China Books

Daruma dolls, mochi pounding, Shinto shrines and Buddhist temples . . . Japan is a land of the old and the new, a blending of traditional culture and modern life styles. The newest in a series of festival books, Floating Lanterns & Golden Shrines is full of detailed and charming illustrations of seven Japanese celebrations. It begins with a discussion of the origins of the Japanese people and the creation myth of Amaterasu, the Sun Goddess. The first festival, Setsubun (the day winter ends) links ideas of Japan's indigenous religion, Shinto, with ideas and images borrowed from China. Traditional family holidays follow: Obon (remembering one's ancestors), Kodomono Hi (Children's Day), Hina Matsuri (Dolls' Festival), Oshogatsu (New Year's). The Sapporo Snow Festival is a world-famous yearly event begun in 1950 and the festival description is followed by information on life today in this modern prosperous country. Finally, the Cherry Blossom Festival focuses on the Japanese-American experience in the United States. Important information about arts and daily life are interspersed throughout the text: ikebana, taiko, lacquerware, bonsai, origami, haiku, traditional Japanese sports and martial arts, as well as how Japanese names are formed. There are recipes, games, and other activities. The historic text provides the background while the author's careful retelling of four folktales provide a more intimate sense of the culture. The Japanese language is explained with common, relevant phrases introduced. A book for children from 8 to 13, but enjoyable for all ages. (For this item please quote stock ID 8952) ISBN: 9781881896210

[Indent] (For this item please quote stock ID 10674) ISBN: 9789627101277

(For this item please quote stock ID 11437) ISBN: 9780824821272

(For this item please quote stock ID 12456) ISBN: 9780824814885

[Indent] 'Japan today is fundamentally reassessing the nature of its politics, constitutional rule, and public participation in government. Wesley Sasaki-Uemura?s Organizing the Spontaneous: Citizen Protest in Postwar Japan provides invaluable historical perspective on these questions through a searching look at the formative moment of postwar Japanese democracy. This study of four little-known provincial civic groups redirects attention away from the prevailing master narrative of state repression and labor militancy in the security-treaty crisis of 1960 by focusing on the much wider, nonideological reservoir of citizen opposition to Japan?s military alliance with the United States - and by extension to Japan?s postwar establishment of politicians, bureaucrats, and business people. Thoroughly researched in a wide range of primary sources, this stimulating book brings to light the multiple motives of civilian-actors in various grassroots protest organisations while underscoring the overriding concern that united them: fear for the fate of postwar Japanese democracy at the hands of their country?s repressive central government.' - Tom Havens, Northeastern University Wesley Sasaki-Uemura is associate professor of Japanese history at the University of Utah. (For this item please quote stock ID 15990) ISBN: 9780824824396

[Indent] On the sixtieth anniversary of the Pearl Harbour attack, Silence to Light illuminates the tumultuous period, and the aftermath, of World War II and the war in Asia. Through fiction, memoirs, film scripts, poetry, photography, and manga (Japanese cartoons), the volume brings to light the personal and communal memories that have disappeared into silence. Readers get a new and vivid perspective on such events as the Manchurian Incident, the rape of Nanking, Japanese American internment, and the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The authors include well-known Japanese figures, such as Yukio Mishima and Dazai Osamu, and such contemporary authors as Hayashi Kyoko, Choko Ishigaki, and Keiji Nakazawa. American authors adding their perspective include Jeanne Wakatsuki Houston, Donald Richie, and Gladys Swan. Work by Linda Gregg, Martha Zweig, and other American authors is also included. Frank Stewart is the author of four books and the editor of six, primarily on Pacific and Asian writers and literature. Leza Lowitz is an award-winning translator and the coeditor and cotranslator of two anthologies of contemporary Japanese women's poetry, A Long Rainy Season and Other Side River. Manoa 13:1 (For this item please quote stock ID 15992) ISBN: 9780824824365

