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May 04, 2024
 

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Damian Flanagan
For Damian Flanagan's latest contributions to The Japan Times, see below:
Japan Times
CULTURE / Books / ESSENTIAL READING FOR JAPANOPHILES
May 19, 2018
Yasunari Kawabata's 'Dandelions' probes the nature of mental illness
Initially published by Yasunari Kawabata (1899-1972) in 22 installments between June 1964 and October 1968, and subsequently revised from his notes after his death, 'Dandelions' examines the nature of memory.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Books / ESSENTIAL READING FOR JAPANOPHILES
May 12, 2018
Kenzaburo Oe's 'Seventeen and J: Two Novels': 1960s Japan on the brink of social revolution
On the cusp of the 1960s sexual revolution and the anti-Vietnam War movement, 'Seventeen' and 'J' are intriguing primers on the seething social turbulence of the age.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Books / ESSENTIAL READING FOR JAPANOPHILES
Apr 7, 2018
Lose yourself in 'The Face of Another,' Abe's existentialist fantasy
Losing face and the public humiliation associated with it is something that we all dread but, in Kobo Abe's 1964 fantasy 'The Face of Another,' the metaphorical term is made real.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Books
Mar 24, 2018
Haruki Murakami: Literary lightweight or global superstar?
You know you've made it as an author when there are week-long conferences dedicated to your work that attract scholars, critics and translators from all over the world and which you, the author, do not feel the need to attend.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Books / ESSENTIAL READING FOR JAPANOPHILES
Mar 24, 2018
'Quicksand': A racy transition from old Tanizaki to new
A young lady from Osaka begins to attend an art class and, while painting a picture of the Kannon (the goddess of mercy), substitutes the head for that of a beguiling student. Soon, she is drawn into a complex web of lesbian passion, pitted against the social norms of marriage in a deadly game that will engulf both the women and their male partners.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Books
Mar 17, 2018
The Irish influence on Soseki, a pioneer of Japanese literature
St. Patrick's Day is the time of year when many raise a glass in their local "authentic Irish" pub to Ireland's literary greats, from master satirist Jonathan Swift (1667-1745) to poet Seamus Heaney (1939-2013). In Japan too, the dynamic interaction of Ireland and Japan's literary traditions is a rich one; from William Butler Yeats adapting Noh plays to novelist Yasunari Kawabata and his modernist contemporaries being inspired by James Joyce's "Ulysses."
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Voices / FOREIGN AGENDA
Mar 14, 2018
The Japanese lessons of a 'plastic Paddy'
A Briton of Irish stock finds the 'Irishness' he seeks not on the Emerald Isle itself but in the expat pubs of his adopted land.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Books
Mar 3, 2018
Sowing the seeds of a great Tanizaki biography
Into the world of the familial memoir steps this slim, but fascinating volume titled, 'Remembering Tanizaki Junichiro and Matsuko: Diary Entries, Interview Notes, and Letters, 1954-1989.'
Japan Times
CULTURE / Books
Feb 3, 2018
Exploring the leaps and bounds of Japanese feminism
'Rethinking Japanese Feminisms' is a collection of short essays by 15 academics on diverse aspects of gender issues in Japan. Topics range from the androgynous eroticism in the art works of Taisho Era (1912-1926) illustrator Kasho Takabatake to reactions to the enactment of the 1999 Basic Law for a Gender-Equal Society.
Japan Times
CULTURE / TV & Streaming
Jan 31, 2018
1970s Japanese TV series 'Monkey' had a magic that has never been matched
The news that 'Monkey' has been remade by Australia's ABC in a co-production with TV New Zealand and Netflix is likely to cause those in the know to fan two fingers in front of their mouth, Monkey-style, to summon a flying cloud.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Books / How the visual arts shaped Japan's modern literature
Jan 6, 2018
Yukio Mishima: Saints and seppuku
In March 1937, an official in the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry, Azusa Hiraoka, traveled to Europe on government business and acquired some guides to Italian museums.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Books / ESSENTIAL READING FOR JAPANOPHILES
Dec 9, 2017
'Secret Rendezvous' reveals primeval urge for knowledge and sexual satisfaction
"Secret Rendezvous" opens with an ambulance in the dead of night: The narrator's wife is taken to an underground hospital from which she vanishes. The connections to Franz Kafka's "The Trial" in the absurdist, comical and sinister world of Kobo Abe are unmissable, but Abe characteristically takes his narrative in directions that establish this milieu as uniquely his own.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Books
Dec 2, 2017
Yasunari Kawabata's surrealist window on the world
Opening with one of the most famous lines in Japanese literature — "Emerging from the long border tunnel, they entered snow country," shifting us at speed from the darkness of the tunnel into the bright light of the snow — Yasunari Kawabata's novel "Snow Country" tells of a city-dwelling, worldly aesthete Shimamura who travels to an onsen (hot springs) retreat in winter and resumes his casual affair with Komako, a beautiful young "mountain geisha," a rustic panderer to male desire.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Voices / FOREIGN AGENDA
