Voices | FOREIGN AGENDA Feb 22, 2017

Standing up to alienation on Tokyo's comedy scene

Japan is an easy place to foster self-delusion, and a failure at comedy is like a bucket of ice water to the face.

Voices | FOREIGN AGENDA Dec 7, 2016

So you want to write about Japan?: the 10 essential tips

Having taken the daring — not reckless or avoidant — step of leaving your home country, you now have a million stories to tell.

Books Apr 2, 2016

Finding the locus of David Mitchell

David Mitchell's world is always growing. Raised in England's West Midlands, Mitchell lived in London for a time before moving to Japan in 1994 — while he was in his 20s — to work as an English teacher. After eight years in Hiroshima, he ...

Books / Reviews | ESSENTIAL READING FOR JAPANOPHILES Jul 4, 2015

Yasunari Kawabata's 'Palm-of-the-Hand Stories' are taut tales of the human heart

"Palm-of-the-Hand Stories" is a collection of 70 very brief stories by Nobel Prize-winner Yasunari Kawabata that were written between the early 1920s and 1970s. It contains poetic depictions of emotions, a focus on feelings rather than understanding. These stories present the chaos of the ...

Voices | FOREIGN AGENDA Jul 1, 2015

Getting creative when it comes to finding the motivation to study Japanese

I respect people who possess a high-level of Japanese proficiency the same way I respect people who are well-built. I don't respect the results of the effort so much as the discipline required to attain it. I can't deny that focus and perseverance are ...

Voices | FOREIGN AGENDA Apr 12, 2015

Expats can find their creative mojo in Japan's inspiration and isolation

The inflated sense of being special that Japan fosters among non-natives can be dangerous, but that same emotion can also lead you to do things that might otherwise feel like symptoms of a mid-life crisis.

Books / Reviews | ESSENTIAL READING FOR JAPANOPHILES Oct 25, 2014

No Longer Human

Osamu Dazai's "No Longer Human" comprises a series of three fictionalized notebooks, with each increasingly darker than the last. The character writing these books, Yozo, is detached from the beginning and is afraid of human interactions, but he learns how to socialize with people ...

Voices | FOREIGN AGENDA Oct 8, 2014

Bonding boozily over the pleasure and pain of Bukowski

The embrace of individuality combined with the pain of loneliness could explain why Bukowski's works have been embraced by many of the Japanese men I've met in Tokyo.

Voices | FOREIGN AGENDA Aug 6, 2014

After the romance of expat life fades, the dream lives on

Some foreign residents in Japan might be living a dream on paper, but many are plagued by the question of if and when to return home.

Books / Reviews Jul 5, 2014

Rashomon and Seventeen Other Stories

It is noticeable that the tales in "Rashomon and Seventeen Other Stories" by Ryunosuke Akutagawa change in tone and style alongside the mental state and interests of the writer. Akutagawa's most famed early works (including the titular story) are intricately woven setups for moral ...