Sense of beauty differs by person, of course — there's no absolute axis.
Here I don't mean only design or color sense tied to art. Simply: what do you find beautiful or cool? A humble example: lately, reading historical fiction, I thought "what a beautiful way to live" and felt moved. That kind of thing.
The writing I put out can also be said to come from my sense of beauty. (Obviously. Whether the writing itself is beautiful is another matter — that's personal.)
Personally I think a sense of beauty is largely set by around age twenty. After that it basically doesn't change. Trends inside you come and go, but the elements you found cool by then stay common afterward.
When I meet something that hits "this is it" — when my sense of beauty is at full throttle — another word for the feeling is "shivering" (shibireru). A bit feverish as a phrase, but when I read a gripping story or find hot words, inside I go: "oh, this makes me shiver..."
(By the way, I started using "shiver" after sharing a passionate online article with a friend as a student, and they replied "this makes you shiver" — I liked the expression and have used it since.)
I have many films, books, articles, and people that make me shiver; I revisit and refer to them often. A bit old-fashioned, but some I excerpt and file. On this blog, when I feel like it, I might make a "things that make me shiver" page and publish it.
One person who makes me shiver is Toru Kenjo, president of Gentosha. Needless to say, a lion of publishing, a legendary editor, and a first-class player.
Look up his glory in publishing yourself — I love his character and thinking. Straight, overflowing with love.
For example, stories from when he was an editor of his loving approaches to writers move me deeply. To work with one author he memorized their books and suddenly recited them aloud; with another he wrote reactions to every magazine piece and essay they published and sent them within five days.
Those approaches surely had a sales side, but I think they came from love welling up from the bottom of his heart. He approaches with real words grounded in his absolute sense of beauty. I recently wrote that I don't like the phrase "gritty" — Motoya probably doesn't think of those approaches as "I did the gritty thing." Even if roundabout, I imagine he does them because for him they're the most correct way to earn a writer's trust.
He also says that when he meets people, he can't rest unless they think "Motoya-san is an interesting person" — which is very funny. He probably says it with a straight face. It may sound presumptuous, but that attitude shows his "cuteness." I like that stance and try to work that way. You should treat people you deal with with love.
Besides that loving communication, another thing I like about him is his narcissism.
He's very sensitive; from childhood he had complexes about appearance and circumstances. He wrestled with identity, self-negation, and self-loathing, and overcame weakness that way. That's why, I think, he can take those loving approaches.
In his books, while still wrestling with that conflict, when he looks back on life, delicate emotion spills across the pages. And to put it unkindly: writing close to self-intoxication shows up often. Narcissism enough to make you a little embarrassed reading it.
And I love that part to death.
Don't misunderstand — I'm not hunting narcissistic writing for fun. The exquisite narcissism born from Motoya's conflict of complex and self-loathing makes me "shiver."
Needless to say, it's a world apart from Showa-dad war stories or bubble-era praise.
Turning it around: he probably has many enemies. Some dislike that narcissism; in business, Gentosha's delisting (MBO) drew heavy market backlash, and the NewsPicks fuss is still recent.
To top it off, some time ago a tweet drew criticism as unfit for a publishing-house president. He left Twitter over it. He must have felt many things; I don't simply affirm him — but I thought he quit because he didn't want to live with self-contradiction. A decision after self-loathing. He could have dug in, but his sense of beauty wouldn't allow it. Criticism exists, but I thought his final choice was right — and beautiful.
Everyone has a sense of beauty, and meeting what fits it is happiness. When I encounter something or someone that makes me shiver and let my thoughts wander, I feel something like flow.
That's it. This blog often dumps my thinking, but writing about what I love flowed easily and was fun. First time in a while I've written this long.
I'd wanted to write on beauty / shivering for a while but didn't know how to unfold it, so it slept. Linking it boldly to Motoya, whom I love, somehow (to me) worked. I considered titling it Toru Kenjo, but the theme was originally sense of beauty, so I left it.
I started this on my phone in a café when the idea hit, hunched over, writing in a rush. My shoulders got stiff.
Finally: if Motoya interests you, I strongly recommend Reading as Wilderness and The Passion of One Alone.
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