Search - author

 
 
Reader Mail
May 2, 2007

Blogger editorial disappoints

I was excited to see an editorial about the ascendancy of blogging in Japan . . . until I actually read all of it ("Japan as number-one blogger," April 22). While it could have been an engaging celebration of this boom in people's media, it ended up being a lame and quite bizarre attempt to downplay...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Apr 22, 2007

The man behind the woman

AN AMERICAN DIARY OF A JAPANESE GIRL, by Yone Noguchi, with an introduction by Laura E. Franey, an afterword by Edward Marx and illustrations by Genjiro Yeto. Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 2007, 202 pp., $23.95 (paper) Yonejiro Noguchi (1875-1947) adopted the pen name of Yone when he left Japan...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Mar 18, 2007

From profession to prostitution

Selling Songs and Smiles: The Sex Trade in Heian and Kamakura Japan, by Janet R. Goodwin. Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press, 2007, 208 pp. with maps, $48 (cloth) Prince Genji was apparently among the few to resist the charms of those bands of young women who made a living by offering themselves....
CULTURE / Books
Feb 25, 2007

Upstairs, downstairs and inside old Japan

Companions of the Holiday by Donald Richie, with an introduction by Timothy Harris and an afterword by the author. Tokyo/New York: Printed Matter Press, 181 pp., $15 (paper) Donald Richie is known to readers of The Japan Times for his regular reviews of books dealing with Asia, and more particularly...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Jan 28, 2007

Why apologize profusely as a woman, when you can insult like a man?

A CULTURAL HISTORY OF JAPANESE WOMEN'S LANGUAGE by Endo Orie. Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan, Center for Japanese Studies, 2006, 140 pp., $38 (cloth) When I was first studying Japanese back in 1947, I went to a local language school where the teachers were mostly older ladies, born in the Meiji...
CULTURE / Books
Jan 28, 2007

From the truth comes some strange fiction

Homunculus by Hugh Paxton. Macmillan New Writing, 2005, 256 pp., £12.99 (paper). The grotesquely fanged monster armed with a spear and an assault rifle that comes hurtling out of a rising sun on the cover of "Homunculus" should be fair warning to readers that something a tad disturbing is to be found...
CULTURE / Books
Oct 22, 2006

Exploring the cobwebs and exposing some dirt

ISTANBUL: Memories of a City, by Orhan Pamuk. Faber & Faber, 2006, 348 pp., £8 (paper). Turkey it seems has always inspired fear. The memory of advancing Turkish units camped outside the gates of Vienna haunted the European mind for centuries. "Where the Turk treads, no grass grows," ran one saying...
CULTURE / Books
Aug 20, 2006

Japan: Never quite closed and still opening now

THE OPENING OF JAPAN 1853-1855: A Comprehensive Study of the American, British, Dutch and Russian Naval Expeditions to Compel the Tokugawa Shogunate to Conclude Treaties and Open Ports to Their Ships, by William McOmie. Folkestone: Global Oriental, 505 pp., 2006, £65 (cloth). The assertion that Commodore...
COMMENTARY / COUNTERPOINT
Jul 23, 2006

Dark chronicler of a dubious Jewish uniqueness

Who are the Jews? What do Jewish writers have in common with each other? What, strictly speaking, is a "Jewish" writer . . . and, for that matter, what is meant by "strictly speaking"?
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...
CULTURE / Books
Jun 18, 2006

The lore and legend of Asian lawmen

"The Calf Strung Up beneath The Cart" will cause you agony profound; "The Ass tied tightly to The Post" will make you scream and leap around; "The Phoenix drying both her Wings" to death itself will bring you near; "The Boy who Sits and Contemplates," the stoutest soul will cause to fear; And if "The...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
May 21, 2006

Yukio Mishima's prequel to the end

YUKOKU (Patriotism), 1966, produced, written and interpreted by Yukio Mishima, associate producer Hiroaki Fujii, associate director Masaki Domoto, photographed by Kimio Watanabe. Tokyo: Toho DVD, 2006, Disc One: 28 minutes, Disc Two: 175 minutes, 6,300 yen. In 1961 Yukio Mishima published a short story,...
Japan Times
LIFE / Lifestyle
Mar 7, 2006

"How the Hangman Lost His Heart," "Fish"

"How the Hangman Lost His Heart," K.M. GRANT, Puffin; 2006; 192 pp.
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Feb 26, 2006

Memoirs of a foreigner

JAPANESE JOURNEYS: Writings and Recollections, by Geoffrey Bownas. Kent: Global Oriental Ltd., 2005, 264 pp., with b/w photos, £30 (cloth). One late evening in 1970, the scholar Geoffrey Bownas was working with the writer Yukio Mishima on their anthology "New Writing in Japan." The noted author excused...
Japan Times
LIFE / Lifestyle / ON THE BOOK TRAIL
Feb 7, 2006

"Firebird," "Thor's Wedding Day"

"Firebird," Susan Gates, Puffin; 2005; 212pp.
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Jan 8, 2006

Unsparing view of Indonesia past

IN THE TIME OF MADNESS by Richard Lloyd Parry. London: Jonathan Cape, 2005, 315 pp., £12.99 (paper). This firsthand account of fin de siecle Indonesia, an era of widespread chaos and violence, takes us into the heart of darkness, searing our consciousness with images of deprivation, fear and mayhem...
Japan Times
LIFE / Lifestyle / ON THE BOOK TRAIL
Nov 1, 2005

