“but what’s haikyuu about?” “it’s about volleyball” “volleyball???” i’ve been talking about haikyuu to literally anyone around me for the past months and i find it so funny when i tell people it’s a story about volleyball and they just don’t get it. it’s not even a matter of liking anime/manga or not, it’s how no one understands how a story about volleyball can be so good and so interesting to the point i make it seem to be. it’s hard to explain to someone who doesn’t know it, but i just want to say that furudate is such, such a good writer. reading their interviews and the way they repeat so many times that they just wanted to write a story about volleyball, because they loved playing volleyball and they just really want other kids to enjoy volleyball too is just fascinating to me. furudate doesn’t pretend to pick volleyball as a pretext to talk about other themes, they’re just genuinely interested in talking about volleyball and all the other themes we see in haikyuu are simply intrinsically related to playing volleyball as a teenager. i’m just absolutely fascinated with the way furudate draws so much meaning from it, to the point that even someone who never played volleyball before can feel so touched and inspired by their story and their characters, while it’s still about volleyball. their passion for this sport slowly grows on you as you get attached to the characters, as you watch them talk about their love for volleyball and see them working so hard for it, as you watch a match and catch yourself rooting so much for them and celebrating each point they score, and as you see them lose and you suddenly feel like you’re standing on the court with them, staring at the floor while trying to recover your breath after that long rally, taking that moment to realize that it’s really over. you want to be a part of that too. you want to feel that too. but you don’t play volleyball, and maybe haikyuu even makes you want to learn how to play it, but it also makes you look for where can you find that much meaning and passion in your life and the things you do. you see those kids covered in sweat, barely standing up after the match ends, and they look at each other with that expression of wonder in their eyes and say “volleyball is fun”. and damn you want to feel that too. and you also agree: volleyball is fun. you see so many different characters (who are so well written too) and the many different reasons why they love and play volleyball, the many reasons why they struggle with it, and some of them will hit you so deeply that’ll make you think “is this still about volleyball?”. but it is. and at the same time it’s about everything else. this is what i really admire on furudate-sensei and this is what’s so inspirational about their work. i want to find my passion and work hard for it too. and more than that: i want to find a way to talk about my passion that inspire others to find the passion in their lives too.
