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Japan Times
LIFE
Aug 13, 2006

His Emperor's reluctant warrior

Samurai-born and steeled in Japan's harsh military culture, Gen. Tadamichi Kuribayashi had lived five years in North America but was largely unknown to Washington's leaders when he was ordered to defend Iwo Jima "at all costs." The U.S. would pay dearly for underestimating him.
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Aug 13, 2006

Painting a religion

ZEN MIND/ZEN BRUSH by John Stevens, introductory essay by Claire Pollard, forewords by Edmund Capon and Kurt A. Gitter. Sydney: Art Gallery of New South Wales, 2006, 144 pp., 78 plates, A$35 (paper). Zenga (Zen painting) usually designates the pictures and calligraphy of the monks of the Edo Period (1600-1868)....
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Aug 13, 2006

High-school baseball pitches the way of the samurai

It's said that even Japanese people who don't like baseball still get caught up in the annual summer high-school baseball tournament, which happens to be taking place right now at Koshien Stadium in Hyogo Prefecture. Apparently, this same paradox applies to at least one American. On the Internet message...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Stage
Aug 10, 2006

Kyogen meets contemporary theater

For the past 20 years, Kazuhiro Morisaki has promoted the comical performing art form of kyogen, but that doesn't make him a purist.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Aug 10, 2006

Looking beyond the West

Art historian Dr. Charles Merewether is the artistic director and curator of the 2006 Biennale of Sydney (established 1973). Merewether has worked and taught in Mexico, Spain, Australia and the United States and is the author of a number of books on art, including "Art, Anti-Art, Non-Art: Experimentations...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Aug 6, 2006

Japan's baroque theater

KABUKI: Baroque Fusion of the Arts, by Toshio Kawatake, translated by Frank and Jean Connell Hoff. I-House Press, 2006, 358 pp. with 78 illustrations, 1,905 yen (paper). This is the new enlarged and revised edition of an important book on the Kabuki, originally published by the University of Tokyo Press...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Aug 3, 2006

"edison Osorio Zapata: Transcriptions of Legends"

Promo-Arte Closes Sunday
BUSINESS / JAPANESE PERSPECTIVES
Jul 31, 2006

BOJ should have based hike on consumer needs, worldwide inflation trend

The Bank of Japan raised the unsecured overnight call rate from virtually zero to 0.25 percent at the end of its July 13-14 Policy Board meeting and hiked the official discount rate from 0.1 percent to 0.4 percent.
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Jul 30, 2006

Tokugawa shogun saved from going to the dogs

Tsunayoshi (1646-1709) was the fifth in a line of 15 Tokugawa-family rulers. His 29-year rule was marked by an unusual number of natural disasters, including a volcanic eruption of Mount Fuji, and by that equally unusual outbreak of commerce — the arts, extravagance and indulgence now known as the...
JAPAN
Jul 27, 2006

'Harry Potter' translator's spell fails on tax office

Tax authorities believe Yuko Matsuoka, the Japanese translator of the global best-seller "Harry Potter" series, failed to declare 3.5 billion yen in income in the three years to 2004, sources said Wednesday.
CULTURE / Books
Jul 16, 2006

Vietvets come in from the cold war

THE LAST ASSASSIN by Barry Eisler. G.P. Putnam's Sons, 2006, 334 pp., $24.95 (cloth). WHITE TIGER by Michael Allen Dymmoch. St. Martin's Minotaur, 2005, 308 pp., $24.95 (cloth). THE TUNNEL RATS by Stephen Leather. Hodder and Stoughton, 2005, 501 pp., £6.99 (paper). John Rain, Barry Eisler's American-Japanese...
CULTURE / Books
Jul 16, 2006

Adventures in Gerontology

THE OKINAWA DIET PLAN by Bradley J. Willcox, D. Craig Willcox and Makoto Suzuki. Three Rivers Press, 2005, 432 pp., $14.95/2,300 yen (paper). In works like "Awakenings" and "The Island of the Color Blind," neurologist Oliver Sacks showed how serious medical subjects could, in the right hands, be turned...
Japan Times
JAPAN
Jul 15, 2006

