- Joined
- Oct 13, 2007
- Messages
- 1,517
Just a couple of questions for anyone who knows Japanese:
First, about "hearts." From what I can find on Google, it seems that the Japanese concept of the heart ("kokoro") is significantly different from our Western conception of the heart as something purely emotional. Since Kingdom Hearts loves to raise questions about what it means to have/lack hearts, I'm really curious about what might have been lost in the translation of "kokoro" to the English word "heart."
The second is on a similar line: in the Secret Ansem Reports, Ansem makes a distinction between heart ("kokoro") and soul ("tamashii"). What, exactly, is the dividing line between these two concepts in Japan? The difference between the two isn't explained all too much in the game, so I'm wondering if we might be expected to know it already... which seems like something that might get messed up by linguistic differences.
Of course, there is the distinct possibility that Kingdom Hearts' metaphysics might not perfectly correlate to either language - but I still think it would be helpful to get a better feeling for the Japanese concepts, since Nomura himself admits that's what a lot of what he's doing is based on.
First, about "hearts." From what I can find on Google, it seems that the Japanese concept of the heart ("kokoro") is significantly different from our Western conception of the heart as something purely emotional. Since Kingdom Hearts loves to raise questions about what it means to have/lack hearts, I'm really curious about what might have been lost in the translation of "kokoro" to the English word "heart."
The second is on a similar line: in the Secret Ansem Reports, Ansem makes a distinction between heart ("kokoro") and soul ("tamashii"). What, exactly, is the dividing line between these two concepts in Japan? The difference between the two isn't explained all too much in the game, so I'm wondering if we might be expected to know it already... which seems like something that might get messed up by linguistic differences.
Of course, there is the distinct possibility that Kingdom Hearts' metaphysics might not perfectly correlate to either language - but I still think it would be helpful to get a better feeling for the Japanese concepts, since Nomura himself admits that's what a lot of what he's doing is based on.