The term “battle royale” has become ubiquitous in modern pop culture, appearing in everything from video games to comics. Initially meaning a fight between two or more participants, it would take on an edgier, more violent connotation with the release of the 1999 Japanese dystopian runaway bestseller Battle Royale (バトル・ロワイアル). Pitting student against student in a fight to the death, this seminal novel would go on to spawn three manga series, two films, and inspire hundreds of media creations.
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A Destined Cult Classic
The timing of the book’s release coincided with Japan’s descent from an all-consuming economic high. Japan was in the midst of its “lost decade” (失われた十年; Ushinawareta jūnen) following the crash of the bubble economy in 1990, earmarked by the 1995 Kobe earthquake and the Tokyo sarin gas attacks perpetrated by Aum Shinrikyo cult members (地下鉄サリン事件; Chikatetsu sarin jiken). The horrific 1997 Kobe child murders (神戸連続児童殺傷事件; Kōbe renzoku jidō sasshō jiken) brought to light a rising spate in violent juvenile crime. Then Takami comes along with Battle Royale.
“What’s the point of this game? Is there a point to all this?”
Kawada’s eyes widened a little, but then he looked down and let out a chuckle. He must have found the question pretty funny. Then finally, he said, “Of course there isn’t.”
Battle Royale: Remastered, page 226
The story centers on a class of middle school students forced to participate in a fascist government-run initiative known simply as “The Program.” The Program’s objective is gruesomely simple: kill until only one student remains. Some students eagerly embark on a killing spree, while more pacifist students attempt to find a way to cheat the Program without bloodshed. Alliances form, double-crossing and literal back-stabbing ensues, rebellions are thwarted, and the number of living students dwindles. Takami gives the reader unflinching access to the students’ minds, and we learn perhaps more than we want to about them. It’s a gritty, blunt, darkly humorous, page-turner that ends on a surprisingly optimistic note.
The Man Behind the Phenomenon
Takami Koushun (高見広春) grew up in Kagawa Prefecture on Shikoku. As a literature student at Osaka University, he penned stories pairing detective protagonists with horror elements. Some of his literary influences included horror novelist Hideyuki Kikuchi and Western heavyweights Stephen King and Robert B. Parker, the latter two of whom he discovered in college. Singer-songwriter Sano Motoharu (佐野元春) also features heavily; Takami includes the lyric「愛することってむずかしい」(“It’s so hard to love”) in the book’s epigraphs, and the main protagonist Nanahara Shuya shares similar physical attributes to Sano.
Takami credits Parker’s handling of social commentary within a story as vital to employing his own in the book, mostly expressed by the triumvirate of Nanahara Shuya, Nakagawa Noriko, and Kawada Shogo. His imagined Republic of Greater East Asia is essentially Japan, something born out of his antipathy for Japanese social norms. In an afterword to the 2009 English edition, Takami mulled on how his own feelings are reflected in the book:
“I wanted to write about the trapped feeling of living in Japan I’ve felt clearly since childhood…and that’s what I attempted to do. Here in Japan, being different from other people makes you a potential scapegoat when anything goes wrong…. Even if a rule is clearly ridiculous, nobody will speak out against it, because people think, “If I say something, others will think I’m different,” and the rule continues unchanged.”
Takami Koushun
An Arduous Path to Publication
After graduating from Osaka University, he worked for Shikoku Shinbun as a journalist for five years before quitting in 1996. He began writing Battle Royale that same year, and upon completion, hoped to get it published — which proved easier said than done.
Read Battle Royale: 日本語 | English
In 1997 he submitted the Battle Royale manuscript to the Japan Horror Fiction Awards (日本ホラー小説大賞). Out of 229 entrants, only four made it to the final round of the novel category, including Takami. Of the four finalists, his stiffest competition was Togashi Keita (戸梶圭太) and his novel Century of the Damned (センチュリー・オブ・ザ・ダムド) centering on an underworld operative and a telepathic 13-year-old girl.
Read Century of the Damned: 日本語
Takami’s depiction of students killing students — basically, children killing children — didn’t sit well with the three judges. (I suppose they thought Togashi’s story was less disturbing, even though his 13-year-old psychic does telepathically links with a serial killer who forces his victims to eat feces. Gross.) While they found the writing compelling, they found the content too problematic and liable to hurt the competition’s reputation. As a result, Battle Royale ended up being passed over by the judges for its uncomfortable. No winner was declared that year.
In a reflective piece included in the 2014 essay collection The Battle Royale Slam Book, preliminary committee judge Masao Higashi admitted that the Kobe child killings played a heavy role in the judges’ decision to reject the book. The parallels between the Program as a “game” and the Kobe murderer’s handwritten note mentioning “the game begins” proved too disturbing to ignore.
An Overnight Success
Rather than disenchanting people, the hype over this mysterious book only picked up. Battle Royale placed fourth out of ten in the 2000 issue of the popular mystery fiction guide book このミステリーがすごい! (This Mystery’s Awesome!) Finally, after rejection and revision, Takami’s book was picked up and published by Ota Publishing in 1999. (It’s worth noting that Ota Publishing would later release the autobiography of the Kobe child killer, much to the consternation of the public and victims’ families.)
Battle Royale became an instant bestseller, selling 1 million copies. The first print edition numbered 666 pages, which wasn’t a coincidence; Takami’s editor purposely emphasized the page count as 獣の数字 (kemono no suji; “Number of the Beast”).
