Ep.11 Honey & Clover
Written by Cordelia Shan, edited by Grace
In this episode, we are going to talk about a manga called ハチミツとクローバー (Honey and Clover) and its movie adaptation.
Listen to full episode :
The Story
Honey and Clover tells a story about a group of students at an Art University. In 2000, the artist Chika Umino first published the manga in magazine “CUTiE,” and then ended it in 2006 in the magazine “Chorus.”
The manga is short, in total it is only ten volumes. But these ten volumes saved me from burnout and hopelessness.
In 2008, about four months towards the University Entrance Exam, on an afternoon, I told a classmate about an upcoming movie called Honey and Clover, featuring one of my favourite actors, Sho Sakurai. This classmate told me that this movie was based on the manga of the same name, and offered to bring me to the bookstore to find and read it with her.
After reading the first chapter of the manga series that afternoon in the packed, tiny bookshop at the corner of the school, I bought the whole set with all my pocket money.
In the first reading, I was 17 years old, and was wrapped up in the complex relationships that made my brain spin, and I just gave up on it without even figuring it out. I also did not understand the title of the work. Back then, all my attention was attacked by Yuta Takemoto, one of the main characters in the manga.
Who is Yuta Takemoto?
In the story, Yuta majors in architecture, and he is good at model building. Yuta is ordinary, plain, and even a bit too normal, surrounded by talented classmates and seniors every day.
Yuta is the one a lot of people come to bring projections to. In school, he is not the most outstanding in terms of grades, talent, and appearance. When he was about to graduate, the confusion and fear in his heart swelled day by day. He didn't want to compromise with these emotions, so after smashing his graduation project "Tower of Youth", he embarked on a journey to find himself.
As many people will do during their Saturn return, Yuto tries to get to himself and the bare bones of who he is. What he stands for, why he is here on the earth, and where he draws the line.
He cycled all the way from Tokyo to northern Japan, sleeping under bridges, staying in temples, begging for water, and so on. Being well protected and sheltered on campus, Yuto experienced the hard work of self-reliance for the first time like this, but also understood the beauty of ordinary life through these experiences. Yuta rides his bike, and the journey he goes on is the one he takes to find himself. He wants to know his heart at such a young age. His journey woke me up to hold on to hope for the future.
After returning to campus, and although he still doesn't have a clear plan for the future, he finally understands that "an ordinary life is also respectable and lovely", so he does not tremble in front of the word "graduation". Accepting one's own mediocrity is one of the "required lessons in life" that many people experience during their studies.
We only get there by living – by screaming, laughing, crying, shaking, and letting go, one step at a time.
In the story we see people get there by loving someone so much that it makes them inexplicably cruel, through hurting a friend and only understandingthe pain they caused when the same is done to them.
We also see people get there through their outstanding talents, but lose real-life experience and only know the theory when they have to start working with others.
We also see people get there by working hard, but losing their boundaries and interests and only knowing true loneliness late at night and during cold winters.
They come home to themselves when they have a thing or two in their past to talk about, and when they clearly see the parts of themselves that they need to keep or discard.
They see the many paths they could have taken, the things they could have seen. The person they could have loved, the love they could have had, the life they could have lived.
Then, the story tells us that if we ever reach those moments, we close our eyes, feel relief, and become grateful that we ended up the way we are
Someone told me once that manga meant nothing to them, and that manga is for kids. Oh well, I remembered I just rolled my eyes at that statement, because they missed out on the best teacher, mentor, and lessons they could ever have.
The Movie
At the very beginning of the movie, there is a poem by Emily Dickinson, called To Make a Prairie (1755), and it says:
To make a prairie it takes a clover and one bee,
One clover, and a bee.
And revery.
The revery alone will do,
If bees are few.
The story of the movie focuses on Yuta. It starts with an encounter, moves on to a parting, and ends with a reunion.
In the movie, at 3’19’’, the first time Yuta meets Hagumi, Takumi observes and says, “I saw the moment of someone falling in love.” But as an audience member, it was the first time I heard the sound of falling in love. The quick, short, sharp, bump of the electronic tone, along with the sakura floating in the picture, was produced by Yoko Kanno, whose soundtrack is one of the best parts of the movie.
I would say that I prefer the manga more. But it is still so worth it to watch the motion picture. I like the depiction of the art school, the bike journey, the colours they use, Hagu’s clothes, Yoko Kanno’s music, Sho Sakurai as Yuta, Yu Aoi as Hagu, and Arashi’s music.
Ending
A week ago, I rode my bike from home to work, then to school, and then home. The cold breeze cut my face, but all I was thinking about was Yuta, his bike, and his journey. All of sudden I realized that I missed him.
Yuta could be everyone, even ourselves, for example, it could even be me. I am currently studying part-time at an art university, and I am also way older than others in my class. Maybe I am not Yuta, but by observing others, I am amazed by my classmates’ youth, passion, and talents. This made me want to re-read Honey and Clover, and talk about this series in this podcast.
From 2008 to 2023, 15 years have passed, but the heart still goes towards a clear future, and is still full of wonder, hopes, excitement, loss, and seeing the light. is not only preserved in diaries or photo albums, but also in each others’ memories.
To share a quote from Honey and Clover: “In another ten years, we will reach the age of our instructors. What kind of adult will we become when we are in our 30s? Even if we think that far, today is for tomorrow, and tomorrow is for the next day. Time will keep going. One day, we too will be adults, as if we never were juvenile before in others’ eyes.”
Reference
Manga on Amazon Canada page: link
