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April 25, 2025
 

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LITERATURE

Author Yasunari Kawabata’s “The Rainbow” seems to suggest it is never too late to heal, so long as we face our pain rather than run away.
CULTURE / Books
Dec 21, 2023
‘The Rainbow’: Artistic world underscores truths of the human heart
Despite resonant themes, this translation of Nobel Prize-winner Yasunari Kawabata’s novel about lingering grief and regrets feels strangely distant.
While non-Japanese readers have in recent years been spoiled for choice when it comes to Japanese literature in translation, there is still a wealth of notable works that translators would love to see rendered into English.
CULTURE / Books
Dec 20, 2023
A wish list of hidden gems for Japanese literature lovers
Eight translators reveal their top Japanese books that English readers have yet to enjoy.
There are no villains in Saikaku's stories … just people caught more or less helplessly in life's vortex.
JAPAN / History / The Living Past
Dec 17, 2023
Tales of a Closed Country: Part 3
There are no truly evil villains in Ihara Saikaku's stories, just people caught helplessly in life's vortex.
Japan’s crime thriller genre owes a lot to Kido Okamoto and Taro Hirai, who is better known by his pen name of Edogawa Ranpo
CULTURE / Books
Oct 22, 2023
Japanese thrillers and crime mysteries to curl up with this fall
As the nights grow colder, pick up a recommended read in crime fiction and dive deep into this unique intersection of art and entertainment.
Writer Jon Fosse poses in Oslo in 2015. Since his debut novel was published in 1983, Fosse has written poems, essays, children’s books, plays and novels.
CULTURE / Books
Oct 5, 2023
Norwegian playwright and author Jon Fosse wins literature Nobel
The Swedish Academy cited Fosse's “innovative plays and prose which give voice to the unsayable.”
History recorded the thoughts and actions of rulers and warlords, but what did the average folk think in that time? Were their days filled with angst, passion or poignancy?
JAPAN / History
Sep 17, 2023
Writers find a new muse in the 20th century: the ordinary person
The past at its very best spread its benefits thinly, leaving the masses to make the best of things beyond the reach of civilization’s light.
CULTURE / Books
Sep 2, 2023
Saou Ichikawa’s 'Hunchback': A darkly funny portrait of disability
The winner of the second 2023 Akutagawa Prize is a sardonic commentary on the utility of bodies, both abled and disabled.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Books
Jun 17, 2023
The quotidian madness of Mieko Kanai’s 'Mild Vertigo'
Originally published in 1997, “Mild Vertigo” is just as relevant today in its unpacking of meaning within the ennui of our often stultifying, consumer-driven modern age.
CULTURE / Books
Jun 14, 2023
Cormac McCarthy, novelist of a darker America, is dead at 89
His characters were outsiders, like him. He lived quietly and determinately outside the literary mainstream.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Books
Jun 10, 2023
Ao Omae confronts identities and alienation of modern youth
The author deftly explores the struggles Japan’s young people face today with subtlety and incisive criticism in his English-language debut, “People Who Talk to Stuffed Animals Are Nice.”
Japan Times
CULTURE / Books
May 28, 2023
The curious case of Fuminori Nakamura's genre misalignment
Little do English-language readers know, the author of 'The Rope Artist' and other critically acclaimed books writes on much more than crime.
Japan Times
CULTURE
May 24, 2023
Haruki Murakami wins top books prize in Spain
The €50,000 ($55,000) award is one of eight prizes for the arts, sport and scientific research handed out yearly by a foundation named for Crown Princess Leonor.
Japan Times
JAPAN / History / THE LIVING PAST
May 23, 2023
Hell is a crab cannery ship in industrial Japan. The way out? Russia.
Stories of brutality from the era of industrialization are testament to the sacrifice of former generations, sacrifices that resulted in what we take for granted today.
Japan Times
LIFE / Language / BILINGUAL
May 5, 2023
Why bilingual literature is needed in a place like Japan
Only when Japan’s great stories are translated into other languages can we get a glimpse into the real lives of people living here.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Books
Apr 13, 2023
Haruki Murakami’s first novel in six years hits shelves in Japan
The bestselling author spent three years working nonstop on his new novel, 'The City and Its Uncertain Walls,' which reworks the story of the same title from 1980.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Books
Mar 19, 2023
'The Flowers of Buffoonery': Osamu Dazai's unexpected portrait of camaraderie
The novel adds new texture to the author's classic 'No Longer Human,' while bringing levity to a somewhat dire thesis: The world is full of inauthenticity.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Books
Mar 14, 2023
The guilt of fatherhood helped shape Kenzaburo Oe’s literary vision
The award-winning writer attempted to give his disabled son a voice through fiction.
JAPAN
Mar 13, 2023
Nobel-winning Japanese novelist Kenzaburo Oe dies at 88
Oe was regarded as one of Japan’s leading contemporary novelists and was the second Japanese person to win the literary award.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Books
Mar 8, 2023
‘A Kamigata Anthology’: Everyday enjoyments of everyday people
The collection chronicles the rise of the “commoner arts' through genres like travelogs, poetry and easy-reading books that entertained the masses during the Edo Period (1603-1867).
Amid uncertain tariffs, is now the time to buy a new iPhone?
An Apple store in Tokyo's Shibuya Ward in September. Prices for the newest iPhone models start at around ¥100,000 ($700) in Japan.
Japan must correct Trump’s false data for trade talks, says Kono
Former Foreign Minister Taro Kono
Japan wants to 'separate' tariff and security issues. That may be tough.
Japan’s chief tariff negotiator, Ryosei Akazawa, poses with a "Make America Great Again" cap at the White House in Washington on April 16.
Social media helps fuel growing 'sex tourism' in Japan
People walk down a street in the red-light entertainment area of Kabukicho in the Shinjuku district of Tokyo on March 31.
Japan set to fine cyclists on the spot for rule violations from 2026
Under new rules, those who use smartphones while riding a bicycle would be subject to the maximum fine of ¥12,000.
Amid uncertain tariffs, is now the time to buy a new iPhone?
An Apple store in Tokyo's Shibuya Ward in September. Prices for the newest iPhone models start at around ¥100,000 ($700) in Japan.
Built in a flash, Osaka Expo pavilions wrestle with sustainability
Kengo Kuma & Associates oversaw the construction of the Malaysia pavilion, which is encased in interwoven rows of bamboo that appear to ripple.
Japan weighs using U.S. rice imports as tariff negotiation tool with Trump
A restaurant owner pours California-grown Calrose rice into a rice cooker at his restaurant in Tokyo
Is Japan’s parliament ready to welcome more youth to its ranks?
Lower House lawmaker Kai Odake in his Tokyo office on Wednesday
Crow meat, goat tartare: Mauvaise Herbe raises its game
Crow meat, shaped into a ball and attached to a foot of the bird, is one of the peculiar offerings of game at Mauvaise Herbe.

Podcast

One of the many entrances to the Kabukicho neighborhood in Tokyo’s Shinjuku Ward.
Kabukicho: Tokyo’s ‘stadium of desire’

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.
By Tomoko Otake

SUSTAINABLE JAPAN

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Looking ahead to Yokohama’s Green × Expo 2027

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