Nov 19, 2017
You're living in Japan — so now for something completely different
In a way, foreign residents who gravitate toward a third culture are simply following in a fine Japanese tradition.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Books / ESSENTIAL READING FOR JAPANOPHILES
Nov 11, 2017
'Hiroshima Notes': Kenzaburo Oe on Hiroshima and the U.S. Occupation
In 1963, 28-year-old novelist and rising star Kenzaburo Oe was sent to Hiroshima to report on the rancorous split between political groups calling for the abolition of nuclear weapons.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Books / How the visual arts shaped Japan's modern literature
Nov 4, 2017
Natsume Soseki's Pre-Raphaelite dreams
In 1900, the future novelist Natsume Soseki — then a scholar of English literature — arrived in London to commence two years of study abroad. Back in Japan, his best friend, the renowned haiku poet Masaoka Shiki, had — as explained in the first installment of this series — adopted the painterly concept of "sketching from life" as a means of injecting fresh realism into haiku and tanka poetry. Now prose writers, too, Soseki included, were being encouraged by Shiki's circle to "sketch from life."
Japan Times
CULTURE / Books
Oct 21, 2017
'In Search of the Way': looks for enlightenment
Richard bowring, religion, shinto , Confucianism, China, Shingo Buddhism
Japan Times
CULTURE / Books / How the visual arts shaped Japan's modern literature
Sep 30, 2017
How the visual arts shaped Japan's modern literature
Early on in Natsume Soseki's 1908 campus novel "Sanshiro" — one of the most important expositions of the inter-connectedness of visual and literary art ever written — a young scientist, Nonomiya, looks up at a long, thin, white cloud floating diagonally in the sky.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Voices / FOREIGN AGENDA
Sep 25, 2017
Buying a house in Japan can be an investment in joy
The 'return' on your investment in a home in Japan is best measured in terms of the pleasure it will yield and the doorway to the intimacies of community and the Japanese mind it will lure you into.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Books
Sep 23, 2017
'Devils in Daylight' and 'The Maids': The literary sleuthing of Junichiro Tanizaki
Question: Is it really the case that for a large part of the 20th century Japan enjoyed a golden age of literature? Or is this just misty-eyed nostalgia?
Biden calls ally Japan ‘xenophobic’ along with rivals China and Russia
U.S. President Joe Biden speaks in Syracuse, New York, on April 25.
Yen swings stir talk that Japan is in the FX market once again
An electronic screen in Tokyo displays the yen exchange rate against the U.S. dollar and the graph showing its recent swings, on Thursday.
Harajuku strives to reclaim its former glory — and surpass it
Laforet Harajuku, which celebrated its 45th anniversary last year, has been a witness to the district's evolution over the years.
Weak yen fattens tourist wallets in Japan
People visit the Ameya Yokocho market in Tokyo's Ueno district during the Golden Week holiday on Tuesday.
Japan's May 1 intervention may have cost ¥3.66 trillion, BOJ data suggests
An electronic screen displays a graph showing Japanese yen exchange rates surging against the dollar amid signs of intervention by authorities, in Tokyo on Thursday.
Kishida sets sights on energy and climate in South America trip
Prime Minister Fumio Kishida will use a policy speech in Sao Paulo to set out his vision for ties between Japan and South America, almost 10 years after former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe advocated for stronger ties between the two in the same city.
Yellow sand allergy: A health issue made worse by climate change
A screenshot of the Meteorological Agency's satellite image of clouds and yellow sand (in pink) on Sunday.
Climate change, chalky grains and the risks for Japan’s rice farmers
A farmer plants seedlings in Satsumasendai, Kagoshima Prefecture. Japan’s self sufficiency rate for rice is nearly 100%, compared with 38% for food overall, on a calorie basis.
Japan wants you to spend more with ‘luxury tourism’
Performers play a traditional drum unique to Wajima, Ishikawa Prefecture, in the prefectural capital of Kanazawa on March 16 to mark the extension of the Hokuriku Shinkansen line to Tsuruga Station in Fukui Prefecture.
Theaster Gates’ ambitious ‘Afro-Mingei’ brings Black Chicago to Tokyo
Theaster Gates' “A Heavenly Chord” lines up church pews before seven speakers and a Hammond B3 organ, a type of electric organ prevalent in Black American churches.

Podcast

From easily navigable train stations to the helpfulness of its municipal staff, Tokyo has earned high praise for its commitment to accessibility for disabled travelers.
[Rebroadcast] Japan is doing better on accessibility than you may think

Longform

When trying to trace your lineage in Japan, the "koseki" is the most important form of document you'll encounter.
Climbing the branches of a Japanese family tree
By Alex K.T. Martin

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