Britain to get new Japanese studies center in September

Efforts by Japan experts in Britain to boost Japanese studies in the country will bear fruit this September with the opening of the National Institute of Japanese Studies in the new White Rose East Asia Center.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY
Jul 15, 2006

Grandmother inspires German cake cookbook

There are a lot of changes in Tania Kadokura's life right now. But that's OK, she says. "I'm used to change."
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel / NATURE TRAVEL
Jul 9, 2006

Wild times in the Lost World

The scene looks straight out of Jurassic Park. Huge vehicles thrash through the churned earth burdened with winches and cranes, steel crates and giraffes. Tough guys in uniforms bellow instructions or saunter about holding guns, netting, ropes to restrain buffalo, and all sorts of other neat "boys' toys"...
CULTURE / Books
Jul 9, 2006

Looking at Westerners' accounts of the salaryman blues

THE BLUE-EYED SALARYMAN by Niall Murtagh. Profile Books, 2006, 228 pp., £7.99 (paper). The phenomenon didn't start with Lafcadio Hearn, but in his day he became best known for it -- the foreigner who comes to Japan and writes a book about his experiences. His female contemporary, Isabella Bird, was...
COMMENTARY / COUNTERPOINT
Jul 9, 2006

Home from home from home

Three days ago marked an anniversary of my own personal day of independence. Thirty years ago, on July 6, 1976, I became an Australian citizen and legally forfeited my U.S. citizenship.
COMMENTARY
Jul 6, 2006

Bush's Iraq dreams are turning to dust

WASHINGTON -- It appears to be the season for second thoughts about American intervention in Iraq. Periodic public-relations offensives after endless "turning points" have failed to halt the Bush administration's long-term slide in popular support. The misbegotten war in Iraq does more than discredit...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Jul 6, 2006

Through the looking glass with Gilliam

At age 64, Terry Gilliam continues to confound. "Tideland," his latest and perhaps most challenging film, was an excursion into low-budget and fast shooting for the director, who is known for tortuous production difficulties. (See the documentary "Lost in La Mancha," about his failed attempt to shoot...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Voices / VIEWS FROM THE STREET
Jul 4, 2006

What's your favorite holiday read?

Geoffrey Rothwell Professor, 52 I love Japanese literature. Read "The Wild Sheep Chase" by Murakami. It's a combination of reality and fantasy that gets you out of the everyday reality of life. There are talking cats, sheep and magic and much more.
Japan Times
LIFE / Lifestyle / ON THE BOOK TRAIL
Jul 4, 2006

"The Possum Always Rings Twice: A Chet Gecko Mystery," "Strange Happiness"

"The Possum Always Rings Twice: A Chet Gecko Mystery," Bruce Hale, Harcourt; 2006; 112pp.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY
Jul 1, 2006

Palestinians need a book as good as 'The Israelis'

Donna Rosenthal heads the pack across Shibuya's famed pedestrian crossing, grinning from ear to ear and arms waving hello. In Tokyo to meet with her agent about a possible Japanese edition of her book "The Israelis," she's more than happy to meet up in old territory.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WORDS TO LIVE BY
Jun 27, 2006

Tadanobu Tsunoda

Tadanobu Tsunoda, MD, 79, is the author of "The Japanese Brain" (now in its 38th Japanese edition), and the inventor of the Tsunoda Key Tapping Machine. He developed this simple analog system in the 1960s, and claims it is still the most accurate machine in the world for measuring the brainstem's switch...
COMMENTARY
Jun 26, 2006

South Korea and China also stir the pot

NEW YORK -- A friend of mine in Tokyo has sent me two recent proposals to improve Japan's relations with its neighbors. One, by the Japan Association of Corporate Executives, deals with China and is addressed to both the Japanese and Chinese governments; the other, by the Kansai Association of Corporate...
BASEBALL / BASEBALL BULLET-IN
Jun 25, 2006

Giants looking to bring in late comers with 'Heat Up' ticket promotion at Tokyo Dome

Discounts for tickets to Yomiuri Giants home games?

Longform

A small shrine perched atop rocks braves the waves hitting the shoreline during a storm in Shimoda, Shizuoka Prefecture. The area is under threat of a possible 31-meter-high tsunami if an earthquake strikes the nearby Nankai Trough.
If the 'Big One' hits, this city could face a 31-meter-high tsunami