Eating amid Affluence

This chapter investigates the tensions between the pleasures and discomforts of indulgence in the 1960s and 1970s, an era of growing affluence and consumption, through the work of writer Kaikō Takeshi (1930–1989), who frequently waxed rhapsodically and nostalgically about his favorite foods in essays and novels. In his satiric 1972 serial A New Star, a middle-aged bureaucrat is ordered to literally eat his ministry’s budget surplus through lavish meals and regional excursions to consume local delicacies. The chapter observes that, while the novel can be read as a critique of consumption and government waste, there is also a nostalgic tone to Kaikō’s final inventory of dishes that suggests both the pleasure and pain of overconsumption and thus reflects the complex relationship between duty and desire.