David Burleigh - The Japan Times

CULTURE / Books

Jan 13, 2008

THE THIRD PARTY by Glenn Patterson, Blackstaff Press, Belfast, 2007, 169 pp., £7.99 (paper) An unnamed businessman and a well-known novelist, both from Belfast, meet while checking into a hotel in Hiroshima. The recognition of a shared home, so far away, is awkward and unwilling, but over the coming days they cannot avoid each other. As the novel opens, the businessman, rising from a fitful sleep, sees an eagle in flight from his lofty bedroom window. It might be a portent of something.

CULTURE / Books

Dec 30, 2007

Need something to read in the new year?

OUR SHARED JAPAN: An Anthology of Contemporary Irish Poetry, edited by Irene De Angelis & Joseph Woods (Dedalus Press)

LIFE / Language

Dec 25, 2007

'A Happy Winter Holiday' to you one and all

In many places, celebrations will be getting into full swing. But if you're in Japan, by the time you read this, Christmas (kurisumasu) will have already been forgotten. Like everywhere else, in the runup before, there have been carols sung and trees and lights and images of Santa hung up, especially in shops. All of this will have strangely disappeared by Christmas morning.

CULTURE / Books

Dec 16, 2007

When traditions attract: finding Japan in Ireland

OUR SHARED JAPAN: An Anthology of Contemporary Irish Poetry, edited by Irene De Angelis and Joseph Woods. Dublin: Dedalus Press, 2007, 232 pp., 20 euro (paper)

CULTURE / Books

Oct 28, 2007

A friendship's influence across Asia

Another Asia: Rabindranath Tagore and Okakura Tenshin, by Rustom Bharucha, New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2006, 236 pp., $35 (cloth) This book examines the friendship engendered between two significant thinkers — one Indian and the other Japanese — who were highly representative of their time when they met in Calcutta in 1902. The great Bengali poet, Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941), was then approaching the peak of his reputation and would go on to win the Nobel Prize in literature in 1913, the first author laureate from the continent of Asia. That same year, the influential art historian and curator, Okakura Tenshin (1862-1913), would reach the end of his shorter life, though his writings would outlive him.

LIFE / Language

Oct 2, 2007

Giving Japanese names as tricky as picking buns

When you see an obvious mistake, should you point it out or just keep silent? It was coming up to Christmas, and I was in the bakery beside the station getting a sandwich for my lunch, when I noticed something new on the shelves: hot cross buns.

CULTURE / Books

Jul 29, 2007

Details from the British Museum

Japanese Art in Detail, by John Reeve. British Museum Press, 2005, 144 pp., £14.99 (cloth) FLOATING WORLD: JAPAN IN THE EDO PERIOD, by John Reeve. British Museum Press, 2006, 96 pp., £9.99 (cloth)

CULTURE / Books

Feb 4, 2007

Drawing on some humorous animal characteristics

A JAPANESE MENAGERIE: Animal Pictures by Kawanabe Kyosai, by Rosina Buckland, Timothy Clark and Shigeru Oikawa. London: The British Museum Press, 2006, 112 pp., £16.99 (cloth) The Meiji Era artist Kawanabe Kyosai (1831-89) is said to have had his first memorable encounter with an animal as a little boy. One day, walking along the road, he came upon a frog, which a servant picked up and gave to him.

CULTURE / Books

Jan 7, 2007

Searching for the perfect personal haiku pen-name

The Haiku Apprentice: Memoirs of Writing Poetry in Japan, by Abigail Friedman. Berkeley: Stone Bridge Press, 2006, 235 pp., $14,95 (paper) The story in this book begins with a chance encounter. As the author later explains, she was living with her family in Japan, and serving as a diplomat (for the United States). One day, at a gathering she attended in Tokyo, a man gives her a name-card on which he identifies himself as a haiku poet. This sparks a conversation, which leads to a connection.

CULTURE / Books

Nov 5, 2006

The Emerald Isle in a very different light

ON TWO SHORES: NEW AND SELECTED POEMS, by Mutsuo Takahashi, translated by Mitsuko Ohno & Frank Sewell. Dedalus Press, Dublin, Ireland, 2006, 126 pp., 12 euro (paper). We are only too familiar with those books in which a foreign visitor, usually from a Western country, gives their impressions of Japan. In this slim volume, by contrast, a Japanese poet evokes his response to a Western country: Ireland.