In 2002 Takami gave a lecture on the ethics of “hardboiled” fiction writing at his alma mater Osaka University, revealing some of the thoughts behind his writing process for Battle Royale. When conceiving the story, he confessed he just wanted to write “cool characters;” contrary to popular opinion, the gruesome beheading of the Kobe child killer’s first victim played little part in his decision to intertwine children with violence.
Takami also originally pictured the students’ explosive tracking devices as bracelets, but as a friend soundly pointed out, it’d be easy to get rid of the bracelet by cutting one’s arm off. Takami thought, “Well, you can’t cut your own neck off” and wisely changed the bracelets to collars.
An Unforgettable Film Adaptation
The 2000 movie Battle Royale deserves an essay all on its own, but for now we’ll spare a few words.
Powerhouse movie director Fukasaku Kinji (深作欣二) read Takami’s work and found himself relating all too easily with the students. His wartime experiences in a munitions factory as a teenager instilled an acute understanding of how easily children and violence can intersect. The book reignited his antipathy towards how adults treated children in society, and he knew he had to make the novel into a film.
“During the raids, even though we were friends working together, the only thing we would be thinking of was self-preservation.”
Fukasaku Kinji in a 2001 interview for The Guardian
The film starred acting veteran and film director Kitano “Beat” Takeshi as the sadistic Program overseer, Fujiwara Tatsuya as main protagonist Nanahara Shuya, and Yamamoto Taro as Program veteran Kawada Shogo. (Yamamoto would later go on to become an anti-establishment politician and founder of the Reiwa Shinsengumi (れいわ新選組), something that would no doubt earn a nod of approval from Kawada).
It’s one thing to read violence, but another to witness it on the big screen. The novel may have upset a few people, but the film garnered criticism and debate from everyday people to Diet politicians. Japan’s film rating society slapped the rare R15 rating on the film despite Fukasaku’s objections (and despite many of the actors themselves being 15 years old.) An LDP-led movement to pass a bill limiting children’s access to violent or sexual media coincided with the movie’s release, forcing Fukasaku to drop his petition to change the film’s rating.
Some authors despise film adaptations of their works. Takami wasn’t one of them. When interviewed after his 2002 Osaka University lecture, Takami expressed his pleasant surprise over Fukasaku’s dexterous handling of the source material, noting the film’s “miraculous cohesion.” If you can stomach the violence, it’s definitely worth a watch.
As for the sequel Battle Royale II: Requiem…well, it doesn’t live up to its predecessor. Fukasaku passed away during its production, leaving his son at the helm. It’s been largely bashed by critics, both domestic and overseas. Suffice it to say, it’s far more political (some would say anti-American, given its terrorist elements) and doesn’t quite hit as deep as the first film, though it’s still worth viewing.
Taking Explicit to a Whole New Level
Battle Royale got the manga treatment the same year of the film’s release. Running from 2000 to 2005 in Young Champion, the seinen manga upped the violence factor. Artist Taguchi Masayuki brought Takami’s story to stark grisly life. In the beginning, the manga stayed true to the novel. As the series progressed, however, Taguchi introduced more explicit scenes, including rape and over-the-top violence not present in the novel.
Read Battle Royale (Manga): 日本語 | English
In a lengthy discussion published in the final volume, Takami said he preferred Taguchi’s take on the story over Fukasaku’s. Takami felt Taguchi stayed true to Battle Royale’s underlying theme of an incorruptible love for humanity — that there is more to life than violence and oppression, and it’s only a given for humans to hope for more.
In 2009 Takami confessed he wouldn’t write anything more about Battle Royale, but in 2014 he penned a side story manga titled Battle Royale: Angel’s Border, focusing on the six girls holed up in the lighthouse, who end up killing each other after rampant feelings of paranoia and fear overrule their bonds of friendship.
An Impressionable Legacy
Takami has yet to write new work unrelated to Battle Royale, though he’s repeatedly said he’ll return. It’s hard to imagine anything he’ll write will compare to his now cult classic. While facing similar criticism overseas (especially in North America, where school shootings occur on a sickeningly daily basis), Battle Royale has also been met with rave reviews and die-hard fans.
Takami coupled gruesome violence with overwhelming kindness, misery with hope, in a pulp-fiction style that makes reading it a breeze. It’s an unforgettable experience.
Battle Royale is one of those books that present new illuminating moments of clarity whenever you revisit it. I highly recommend giving it a read.
What to Read Next
The Ultimate Ranking of the Studio Ghibli Universe
Sources
Lee, Andrew. “‘Battle Royale’ wins the game for hungry fans.” The Japan Times. 7 June 2014. https://www.japantimes.co.jp/culture/2014/06/07/books/book-reviews/battle-royale-wins-game-hungry-fans/#.WFXQYX2g1RR
Takami, Koushun. Battle Royale: Remastered. Translated by Nathan Collins. San Francisco: Haikasoru, 2014.
桑島, 秀樹. 作家・高見広春氏講演会をめぐる覚書 : ユニバーサル・ルールとしてのハードボイルド どんな時代でも、わかってる奴にはわかってる. 文芸学研究. 7 P.121-P.135. https://ir.library.osaka-u.ac.jp/repo/ouka/all/50952/
