Words contain power. Power to create, power to destroy, power to redefine reality. The architect protagonist of knows this well Tokyo Sympathy Tower, who with a simple linguistic game transforms a prison into a monument to compassion. In the work of Qudan Rie, winner ofAkutagawa Prize e just released in Italy published by Ippocampo, we are witnessing the birth of a new contemporary Babel: a 71-story prison skyscraper where criminals, renamed “victims of society”, live in luxury.
A novel that caused a sensation not only for its provocative plot, but also because the author He admitted to using AI to write 5% of it. Ironically, in a book that explores how language can be manipulated to redefine reality. I talked about it with the author herself, in an “epistolary” exchange, like in the old days.
A Contemporary Babel
The Tokyo Sympathy Tower is, in the words of the author herself, a “recreated Tower of Babel”. A building that, like its biblical ancestor, has the power to “throw our language into disarray and break the world”. It is no coincidence that this imposing 71-story skyscraper stands right next to the stadium designed by Zaha Hadid (a detail that distinguishes this alternative reality from ours, where the stadium was later redesigned by Kengo Kuma). In the cover image you see an artistic reconstruction generated by AI and based on how I imagine it (experiment within the experiment).
This is a world where the Tokyo Olympics were held regularly in 2020, despite the pandemic. A world where the protagonist architect, Sara Makina, falls madly in love with the beauty of that stadium and decides that her creation (the luxury prison I was telling you about) must live up to it. And so Sympathy Tower, Tokyo is born. A name in katakana that perfectly reflects a certain Japanese tendency to abandon their own language. A theme, you will read, dear to the author.
The Transformation of Language in Tokyo Sympathy Tower
In the world imagined by Qudan Rie, Japanese is gradually disappearing, replaced by loanwords that, in the protagonist’s mind, serve mainly to “avoid a sense of inequality or discriminatory expressions.” Foreign words are perceived as softer, more euphemistic. “When they don’t know what to do, people immediately resort to a foreign word. And it’s funny how often that solves everything,” reflects the protagonist Sara.
It is precisely this manipulation of language that allows for the most radical transformation within the novel: criminals are no longer called such, but miserable man. They are victims of the environment in which they were born and raised, deserving of sympathy and preferential treatment. The prison becomes a place where inmates can wear fashionable clothes, drink coffee, watch DVDs and enjoy a spectacular view of the city. A prison paradise that inevitably arouses protests and threats.
AI in fiction (and reality)
The novel made headlines when Qudan revealed that she had used generative artificial intelligence to write a small part of it. A statement that caused a wave of media attention, as the author herself confided to me:
The change in my thinking about AI didn’t happen after I wrote “Tokyo Sympathy Tower,” but after the use of AI in my novel was widely covered in the media. I was overwhelmed by the scale of human reaction to the fact that a novel was written with the help of AI.
In the novel, the interaction with AI occurs through the character of Sara, who asks questions to the computer. These are the scenes in which the author has really used artificial intelligence. Qudan later explained in the magazine Bungei Shunju that the idea of the novel, the prose, the dialogues and the characterization of the characters are all original. AI was used only where necessary.
A complicated relationship with technology
The protagonist's opinion on artificial intelligence is sharp: "I hate this kind of mansplaining, when it starts explaining things I didn't even ask for... No matter how much learning ability it has, it doesn't have the strength to face its own weaknesses. It is so used to getting by by stealing words, that it doesn't doubt or feel ashamed of its own ignorance". An interesting position (and all in all it is understandable)
But what is Qudan Rie's real opinion on artificial intelligence? I asked her if her approach has changed after writing the novel:
Actually, I'm not particularly interested in AI itself. I'm much more interested in the people who use it. I'm curious about how AI will change human life and to what extent humans will be able to control it. Since AI is a technology based on human data, it is clear that humans are already present within AI. And just as there is a human presence within AI, I myself have the feeling that AI is already within humans, or at least that we share some of our thinking with it.
This reflection reveals a deep awareness of the mutual influence between humans and artificial intelligence. It is true, I think so too: it is not just a tool that we use, but something that is already changing us from within.
Qudan Rie between hope and fear
I was particularly struck by the balance with which Qudan looks at the future of technology:
I feel both a sense of danger and of expectation towards this situation. The sense of danger concerns the risk that, by automatically accepting the suggestions of the AI, the human being will stop thinking autonomously. Or that we will end up delegating the criteria of what is right to the AI. On the other hand, if we could use AI intelligently, without giving up our own thinking, it could become a tool to strengthen our way of thinking or to understand the human being more deeply.
And what if I asked you which parts of your literary style you would completely entrust to artificial intelligence?
If it is a job that can be completed simply by imitating a style from the past, then I would like to entrust it entirely to artificial intelligence. For example, for texts to be used in administrative email communications, a clone of me would be more than sufficient. I would like to entrust those tasks to the clone and dedicate the time saved to more creative work.
In short, is Tokyo Sympathy Tower a utopia or a dystopia?
“Tokyo Sympathy Tower” ends in 2030, with the imposing 71-story structure finally completed. From the top floor, there is a spectacular view, one can observe the lives of all the people down there. The prisoners, or rather, the victims of society, live in an apparent utopia of equality and freedom.
But is it really a utopia? Or is it rather a disguised dystopia, like those described in “1984” by George Orwell or in the works of Tawada Yoko (The Emissary e Scattered All Over the Earth)?
I like to think that Qudan Rie is showing us how thin the line is between these two concepts. How language can be manipulated to redefine reality. How words can build contemporary towers of Babel, destined (perhaps) to collapse under the weight of their own contradictions.
In an age when artificial intelligence is rewriting the rules of creativity and communication, “Tokyo Sympathy Tower” is a small, beautiful monument to the complexity of our relationship with technology and language.
A novel that, paradoxically, has been able to use AI to warn us against the dangers of relying too much on it. A work that, like the tower it describes, invites us to look at the world from above, to see the contradictions and beauties of our society, and perhaps to ask ourselves: are we building a utopia or a dystopia?
You can't, you absolutely must not miss it. I recommend it 100%!
