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COMMENTARY / World
Jan 18, 2012

U.S. no longer land of the free

Every year, the U.S. State Department issues reports on individual rights in other countries, monitoring the passage of restrictive laws and regulations around the world. Iran, for example, has been criticized for denying fair public trials and limiting privacy, while Russia has been taken to task for...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE ZEIT GIST
Jan 17, 2012

And then there was one?: Japan's right royal crisis

According to the Japanese Constitution, the Emperor is the symbol of the Japanese state and the unity of the Japanese people. You could thus say it is symbolic that the Imperial household is now facing an unprecedented demographic crisis, one that may ultimately lead to a succession dilemma and possibly...
BUSINESS
Jan 17, 2012

Machinery orders climb 14.8% as firms stay optimistic on investment

Machinery orders rebounded in November, signaling that companies are willing to invest even as the yen remains strong and the global economy slows.
Japan Times
Reference / SO WHAT THE HECK IS THAT
Jan 17, 2012

Platform doors

Dear Alice,
COMMENTARY
Jan 16, 2012

British influence and the EU

At the European crisis summit in December, David Cameron was snubbed by his European colleagues. His "veto" on accepting treaty changes believed by other members to be necessary to save European economies left Britain isolated.
JAPAN
Jan 16, 2012

Disaster left cities in limbo: mayors

Mayors from municipalities dotting the region around the shattered Fukushima nuclear plant on Sunday said the disaster shattered lives and communities.
JAPAN / History / JAPAN TIMES GONE BY
Jan 15, 2012

Anniversary of Korean annexation, "harakiri" row halts Diet, Socialist Party-China communique, Kyoto Journal debuts

100 YEARS AGOSunday, Jan. 7, 1912
Japan Times
LIFE / WEEK 3
Jan 15, 2012

Graffiti brightens Tohoku housing units

Almost all the temporary public housing units in the disaster-hit Tohoku region of northeast Japan look the same — like little, soulless boxes, in fact.
CULTURE / Books
Jan 15, 2012

Grace shines through Nagai's tales of horror

GEORGIC, by Mariko Nagai. BkMk Press, 2010, 163 pp., $15.95 (paperback) Between writing the "Eclogues" and the "Aeneid," the Roman poet Virgil composed the "Georgics," published circa 29 B.C., which deals with rural lives, agriculture and all things bucolic. In the "Inferno," Virgil acted as Dante's...
EDITORIALS
Jan 15, 2012

Wars over whaling

Japan's annual whaling season is currently under way with the inevitable lurid reports and tangled accusations. The history of conflict between Japan's whaling boats and anti-whaling protesters has not only gained newspaper headlines, but has inspired its own TV program, "Whale Wars," on the American...
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / WILD WATCH
Jan 15, 2012

Sealing a connection with nature

The cliff-ringed cape known as Notoro Misaki stands as a massive natural breakwater west of the city of Abashiri in northeastern Hokkaido, sheltering it from some of the might of the ocean.
CULTURE / Books
Jan 15, 2012

The other side of world's 'worst battle'

FIGHTING SPIRIT: The Memoirs of Major Yoshitaka Horie and the Battle of Iwo Jima. Edited by Robert D. Eldridge and Charles W. Tatum. Naval Institute Press, 2011, 224 pp., $26.95 (hardcover) Iwo Jima is a tiny sliver of an island 1,200 km south of Tokyo, an unlikely setting for anything historical, let...
COMMENTARY / COUNTERPOINT
Jan 15, 2012

Recall, for inspiration, that young people made the last 'Japanese Spring'

How can Japan extricate itself from the morass it sank into two decades ago when its asset-inflated bubble burst? This is the question on nearly everyone's mind in this country today. One thing is for sure: You can't get out of quicksand by pulling on your own hair.
EDITORIALS
Jan 14, 2012

