Speed Tribes
{{Infobox book
| name = Speed Tribes: Days and Nights with Japan's Next Generation
| image = Speed Tribes book cover.jpg
| caption =
| author = Karl Taro Greenfeld
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| illustrator =
| cover_artist = Adrian Morgan / Red Letter Design, Dan Winters
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| language =
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| subject = Japan
| genre = Anthology
| publisher = Harper Perennial
| pub_date = 1994
| media_type = Print
| pages = 286
| isbn = 978-0-06-092665-6
| oclc =
| dewey =
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Speed Tribes: Days and Nights with Japan's Next Generation is a 1994 anthology book by Karl Taro Greenfeld. A collection of nonfiction short stories about the decadence and disaffection of urban Japanese Gen X youth during the early 1990s in the last years of the Bubble Economy, Speed Tribes was widely reviewed in international media.
Summary
Each story in Speed Tribes focuses on the life of a specific Japanese youth in the aftermath of the Japanese asset price bubble collapse. Its subjects include a young Yakuza member, a nightclub hostess, an office girl, a motorcycle gangster, a hacker, an ultra-right-wing nationalist, and 'Choco Bon-Bon', a porn star. Popular 1990s rock band Zi:Kill appears in a chapter that documents the writer's time spent with the band and the events that nearly caused their break up.
Greenfeld wrote Speed Tribes while working as a reporter in Tokyo in the late 1980s and early 1990s.{{cite magazine|url=https://www.publishersweekly.com/978-0-06-017039-4|title=Speed Tribes: Days and Nights with Japan's Next Generation|magazine=Publishers Weekly|date=August 29, 1994|access-date=June 28, 2018}} Speed Tribes is written in a literary style, and has been cited as an example of New Journalism.{{cite web|url=http://asiapacificarts.usc.edu/w_apa/showarticle.aspx?articleID=15074|title=From New Journalism in China to Autism: Interview with Karl Taro Greenfeld|last=Wolley|first=Leann|date=April 29, 2010|access-date=June 28, 2018}} In interviews Greenfeld has freely admitted that many of the characters in Speed Tribes are not real individuals, and that the stories in Speed Tribes are a mixture of secondhand stories and original reporting.{{cite web|url=http://jetwit.com/wordpress/2012/08/30/justins-japan-interview-with-speed-tribes-authorjet-alum-karl-taro-greenfeld/|title=Interview with author Karl Taro Greenfeld on ‘Triburbia,’ ‘Speed Tribes’|work=JETwit: The Alumni Magazine for the JET Alumni Community Worldwide|last=Tedaldi|first=Justin|date=August 30, 2012|access-date=June 28, 2018}}{{cite web|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160326091356/https://moorghen.com/stories/2015/2/1/speed-tribes-revisited-an-hour-with-karl-taro-greenfeld|archive-date=March 26, 2016|url=https://moorghen.com/stories/2015/2/1/speed-tribes-revisited-an-hour-with-karl-taro-greenfeld|title=Speed Tribes Revisited – An hour with Karl Taro Greenfeld|last=Moorghen|first=Jean-Marc|work=Moorghen.com (originally published at figure8productions.com)|date=February 1, 2015}}
Reception
Writing for The New York Times, Alan Poul reviewed the book unfavorably, focusing on its "tough guy" language, inconsistent narrative choices, inaccurate descriptions, and an approach to reporting Japanese culture that reduced the stories to "simple, cynical morality plays".{{cite news|title=Tokyo's Generation X: A portrait of the young and the hip in Japan|work=The New York Times|first=Alan|last=Poul|authorlink=Alan Poul|date=October 16, 1994|page=BR36}} Dennis Romero of the Los Angeles Times criticized Speed Tribes for its "bad writing, shaky structure and strange characters," but favorably noted that "Greenfeld turns over the cold, hard stone of Japanese culture and finds life beneath."{{cite news|url=https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1995-01-22-bk-22803-story.html|title=A Study in Hip|work=Los Angeles Times|last=Romero|first=Dennis|date=January 22, 1995|access-date=June 28, 2018}} Kirkus Reviews called Speed Tribes a "tense and spicy read," but concluded that it was "dragged down by heavy-handed writing."{{cite magazine|url=https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/karl-taro-greenfeld/speed-tribes/|magazine=Kirkus Reviews|title=SPEED TRIBES Days and Nights with Japan's Next Generation|date=July 1, 1994|access-date=June 28, 2018}} In Japan Quarterly, Janet Goff noted "the uneven quality of the stories" but observed that the book added an important perspective on modern Japan.{{cite magazine|title=Speed Tribes: Days and Nights with Japan's Next Generation by Karl Taro Greenfeld|magazine=Japan Quarterly|first=Janet|last=Goff|volume=42|issue=3|date=July 1995|page=354}} A review by Margaret Scott in Asian Wall Street Journal questioned Greenfeld's motives in writing the book, calling the author "shrewdly opportunistic" and summarizing the book as "pretentious pessimism".{{cite news|title=Speeding Through Modern Japan|first=Margaret|last=Scott|work=Asian Wall Street Journal|date=November 18, 1994|page=7}}
Kodansha bought the Japanese translation rights to Speed Tribes shortly after publication, but a Japanese translation has never been published.
References
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