‘Can You Hear Me?’: A Story About Loneliness and Appreciation
Kimi ni shika kikoenai (Can You Hear Me?), literally ‘Nobody Can Hear Me But You’, is a manga written by Otsuichi, real name Hirotaka Adachi, (21.10.1978–) and illustrated by Hiro Kiyohara (24.10.1981–). It was first published in 2007 in Japan as a new edition and was originally part of a three stories collection with the title Calling You released in 2001 by Otsuichi. All the stories deal with a supernatural topic. Otsuichi is mostly known for his gothic and horror stories, e.g. Gosu: risutokatto jiken (Goth: Love of Death) or Zuu (Zoo), both adapted into films (and so is Can You Hear Me?). He made his debut during high school with a novel Summer, Fireworks and My Corpse, but only won a price for Goth, getting the Honkaku Mystery Award in 2003. Hiro Kiyohara is a mangaka known for stories made in collaboration with different authors. Some may know him for The Huntress, or his Another series or the single volume Tsumitsuki. He also has a penchant for horror stories where he shows his characters as vulnerable, beautiful, and mystical. I did not know neither of the authors when I stumbled upon a manga they worked on together and I really liked it a lot – ‘Can You Hear Me?’ It is an original but dense plot with distrubingly real illustrations, dealing with two school students and a mysterious phone.
What I like about this manga is how it unwraps a story about loneliness. Ryō is a girl who barely speaks at school. She is shy and does not really have friends. As she does not dare to speak, she keeps her problems to herself. When her voice fails over time, Ryō finds it difficult to identify herself. Lies are spread about her at school, for example when she fails at reading aloud in the classroom, and is therefore bullied by others. She even begins to hate her voice herself, which is why she does not have a mobile phone like all of her classmates. To compensate for her loneliness, she starts to fantasise about owning an imaginary mobile phone, building an own net of communication in her head as a part of a parallel universe. Living inside her thoughts, desperate for real connection, she suddenly bumps into a voice other than hers. For a moment Ryō thinks that she is crazy, but the boy called Shin’ya really exists and is communicating with her trough a broken phone with which he hoped to reach someone. He also feels lonely and misunderstood, which is how they connected through telepathy. Only they can hear each other’s voices in their heads trough an imaginary phone ringing. Since both seem to carry a secret and feel like outcasts in everyday life, imagination enables them to have a unique relationship and many personal conversations. They go through everyday obstacles at school together. A turning point in the storyline is that the mobile number they are using is imaginary, which means that Ryō and Shin’ya do not even need to exist in the same year or city to be able to connect. In fact, Ryō lives an hour ahead of Shin’ya in Yokohama, whereas he lives in Hokkaido. One day Ryō connects with a mysterious woman called Harada, who seems to live far away and becomes her confidant. She encourages Ryō to meet Shin’ya in real life, but then everything starts to change. Why does Ryō all of a sudden want to turn back time? Who is this mysterious woman? Will Ryō ever meet Shin’ya?
As a reader, you could think that all characters are hallucinating. One can even read it as a ghost story, more of a mystery, slightly gothic fantasy. Almost the whole narrative of the manga happens in the heads of the protagonists, which gives it a supernatural touch. Nevertheless, this fictional story shows beautifully how people feeling lonely withdraw from the social reality, especially those of a young age and not popular at school. In Japan, mobbing is often thematised in the arts such as manga or anime and can be a serious topic for a school student. This manga shows a natural vulnerability of characters who cannot speak for different reasons. A quiet world such as theirs opens doors to a new world of mankind, which makes the reader enjoy even more its unspoken moments. As it is a story with a mystical touch, it makes us question if some people may have a sixth sense, a kind of telepathy that can arise from introversion.
Although Otsuichi came up with this plot himself, he says that the concept of a girl and a boy needing telepathic contact because of their loneliness is his most embarassing one. The idea for this narrative occured to him during the third year at university when he decided not to celebrate Christmas with someone but stay at home with an instant noodle soup devising a plot. Maybe he felt a bit lonely those days, too. In fact, he was inspired by Jack Finney’s novel The Love Letter. In my case, I enjoyed his manga very much, and I could empathise with the social exclusion theme even at my age. I am not sure how much success this work had, but I would not underestimate its message and outline, as it is truly touching. I would suggest you to read it when you have about 2 hours just for yourself, with some soft melancholic instrumental music in the background. To get in the mood I would recommend, e.g., Yume (Dream) by the Smyang Piano, tamagopalette, which I have listened to in repeat while reading the manga. 😊 Enjoy!
Written by VZ