ZetsuAi 1989, Translations to English from Chinese

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     ZetsuAi is a discourse of love-- jealous love, unconditioned love, fatal love, and of course, desperate love. Although some would shun ZetsuAi due to its Yaoi (not literally, but homosexuality) nature, I would argue that its awesome matrix of conflicting passions can only be expressed to its fullest in this intricate web of hyper-absurdity, that, ironically, is spun from reality itself. If you are familiar with ZetsuAi, then you must have experienced the Yaoi-Shounen Ai phenomenon. Honestly, despite the eroticism, feminism, or liberalism justifications, a lot of it is just crap. But ZetsuAi really stood out for me. I don't know why, it just does.
     All translations are an interpretation. Especially in this case, I think a strict translation will lose much of ZetsuAi's aestheticism. And since my version is in Chinese, there is no point. Translating manga is different from research translation (what I used do), so I've taken my own liberty to -- rather than keeping each words technically accurate -- preserve the mood and style of the mangaka, Minami Ozaki.

But before you go on, please make note of the following:

Minami has a mesmerizing "stream of consciousness" narrative style. By randomly juxtaposing passionately conflicting desires (thoughts) along side self-restrained, cool dialogs, she conveys feeling of a suffocating desperation. So to preserve her style, I intertwined thoughts w/ dialogs. However, keep in mind that the linear flow of text is misleading. For certain pages, please read from bottom up.

11/20/98: Vol 4 and 5 are near completion, and will be added to this site in January, 1999, when I load up the new version of Mangallaria. So so so sorry for the delay! Now I'm going to go hunt down the bastard who told me grad school is a piece of cake. JUST A THOUGHT: For my next project, I'm considering FAKE by Sanami Matou, or Kusatta Kyoshi no Houtei-Shiki by Kazuma Kodaka. If you know any of these have already been translated, or if you have a strong preference, please e-mail me. Thanks!

ENJOY!

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