Sure, accomplishments are important and help you move forward in life and society, but true happiness is that moment when you realize that yeah, things could be better and that you’re working hard to get there, but that there are people and things in your life that make life worth living–those you already have.
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Right, here are my questions for the eleven nominated bloggers to answer if they feel so inclined.
1) What do you actually do in the Real World out there? Feel free to be as specific or as vague as you like.
2) Name an anime that genuinely surpassed your expectations.
3) Assuming an unlimited budget, which anime character would you cosplay and why?
4) Surprise! Your class has been captured and dropped off on a deserted island under the “Battle Royale” act. What’s your weapon of choice and how do you fare on the island?
5) What was the very first anime that you watched and finished? How important has this anime been in shaping your anime watching life?
6) “AKB48 is the greatest thing that’s happened to the J-Pop industry.” Agree or disagree?
7) Describe your ideal anime in ten words or less.
8) A live-action Attack on Titan adaptation. Yay or nay?
9) You’ve been informed by a top secret, highly reliable source that the world’s ending tomorrow. What are your plans for today?
10) Which anime character do you most identify yourself with?
11) IYHO (in your humble opinion), best anime opening of all-time?
Anime Monographia 
https://animemonographia.wordpress.com/2014/02/10/mein-liebster-auszeichnung/
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“This is surprisingly difficult to answer considering that most of my favorite characters tend to suffer.”
Suffering makes for the best characters 🙂
Mind if I have a go answering your questions?
1) Err, not much. Study in uni time. Chill in holidays. Read, watch anime, do music stuff, see friends, blog… nothing too exciting haha.
2) Either Aquarion EVOL or Monogatari Series Second Season. I watched about five episodes or so of the original Aquarion, and was thoroughly unimpressed, so was expecting EVOL to be a piece of shit. But it was quite funny and charming. Monogatari S2 was great because I was getting fed up of the franchise, but S2 had some fantastic character arcs and I’m glad I followed through with it.
3) Maybe a Charizard or something, complete with a fiery tail and flamethrower attack.
4) Hmmm. Maybe a silenced pistol, because it would be relatively easy to use and wouldn’t give a way your location when fired, plus it’s small. If not allowed “technology”-type weapons, probably a medium-sized sword would be best because it’s fairly versatile, can be used for cutting food and stuff as well, and wouldn’t be too heavy. I think I’d be pretty shit with a bow or something, and I wouldn’t want something too big or small.
5) Naruto was the first anime I knew was anime that I watched and finished (so not counting Pokemon). I think it gave me some tolerance to endless flashbacks, lame speeches and long fights (it was pretty fun though haha). Wasn’t the first that I finished though. That would probably be FMA.
6) I would like to give a really good answer to this, but I’m afraid I don’t know heaps about the actual industry 😦 . I’m not sure. On one hand, they sell a shitload of music, which is good for the industry. On the other (not related as much to the industry) they’re a really popular group which helps perpetuate idol culture, which I’m not quite as keen on. Tbh I’m not into their music and so don’t care about them much, but really interesting question!
7) CONFLICT AND SUFFERING.
8) Meh, don’t care. I don’t watch much live action stuff anyway.
9) I don’t think I’d do anything special. I’m pretty happy, so I think I’d just have a normal, relaxing day with my family.
Well, in theory anyway. I reckon I’d probably be a gibbering wreck.
10) It’s funny, I was thinking about this because of froggykun’s post, but I honestly can’t think of any anime characters I strongly identify with. I can see hints of myself all the time, when characters are nervous, scared, excited etc but I’ve never felt that there’s an anime character who’s a lot like me. Hachiken from Silver Spoon comes to mind because sometimes I try to bite off more than I can chew and have trouble saying no, but like not heaps… Dunno ^_^
11) Oh that’s just mean. There’s far too many for me to choose from! Ones that come to mind are AKINO OPs from the Aquarion franchise, Lia OPs from Clannad AS and Angel Beats!, Origa’s GitS songs, Evangelion’s OP and Sea of the Stars from LotGH. But probably my favourite is HOWLING by abingdon boys school, from the Darker than Black anime. Viva metal!
Also, is really cool. It has tap dancing in it. The full version is less messy though.
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Yeah, thought your questions and answers were really interesting!
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Thanks for the answers! A Charizard cosplay would be incredibly badass. I’ve tried Monogatari but can’t really see the appeal (Senjougahara did seem pretty cool) and ended dropping it midway through Season 1. I’ve heard good things about Aquarion EVOL so I’ll check that out at some point.
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Senjougahara was basically the reason why I kept watching 🙂 . I didn’t care anywhere near as much for the other characters in the first season.
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Awesome! Let me give these questions a crack!
1) I’m really lazy, so I’ll just link to a post: http://fantasticmemes.wordpress.com/2013/08/15/what-i-do-when-im-not-watching-anime/
2) Sakurasou no Pet na Kanojo. One of my favourite anime of all time and I’d initially dropped it after four episodes.
3) I’d like to put on a pink wig and dress up as one of my waifus.
4) An air guitar. I would die on the first day 😦
5) Inuyasha. It was my first anime love and it got me into the whole fanfic scene for many years. I still consider my perspective to be shaped by that culture, even if I don’t write fanfics anymore.
6) I have no strong opinion about this, since I don’t really care about J-Pop, but I do have AKB48 to thank for the AKB0048 anime, which was heaps of fun.
7) Much waifus. Such harem.
8) YAY. But only if Hollywood does it.
9) I’d try to get laid.
10) Lazy again, so linking to a post: http://fantasticmemes.wordpress.com/2014/01/21/relating-to-an-anime-character/
11) The Evangelion OP. This is be a popular answer, but it’s a great OP from arguably the greatest anime of all time.
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I still have yet to finish Evangelion but yes, Cruel Angel’s Thesis is an awesome opening.
Funnily enough, Inuyasha was one of my earliest anime too. It was definitely the first one, I watched subbed instead of dubbed and that’s what got me hooked on branching out into more anime.
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Thanks for the shout-out! However, I’m far too lazy to answer a bunch of questions, and I don’t read a lot of anime blogs, not enough to make a big enough list, anyway. I tend to look at an article if the title suggests I’ll find it interesting.
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Thanks for commenting. It’s really no problem. I don’t follow a lot of anime blogs either–but it’s always good to take a peek at the work that other writers are doing. Hopefully, something on this website will pique your interest in the future?
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