A highly academic examination of the famous Japanese filmmaker's personal philosophy. I did not finish it. I barely got through the first chapter. The writing is so dense and formal that, as with so many scientific papers, my mind kept wandering and I found myself needing to reread whole paragraphs over and over again. My interest in the subject is simply too casual for this book to be worth the effort required to read it. ( )

I was rather cautious when deciding whether to request this book; while I'm a fan of Miyazaki's work, my previous experience with books published by McFarland has been less than positive. After reading it, neither of those opinions have changed.

Part of the problem is the highly academic style of writing, which I frequently just bounced off. In part, this was due to the fact that I don't have the background to understand what the author is talking about with some philosophical concepts (this is also a major reason I didn't give the book a lower rating); however, the book's description gave the impression that it was more accessible to a general audience.

Even taking the above into account, the scholarship often seems sloppy. Claims are made about Miyazaki's viewpoints without any citations to back them up. The citations that are present (which are frequent, in case my wording gives any other impression) are given in a non-standard method that makes looking up the source difficult. For example, "(Miyazaki, H. 2008a)" might follow a quotation, sending the reader to a list in the back of the book to find the source (especially tricky with Miyazaki himself, as there are about three and a half pages of sources from him). Also, quotes are frequently broken up with paraphrases and digressions, resulting in sentences having patches of one or two words in quotation marks separated by longer stretches of the author's words. At times, this style seems to be used to attribute the author's view to someone else, as when she ends a statement with a particular bit of wording from Blake (specifically, "mind-forg'd manacles"), the citation making it sound like the entire statement was paraphrasing him. (While he might have been in agreement with the argument, the changes that have occurred in the two centuries plus since he wrote the words in question make it unlikely that his concerns were quite the same as either Miyazaki's or the author's.) There are also some bits of either poor wording or poor research that call much of the research into question due to how basic the items in error are. (I definitely recall a statement that seemed to imply both Shinto and Buddhism are native to Japan, although the index makes it impossible for me to find it again. While Shinto is indeed of Japanese origin, Buddhism came from China, possibly via Korea.) ( )

"Hayao Miyazaki's World Picture" is an attempt to broaden the views expressed by Mr. Miyazaki through his films and various interviews and writings over the years. I thoroughly expected to like this book because I love the messages espoused by his films almost as much as the fantastical universes they take place in. Unfortunately, I found the prose very dry and the supporting evidence unconvincing. Cavallaro used other sources even more than Miyazaki himself in explaining his world view. That seemed unnecessary and a bit questionable to me. That being said, I do not read critical essays that often so perhaps I am not the best person to review this book. It is certainly not for the casual fan though. ( )

Caveat: I did not go to school for philosophy, or cinema studies, or whatever else would have made me the ideal audience for this book.

This book is unreadable. I’d be less blunt about it, but I expect that the author would be _pleased_ to know that that someone without an appropriate degree cannot stomach this. It reads like a thesis paper, but along with being dense and narrowly aimed it is pompous and hateful. Not against Miyazaki, of course, but against The Man, or The System, or ignorant rubes who accept the reality fed to them by the fascist capitalist society that we are raised in (or similar jargon). I really want to know more about Miyazaki, but I can’t dig through this terrible term paper far enough to find anything that’s really about him or Studio Ghibli, instead of Jean-Paul Sartre or Johann Wolfgang von Goethe.

Don’t worry, though, you can easily write off my bad review. I admit I didn’t get past the prologue and the first chapter, and anyway I’m probably not qualified to read books that don’t have pictures in them. I'm giving it a 2 because I believe there is an ideal audience out there somewhere. ( )

I received this book as an early reviewer.

Although this book is highly insightful into how human mythologies link to reality in Mayao Miyazaki's works the writing itself leaves something to be desired. Dani Cavallaro has many fascinating theories and observations that layer a depth to Miyazaki's amazing works that may otherwise go unnoticed. The amount of research that went into this book is evident, and it brings to light just how much of a genius Hayao Miyazaki is. Although the ideas are interesting in and of themselves, reading the book takes a bit of energy. The sentences are long and complicated with big words throughout. I feel that the book could have been amazing if it had been written in a more enjoyable format. That said, Dani Cavallaro clearly states complicated thoughts and links things together smoothly.
For die-hard Miyazaki fans like myself, this read adds even more to the already phenomenal movies. It adds depth and levels of human nature that otherwise could be over looked. The reader realizes exactly how much thought and time went into even the smallest actions of Miyazaki's characters. I learned a lot from this book and think that as long as you take your time and don't mind a slightly taxing read it is well worth a look.

The physical book isn't much to look at but is durable has good paper. The font is a little small, and the cover has a slightly strange texture to it, but over all it's fine. ( )