CULTURE / Books

Aug 6, 2006

A blue mood for poetry

POEMS OF DAYS PAST / ARISHI HI NO UTA, by Nakahara Chuya, translations by Ry Beville. The American Book Company, 2005, 81 pp., $19.99 (paper). RIGHT EYE IN TWILIGHT / MIGI-ME NO BYAKUYA, by Ban'ya Natsuishi, translations by Ban'ya Natsuishi & Jack Galmitz. Wasteland Press, 2006, 58 pp., $12 (paper). Both poets in these books are known by their given name and both have been translated into English (and other languages) before, although the contents given here are new. Both books are bilingual and have blue covers that seem to contemplate the reader: One carries a picture of the poet and the other, a colored drawing of a single eye. The mood in each case is somewhat blue as well.

CULTURE / Books

Jul 2, 2006

Journeys across turbulent waters

MAD ABOUT THE MEKONG: Exploration and Empire in South-East Asia, by John Keay. HarperPerennial, 2006, 294 pp., £8.99 (paper). The long-lasting conflict in Vietnam made the name of the Mekong familiar to people in other countries, but to those who live along its banks and tributaries it is known simply as "the river." While it is certainly one of the world's great waterways, readers will be surprised to learn from John Keay that it has only recently been traced to its original source in the mountains of Tibet. Most of Keay's book, however, describes its early exploration.

CULTURE / Books

May 7, 2006

Following the great haiku poet on the road

BASHO'S JOURNEY: The Literary Prose of Matsuo Basho, translated with an introduction by David Landis Barnhill. State University of New York Press, 2005, 191 pp., $19.95 (paper). The great haiku poet Matsuo Basho (1644-1694) was first represented to the West just over a century ago. This was in W.G. Aston's "A History of Japanese Literature" (1899), a pioneering study. Unfortunately the author, a British scholar from the north of Ireland, got the poet's name wrong, and was somewhat baffled by his work. Since then, however, there have been numerous studies and selections to explain it better and more fully. So what makes it necessary to have another one?

LIFE / Language

Mar 7, 2006

Shades of green in search for homecoming gift

"There is a green hill far away, without a city wall," goes the Easter hymn, originally composed for children. The Easter holiday, which one is hardly aware of in Japan, figured in one of my trips back to the green hills of Ireland's north where, a long time ago, this hymn was written.

CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF

Feb 5, 2006

Painting a fascinating picture of the 'noble savage' debate

OMAI: The Prince Who Never Was, by Richard Connaughton, Timewell Press, 2005, 270 pp., £16.99 (cloth). It may not be true that, as the adage has it, every picture tells a story, but if pictures have any tales to tell, then Joshua Reynolds' portrait of Omai has a richer and stranger one than most.

LIFE / Language

Jan 31, 2006

Three is the magic number for haiku and Japan

"The easiest to hurt are these three: The eye, the elbow and the knee."

CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF

Jan 1, 2006

A poetic Irish conversation

SIXTY INSTANT MESSAGES TO TOM MOORE by Paul Muldoon, Illinois: Modern Haiku Press, 2005, 32 pp., 20 dollars (paper). HARBOUR LIGHTS by Derek Mahon, Ireland: Gallery Press, 2005, 78 pp., 11.50 dollars (paper). Unlike the visual arts, which were transmitted to the West quite quickly, the literary arts of Japan took much longer to get through. It has not been much more than a century since the first translations began to be made, and understanding has come slowly. This is especially true of poetry, where the distinction between different forms was not at first perceived.

CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF

Dec 4, 2005

Complexity drawn from emptiness

THE ANCIENT CAPITAL OF IMAGES by John Mateer. Fremantle, Australia: Fremantle Arts Centre Press, 2005, 61 pp., A$22.95 (paper). The poet John Mateer has published previously in South Africa, where he comes from, Australia, where he now lives, and Indonesia, which he has traveled in. A group of his poems about Japan appeared here last year in a small bilingual edition following a visit to this country, and has been incorporated into his new collection. Mateer's style is plain, but the references and content are often quite abstruse.

CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF

Sep 25, 2005

Women of poetic substance

PATHWAYS, by Edith Shiffert, New York: White Pine Press, 2005, 115 pp., $14 (paper). A WOMAN'S LIFE, by Harue Aoki, Tokyo: Shichigatsudo, 2004, 120 pp., 1,200 yen (paper).

CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF

Jul 24, 2005

Weaving together tales of exotic trade

THE SILK ROAD: Two Thousand Years in the Heart of Asia, by Frances Wood. University of California Press, 2004, 270 pp., $19.95 (paper). "The Silk Road, or Roads," begins Frances Wood in this fascinating book, have only been known this way since the late 19th century, when a German explorer came up with the romantic name. She offers a couple of necessary qualifications to the standard image of a route for caravans bearing precious silk from Asia into Europe. One is that the "road" was in fact a network of different routes, linking oases to the north and south of the central desert region, and branching off at either end.

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