"Chasing Vermeer," "How Hedley Hopkins Did a Dare"

"Chasing Vermeer," Blue Ballietta, Chicken House; 2005; 272 pp.
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Aug 28, 2005

The face of joy and happiness

OTAFUKU: Joy of Japan, by Amy Sylvester Katoh, photographs by Yutaka Sato. Singapore: Tuttle/Periplus, bilingual (English and Japanese), 2005, 192 pp., many illustrations, 1,700 yen (cloth). Most of us know Otafuku without knowing her name. She is the full-faced folk figure we see all around us in Japan,...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Aug 21, 2005

A new kind of film history

A NEW HISTORY OF JAPANESE FILM: A Century of Narrative Film, by Isolde Standish. New York/London: Continuum, 2005, 414 pp., 18 illustrations, $39.95 (cloth). Early in this account of Japanese film, the author says that prior histories have tended to follow one of two trajectories. One, which she calls...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Jul 31, 2005

Breach the defenses of marriage with a smile

FORTRESS BESIEGED, by Qian Zhongshu. Penguin Classics, 2005, 426 pp., £18.99 (cloth). 1937 was a rotten year for China. Japanese forces moved their operations from the Peking to the Shanghai region, the Nationalist lines in Nanjing collapsed, and the remnants of the resistance moved their troops deeper...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Jul 10, 2005

Coming out of the linguistic closet

QUEER JAPAN FROM THE PACIFIC WAR TO THE INTERNET AGE, by Mark McLelland. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield, 2005, 248 pp., 15 b/w photos, $34.95 (paper). Japanese homosexuals face a peculiar problem. There is a true confusion among terms for sex, gender, sexual orientation, and gender expression. As one scholar...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Jun 19, 2005

The community in mind as a matter of practice

RITUAL PRACTICE IN MODERN JAPAN: Ordering Place, People, and Action, by Satsuki Kawano. Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press, 2005, 152 pp., with b/w photos, $17.00 (paper). "Ritual" has meanings other than the primary dictionary definition, which insists upon the prescribed order of a religious ceremony...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
May 15, 2005

The last of the romantics: lost beauty and childhood

HELEN WADDELL'S WRITINGS FROM JAPAN, edited and introduced by David Burleigh. Dublin: Irish Academic Press, 2005, 184 pages, with b/w illustrations, 42.50 euros (cloth), 25 euros (paper). Now famous as a medieval savant, author of "The Wandering Scholars" and "Medieval Latin Lyrics," Helen Waddell (1889-1965)...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Apr 17, 2005

Forgetting the world

ZHUANGZI: Basic Writings, translated by Burton Watson. New York: Columbia University Press, 2003, 164 pp., $19.50 (paper). Zhuangzi (369-286 B.C.), along with Laozi, author of the founding tracts of Daoism, argued against Confucius, upheld the freedom of the individual as opposed to a socially circumscribed...
Japan Times
LIFE / Lifestyle / ON THE BOOK TRAIL
Oct 7, 2004

"The End of the Beginning," "Change Your Room"

"The End of the Beginning," Avi Harcourt, Dorling Kindersley; 2004; 140 pp. "Hmmmm," said the ant. "You'll need a lot of questions answered."
CULTURE / Books / THE BOOK REPORT
Jul 1, 2004

Mystery writer Nishimura continues on winning run of great train stories

The recently released list of top taxpayers for fiscal 2003 has shown that, despite the overall slump in the book trade, the payoff can still be great for authors who strike a chord with the public.
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Apr 4, 2004

Pop Meiji romance revives tired legend of poor Okichi

BUTTERFLY IN THE WIND, by Rei Kimura. Amsterdam: Olive Press, 2003, 166 pp., with illustrations, $16.95 (paper). Poor Okichi -- carried away against her will to become concubine to the American consul in Japan, torn away from her handsome lover, stigmatized forever as "Tojin" Okichi, property of the...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Mar 7, 2004

Much ado about Shakespeare: Reworking a Renaissance giant

SHASHIBIYA: Staging Shakespeare in China, by Li Ruru. Hong Kong University Press, 2003, 306 pp., 14 plates, £21.50 (cloth). It has been 100 years since Shakespeare was first staged in China. His name now sinicized to Shashibiya and even colloquialized, ("Old Man Sha"), productions of his plays continue...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Feb 29, 2004

To improve the East, must we move West?

JAPAN: The Burden of Success, by Jean-Marie Bouissou. London: Hurst & Co., 2002, 374 pp., £35.00 (cloth), £14.95 (paper). Jean-Marie Bouissou, who lived in Japan in the 1980s, is a political scientist at the Institut d'Etudes Politiques de Paris and the Centre Franco-Japonais de Management. "The Burden...
EDITORIALS
Nov 2, 2003

Long words for a short bear

'I am a Bear of Very Little Brain, and long words Bother me," Winnie-the-Pooh once famously said. Words like "merchandising" would certainly have Bothered him, or "licensing rights" or even "royalties." Those were all buzzing around the Pooh legacy like bees around a honey pot last week, after a U.S....

Longform

Visitors walk past Sou Fujimoto's Grand Ring, which has been recognized as the largest wooden structure in the world.
Can a World Expo still matter? Japan is about to find out.