On Fri, 4 Dec 1998, Richard Lawson wrote:

I like this part too, the education of royalty thing.  Royalty is weird,

even

good royalty.  They have to do some odd stuff in the course of their

duties,

and it requires a mindset foriegn to most people.  You capture that nicely
in this story.

Thanks again.  Yes, royalty is a strange thing.  And, in a lot of anime,
future societies are controlled by monarchies.  Don't know it that's a
comment about the nature of the human race or if it's the fact that most sf
is thinly-disguised fantasy.  :)

	It's because Nihon still has a titular Emperor, even if he doesn't
*do* anything in the way of governing.  I think the author who calls herself
Ucchan captured the attitude that this creates in Japan in her story "Naga-
NO!", in which even a certain Saotome Ranma has a bit of difficulty saying
no to the Emperor.  (A bit.  Not a lot, but a bit.)

	Also remember that a fair number of the first anime creators -- the
ones who set the trends, like Tezuka and Matsumoto -- were old enough to
remember when Japan (theoretically) had an an activist monarchy.  (Yes, we
know now that the Emperor was basically the puppet of the military
government, but most people in Japan and elsewhere *didn't* at the time.)

Chris Davies.