Scrutinize Osaka mayor's moves

Osaka Mayor Toru Hashimoto, leader of the local party Osaka Ishin no Kai (association of Osaka reform), and Osaka Prefecture Gov. Ichiro Matsui have begun fleshing out the mayor's idea of establishing an Osaka metropolitan government modeled after the Tokyo Metropolitan Government.
CULTURE / Art
Jan 13, 2012

"Exhibition: M. C. Escher"

Maurits Cornelis Escher (1898-1972), more commonly known as M.C. Escher, is likely the most famous master of trompe l'oeil (trick-of-the-eye illusionism). A Dutch graphic artist, specializing in woodcuts, lithographs and mezzotints, Escher excelled in mathematically inspired depictions of impossible...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Jan 13, 2012

'Robo-G'

Japanese commercial films nearly always run on the well-worn rails of franchise and formula. Originality in script and concept is gifted to only a chosen few with strong box-office track records — Hayao Miyazaki, Koki Mitani and Shinobu Yaguchi among them. Though not as well-known as the anime master...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Jan 13, 2012

"Exhibition: M. C. Escher"

Maurits Cornelis Escher (1898-1972), more commonly known as M.C. Escher, is likely the most famous master of trompe l'oeil (trick-of-the-eye illusionism). A Dutch graphic artist, specializing in woodcuts, lithographs and mezzotints, Escher excelled in mathematically inspired depictions of impossible...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Jan 13, 2012

'Jack and Jill'

Either Adam Sandler was hit by a falling meteor or he was abducted by particularly unpleasant aliens, or both. Whatever happened to him and his mental faculties, the man should not be allowed within a 5-km radius of a Hollywood studio.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink
Jan 13, 2012

Kansai eateries offer new flavors for 2012

Businesses in cities around Japan seem to open and close at an alarming rate — and a new year inevitably means new restaurants. Here's a guide to some dragonly new and recent arrivals in the Kansai strongholds of Kyoto and Osaka.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Jan 12, 2012

Artists always find ways to represent themselves

For the countless number of budding visual artists in Japan, 3331 Arts Chiyoda's "Independents" exhibitions, which are held in the event space's main gallery, offer the chance to publicly show works and get feedback from some of the most prominent artists, critics and curators in the country.
CULTURE / Art
Jan 12, 2012

Artists always find ways to represent themselves

For the countless number of budding visual artists in Japan, 3331 Arts Chiyoda's "Independents" exhibitions, which are held in the event space's main gallery, offer the chance to publicly show works and get feedback from some of the most prominent artists, critics and curators in the country.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WHO'S WHO
Jan 10, 2012

Paper artist Gannon cut his own niche

Patrick Gannon admits he loves puzzles. As a literature major and aspiring writer in university, he delighted in deconstructing ideas and consciously pulling together disparate pieces to make a whole. Twenty years later, as a "cut paper" artist in Japan, Gannon, 40, employs the same intellectual techniques,...
LIFE
Jan 8, 2012

Fukushima lays bare Japanese media's ties to top

Is the ongoing crisis surrounding the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant being accurately reported in the Japanese media?
Japan Times
LIFE
Jan 8, 2012

Stop the presses and hold the front page

It was perhaps the biggest financial story of postwar Japan — or it should have been.Yamaichi Securities, one of the nation's four top brokerages, which was among the world's six largest in the 1980s, had in 1992 started to illegally bury millions of dollars in red ink off the books, setting up dummy...
CULTURE / Books
Jan 8, 2012

Sophisticated and sordid: a geisha's dance

RIVALRY, by Nagai Kafu. Translated by Stephen Snyder. Columbia University Press, 2011, 165 pp. $20.00 (paper) Nagai Kafu's "Rivalry," according to the late Edward Seidensticker, is "on the one hand nostalgic, lyrical, and reminiscent, and on the other a modern social novel, purporting to show how life...

Longform

Ichiro Suzuki, one of the most iconic players in NPB and MLB history, was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame with 99.7% of the vote.
With Hall of Fame induction, Ichiro makes himself heard loud and clear