Japan has been a magnet for foreign writers and journalists since opening to the West.
One of the first was a Harpers Magazine reporter named Lafcadio Hearn. He arrived on Japan's shores in 1890 and devoted his life to describing the strange and exotic land for English readers abroad.
Over the 115 years since, there has been no shortage of foreign writers trying to do the same. But unfortunately for today's would-be Hearns, the Japan correspondent's role is not what it used to be. Nor is Japan quite as new or as strange (to the West) as it was.