Full Metal Panic’s Shoji Gatoh is Unnerved Being the Rare Light Novelist With Short Titles
Since about the mid-2000s, the length of Japanese light novel titles (referring to the actual name of the work) has slowly become longer and longer. Back then, there used to be titles like Slayers, Record of the Lodoss War, or Maria Watches Over Us. Today, there’s a deluge of longer titles like That Time I Got Reincarnated as a Slime, Campfire Cooking in Another World with My Absurd Skill, or The World’s Finest Assassin Gets Reincarnated in Another World as an Aristocrat. Long-time author of the Full Metal Panic! series Shoji Gatoh commented on how short the title of his series was compared to others.
©賀東招二 Gatoh’s favorite mecha anime Armored Trooper VOTOMS © Sunrise
Gatoh mused about the length of light novel titles on his X (formerly Twitter) account on January 15, noting that he’s “unnerved” about the shortness of his novel’s titles in comparison to other novels released on January 19. Gatoh included an image in the tweet to illuminate his point.
今月のファンタアジア新刊だけど。俺のだけタイトル短かい……。なんか落ち着かない。 pic.twitter.com/8iYv6G5Oyj
— 賀東招二 (@gatosyoji) January 15, 2024
This month’s new releases from Fantasia. Mine is the only one with a short title… I feel unnerved.
In a follow-up tweet, Gatoh noted the issue of light novel title length began about 15 years prior. He also states that hit manga generally tend to use shorter titles, but “it’s not a question of which is better of worse.” So, he understands the usefulness of longer titles.
タイトルの長さ問題、15年前くらいにはもう業界的にけっこう長くなってて、「新聞のTV欄みたいなもんだろ」とどこかでコメントした覚えがある。
メジャー漫画誌のヒット作のタイトルは今でもシンプルなのは、なんか考えさせられるな。いや、どちらがいい悪いではなく。土俵の違いというか。— 賀東招二 (@gatosyoji) January 15, 2024
Regarding the issue of title length, titles had already become quite long in the industry about 15 years ago, and I remember commenting somewhere it was “kind of like the TV listings in the newspaper.”
The fact the titles of hit works in major manga magazines are still simple makes me think. No, it’s not a question of which is better or worse. It’s more like a difference in the arena.
Of course, one thing Gatoh didn’t address is the difference in title length between the Japanese domestic and international market and the fact there are still light novel series with short titles. Addressing the latter first, Goblin Slayer! or The Rising of the Shield Hero are examples of modern light novels with relatively short titles, not just in English, but also in Japanese.
It’s the difference between the Japanese and English titles, though, where things become interesting. One commonality is the English titles tend to be longer than their Japanese counterparts because more information is included in a shorter character count. For instance, Arifureta – From Commonplace to Worlds Strongest is a mouthful in English. However, its Japanese title when read in Japanese, Arifureta Shokugyō de Sekai Saikyō (ありふれた職業で世界最強) isn’t as long as one would think. Even the above mentioned series That Time I Got Reincarnated as a Slime isn’t all that long in Japanese, being a paltry Tensei Shitara Suraimu Datta Ken (転生したらスライムだった件).
Nonetheless, there are still obscenely long titles in Japanese, such as Danshi Kousei de Urekko Light Novel Sakka wo Shiteiru keredo, Toshishita no Classmate de Seiyu no Onna no Ko ni Kubi wo Shimerareteiru (男子校生で売れっ子ライトノベル作家をしているけれど、年下のクラスメイトで声優の女の子に首を絞められている。(I’m a high school boy and popular light novel author, but I’m being strangled by my younger female classmate who is a voice actor.) Even the titles Gotoh included in his initial tweets image are longer than the average modern light novel title.
Sources: Shoji Gatoh‘s X/Twitter account (link 2, (link 3) via Otakomu