More Culture Articles - The Japan Times

August 07, 2025

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CULTURE / Stage

Aug 17, 2003

New Okinawan theater completes missing link in performing arts

By Tai Kawabata

It is a dream come true for Tatsuhiro Oshiro, a native Okinawan and Akutagawa Prize-winning novelist and playwright.

CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF

Aug 17, 2003

Combining the best of two worlds

By Mark Schreiber

DRAGON BONES, by Lisa See. New York: Random House, 2003, 368 pages, $24.95 (cloth). THE SAMURAI'S DAUGHTER, by Sujata Massey. New York: HarperCollins, 2003, 304 pages, $24.95 (cloth). It is no coincidence that, besides having Eurasian female authors, both of these books feature female detectives with...

CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF

Aug 17, 2003

Monastic comparisons and the rightness of left

By Anatole-roger Peltier

MONASTIC DISCIPLINE: Vinaya and Orthodox Monasticism, an Attempt at Comparison, by George Sioris. Chiang Mai: The Knowledge Center, 375 pp., 495 baht (paper). LEFT VERSUS RIGHT, by George Sioris. Chiang Mai: The Knowledge Center, 150 pp., 195 baht (paper). George Sioris, a Greek scholar on Asia and a...

CULTURE / Books / THE BOOK REPORT

Aug 14, 2003

Manga culture ignites craze in media markets overseas

By Janet Ashby

American boys can now read popular Japanese manga like "One Piece" in an English-language "Shonen Jump" and German girls can read girl's manga in the German-language magazine "Daisuki." Is this a passing fad or the start of a full-scale manga invasion?

Japan Times

CULTURE / Music / HIGH NOTES

Aug 13, 2003

By Simon Bartz

A "vamp" is a woman who seduces or beguiles by using feminine charms, according to my dictionary. It's also the name of a new magazine that promotes underground Japanese bands, preferably if the band members are equipped with guitars, boobs and cute pouts rather than guitars, biceps and bad chat-up lines....

Japan Times

CULTURE / Music / HIGH NOTES

Aug 13, 2003

Manolito y Su Trabuco

By Michael Pronko

The Japanese government can be thanked for one thing: open treaties with the Cuban government that allow the most scorching salsa players in the world to perform here on a regular basis. Perhaps the government doesn't have a choice since Japan has an unusually high percentage of Latin music aficionados....

Japan Times

CULTURE / Stage

Aug 13, 2003

Hotshot terrorist comedy just misses target

By Nobuko Tanaka

Though only in his early 30s, Martin McDonagh already has a 1998 Tony Award under his belt for his worldwide hit, "The Beauty Queen of Leenane." What's more, his works have been staged in 38 countries -- Japan among them.

Japan Times

CULTURE / Music / HIGH NOTES

Aug 13, 2003

Reverend Charlie Jackson: "God's Got It"

By Tom Bojko

When the Rev. Charlie Jackson was a boy, he played sacred music on Sundays and blues the rest of the week. While Jackson himself saw no irony in this, his mother had little appreciation for her son playing electric guitar on both sides of the Lord's fence and quickly steered him toward the church. Little...

Japan Times

CULTURE / Music / HIGH NOTES

Aug 13, 2003

Natacha Atlas: "Something Dangerous"

By Philip Brasor

Beyonce Knowles is not a singer I would have pegged as a model for Natacha Atlas, but the coincidental similarities between Atlas' new album, "Something Dangerous," and the Destiny Child leader's chart-topping debut solo joint, "Dangerously in Love," go beyond their titles. Atlas dives headfirst into...

Japan Times

CULTURE / Art / CERAMIC SCENE

Aug 13, 2003

The pot is mightier than the sword

By Robert Yellin

As brutal as they may have been, many feudal Japanese warlords were passionate about the Way of Tea. In the midst of battle they would pause for a "tea break," appreciating the fleeting moment and simple joys of tea -- with bits of strategy tossed in.

Japan Times

CULTURE / Art / NEW ART SEEN

Aug 13, 2003

'Girl! Girl! Girl!' just wants to have fun

By Monty Dipietro

I've been looking forward to the new show at the Tokyo Opera City Art Gallery. Trying not to sound sexist here, there was more than a little appeal in the show's title: "Girl! Girl! Girl!" I guess I'm just a regular guy, sweltering through summer, looking for some easy distraction. A Steve McQueen film...

CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF

Aug 10, 2003

Pulling away the curtains from the 'Princes of the Yen'

By Bill Totten

PRINCES OF YEN: Central Bankers and the Transformation of the Economy, by Richard A. Werner. London: M.E. Sharpe, 2003, 362 pp., $27.95, (paper). Richard A. Werner has written a rare book. "The Princes of the Yen" is a scholarly, thoroughly researched treatise on economics that reads like a detective...

One of the many entrances to the Kabukicho neighborhood in Tokyo’s Shinjuku Ward.

Kabukicho: Tokyo’s ‘stadium of desire’

A mushroom cloud from the atomic bombing on Hiroshima taken from a U.S. military aircraft on Aug. 6, 1945. Copying the photo without permission is prohibited.

80 years on, a Japanese American hibakusha recalls the day the bomb dropped

By Elizabeth Beattie

SUSTAINABLE JAPAN

Looking ahead to Yokohama’s Green × Expo 2027

Looking ahead to Yokohama’s Green × Expo 2027

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