Well, I'm four episodes in, but truly this programme won me over from its first brutal hour and a bit. It is easily one of my favourite novels (my last re-read of it was during the pandemic, but I first read it the year its 'sequel' Noble House came out in 1981) and so far the creators have done a fantastic job of capturing the characters, the themes and particularly the visual spectacle of feudal Japan. I am totally immersed in a way I haven't had happen since the first few Game of Thrones episodes. Honestly worth the price of my Disney+ subscription on its own - which is just as well, since it's the only thing worth watching on there at the minute!

I'm enjoying this series very much too! I never watched the mini-series on TV but I remember seeing my father's copy of the book around.

Oh man, if you haven't done so yet, read the book. It's phenomenal. Clavell had been a prisoner if war at Changi and this novel was his attempt to come to terms with his experiences - to understand the mentality of his captors by looking at - and learning to value and appreciate - their culture and traditions.

Disney+ subscription?

I wonder what I'm watching it on then, since I'm four episodes in and it's free on TV on one my channels. FX 136, I guess.

And it is brutal -

Yeah, we don't have FX over here, so we get it through Disney+.


That's one way of looking at life on Earth, I suppose.

First episode didn't grab me. But it seems the whole world says it's awesome. I may have to recant.

Oh, the results of katana work, and cannon, are gruesomely realistic - I assume. I've seen nothing quite like it before.

While I think that's one reason to watch it, others may disagree. But there are other reasons to watch it. Historical perspective, for example - unless they are wildly off the mark, but only an expert could tell you - it just seems real and doesn't disagree with things I've been told from other sources.

Have you read it, Jay? Like with GoT, at least some of.my enthusiasm.may be down to how well realised it is.

Episode five maintaining the quality. Not the most eventful part of the tale but still so well done that I can't take my eyes off the screen. Blackthorn, Toranaga and especially Mariko are perfect casting. And of course, this is where Wolverine's girlfriend in the Byrne Claremont X-Men is from. So, you know.

I didn't understand why he hung that pheasant up to rot. What was that about?

It's a bit clearer in the novel - he was maturing the bird, according to English custom.The Japanese find it revolting.but can't take it down because he had jokingly threatened the life of anyone who did, not realising how lethal such instruction from a hatamoto is.

Is that English custom? I thought it was just aging the meat to make it taste better. I never heard it called "maturing."

https://honest-food.net/on-hanging-pheasants-2

Here is a good article on it.

English/European custom, so opposed to Japanese. Maturing and aging are synonyms.

How can you possibly say a thing like that after having years of experience at IMWAN?

LOL

I wasn't trying to be pedantic, I just never heard it called "maturing" even though that has a nice ring to it, and I have subsequently come to learn is synonymous with dry-aging meat. I also never heard that is was uniquely English, nor an English "custom."

In any event, it was pretty obvious that Clavell was trying to show a distinction between the Japanese and English, as well as giving Blackthorne a catalyst to act.

What I find interesting is that the Japanese had sushi (which was different from modern day sushi), so they weren't altogether unfamiliar with food preservation/fermentation. That said, I suppose the cultural/language barriers caused the conflict (which, again, was the point of the scene).

A fair point, made well.

I think one might hang pheasants if it were cold enough, and sequestered away from flies - like in a chest, or a box - or in modern times, in a fridge or a cooler.

I would have thought gutting it first would be important, too, but apparently pheasant guts are not too nasty or foul, I suppose due to a vegetarian diet, maybe.

In Shogun, it seemed that bird was hanging in way too warm a place, exposed to flies, maggot ridden, and for far too long, but apparently some people say they are not only still edible, but delicious, while others say it's like eating rotting meat and it's disgusting. Clearly, tastes vary.

If the smell was sooooo offensive to the whole household, I think that bird was far too gone to eat.

At most, I thought he was going to age it, but he forgot about it. Well, maybe he didn't forget, and maybe he likes the taste of rotting flesh.

I doubt I would have eaten it - or even tried it, after having seen its maggot-ridden corpse.

Blimey.

It's all explained quite clearly in the novel as an example of cultural differences between the European and Japanese. Like Blackthorne's initial horror at their regular bathing when the Western thought at the time was that bathing too often spread disease. Clavell is quite scrupulous in his research, so I'm guessing he knew what he was talking about.

Nago, I wasn't being pedantic either - you asked a question which I answered. I'm sorry if it sounded terse. As I said, in the novel Clavell makes the conflict explicit , having to do with the way the rotting meat affects the harmony of the building. I don't have the novel to hand, or is look up the passages that are germane to this discussion.

The original quotation said 'tenants' of modern Christianity. That's why I made the joke. Now it makes no sense

How is it that the quotation altered itself? Does this now happen when one alters one's own texts - that it also edits the texts of others who have quoted us?

This is my one 'must watch' TV programme of the minute. I honestly haven't so eagerly awaited a 'next episode' since Game of Thrones. Without giving any spoilers, it's not really the sort of thig that would easily give rise to a sequel, so my fervent hope is that the same team (or a team with the same spirit, anyway) take on Tai Pan, which was Clavell's follow up to this, hasloose ties to the narrative - at least eventually - and is another fantastic novel centred on a European in historical Asia.