Sekai no Chushin de Ai o Sakebu
Sekai no Chushin de Ai o Sakebu is roughly translated as Crying Out Love, in the Center of the World, and is the title of the bestselling novel in Japan, surpassing Haruki Murakami’s Norwegian Wood. This novel is also called as “Sekachu”, and is written by Katayama Kyoichi.
Last year, Viz Media decided to release the licensed manga version of this manga, and is called Socrates in Love. Now, I’m kind of wondering why did they use this title when there’s no reference to Socrates in the story. Viz also handled the translated version of the novel, also bearing the same title. I managed to get the manga yesterday afternoon despite of my reservation towards the story.
The story isn’t that unique. It is about middle school and high school sweethearts Hirose Aki and Matsumoto Sakutaro. They faced a very difficult situation when Hirose was confined in the hospital and was later diagnosed to have leukemia. The couple has to struggle to stay in their relationship despite Hirose’s slim chance of recovery. Kinda like A Walk To Remember, no?
The story is really common, however, Katayama-sensei knew who is his target audience, that is why the book managed to be a best-seller. It was a tearjerker, like any other Shoujo stories. I have to admit that I cried while reading the manga. I just have to admit that these East Asian series know where to hit the right spot. I think the best part of the story (I’m only talking about the manga here) is that it gives you the idea or bringing you to that time how it really feels to be in love. However, the joys of loving sometimes come with a price, and in this story, Matsumoto-kun lost his girlfriend Hirose.
I am also worried about the translation of the manga, since I’m not really fond of Viz (I think Tokyopop and Del Rey do better when it comes to translating). I am not sure if the true content of the novel (or the manga) has been translated well from Nihongo to Eigo (English). Although I just noticed that they retained the Japanese honorifics in the manga, so I think that’s good.
If you are not a fan of tearjerking stories (I do, sometimes, hehe), then do not read this. For avid manga readers, I recommend this but again, if you do not like sad stories, do not pick this up.
Related links:
Sekachu JDorama at DramaWiki
Crying Out Love, in the Center of the World (movie) at WikiPedia
Crying Out Love, in the Center of the World movie review at LoveHK
Technorati Tags:
sekachu, Manga, socrates in love, Japan, katayama kyoichi.
Angela Solis grew up in the Philippines before moving in to Canada in 2003. She became a Canadian in 2006. Angela is 22 years old and an alumna of University of Manitoba with a degree in Psychology. She has been blogging since 2002. She maintains a 
December 20th, 2005 at 2:07 am
i didn’t know na may manga version siya. mega-iyak ako sa movie