[Indent] 'A compelling explanation for the peculiar, distorted form that moral argumentation surrounding war responsibility has taken. This is a politically and intellectually courageous study that arrives at balanced, dispassionate, illuminating, and persuasive conclusions.? - Gary D. Allinson, University of Virginia ?Required reading for scholars of nationalism, modern Japanese culture, society and politics, and for anyone who wishes to understand the challenges and possibilities of democracy in contemporary Japan.? - Kevin M. Doak, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign Since World War II ?victim consciousness? (higaisha ishiki) has been an essential component of Japanese pacifist national identity. In his meticulously crafted narrative and analysis, James Orr reveals how postwar Japanese elites and American occupying authorities collaborated to structure the parameters of remembrance of the war, including the notion that the emperor and his people had been betrayed and duped by militarists. Fluently written and flawlessly executed, The Victim as Hero will contribute greatly to the discourses on nationalism and war responsibility in Japan. James J. Orr teaches in the Department of East Asian Studies at Bucknell University. (For this item please quote stock ID 15993) ISBN: 9780824824358

[Indent] Humorous and poignant, Rough Living (Arakure) follows the fortunes of an ambitious young seamstress, Oshima, as she strives to survive and prosper in Meiji Japan. Written in 1915 by Tokuda Shusei (1872-1943), the great chronicler of Japan?s working class, Rough Living explores the social transformations the country underwent in the early twentieth century from the perspective of a young woman who personifies the hungry, entrepreneurial spirit of the times. Through Oshima?s eyes we see the formation of the structures of modern everyday life under capitalism as they evolved in Japan from the time of her birth in 1884 until the end of the novel, around 1910. An unwanted child, Oshima is adopted by a prosperous family but runs away repeatedly after refusing an arranged marriage to a young man with ?the feudal mentality of a slave.? Oshima endures a series of ineffectual husbands and lovers and failed business ventures but refuses to be the victim. She does not tolerate derogatory treatment by men and shocks the citizens of Tokyo by wearing Western-style dresses and riding a bicycle around the city to promote her tailoring business. Largely through her efforts, she and her common-law husband prosper, but in the end she relinquishes her hard-won success for a chance to start a new business with an attractive employee she hopes to seduce. Richard Torrance is associate professor of Japanese at Ohio State University. He is the author of The Fiction of Tokuda Shusei and the Emergence of Japan's New Middle Class. (For this item please quote stock ID 15995) ISBN: 9780824823870

[Indent] Artistic Detachment in Japan and the West takes up the notion of artistic detachment, or psychic distance, as an intercultural motif for East-West comparative aesthetics. The work begins with an overview of aesthetic theory in the West from the eighteenth-century empiricists to contemporary aesthetics and concludes with a survey of various critiques of psychic distance. Throughout, the author takes a highly innovative approach by juxtaposing Western aesthetic theory against Eastern (primarily Japanese) aesthetic theory. Weaving between cultures and time periods, the author focuses on a remarkably wide range of theories: in the West, the Kantian notion of disinterested contemplation, Heidegger?s 'Gelassenheit', semiotics, and pragmatism; in Japan, Zeami?s notion of 'riken no ken', the Kyoto School?s interpretation of nothingness, D. T. Suzuki?s analysis of the function of no-mind, and the writings of Kuki Shûzò on Buddhist detachment. ?Portrait of the artist? fiction by such writers as Henry James, James Joyce, Mori Ògai, and Natsume Sòseki demonstrates how the main theme of detachment is expressed in literary traditions. Steve Odin is professor of philosophy at the University of Hawai'i. (For this item please quote stock ID 15996) ISBN: 9780824823740

[Indent] 'Supersedes in nearly every respect every other critical study of the Kyoto School. Heisig writes with exemplary clarity about topics that have traditionally revelled in obscurity. An extraordinary accomplishment.? - Thomas Kasulis, Ohio State University ?In Heisig the Kyoto philosophers appear to have found a commentator who sufficiently approaches their own intellectual stature to re-live their own adventures of ideas.' - Jan Van Bragt, Professor Emeritus, Nanzan University The past twenty years have seen the publication of numerous translations and commentaries on the principal philosophers of the Kyoto School, but so far no general overview and evaluation of their thought has been available, either in Japanese or in Western languages. James Heisig, a longstanding participant in these efforts, has filled that gap with Philosophers of Nothingness. In this extensive study, the ideas of Nishida Kitarò, Tanabe Hajime, and Nishitani Keiji are presented both as a consistent school of thought in its own right and as a challenge to the Western philosophical tradition to open itself to the original contribution of Japan. James W. Heisig is a permanent fellow of the Nanzan Institute for Religion and Culture in Nagoya, Japan. NANZAN LIBRARY OF ASIAN RELIGION AND CULTURE (For this item please quote stock ID 15997) ISBN: 9780824824815

[Indent] This volume, a project of the English Translation Committee of the Nichiren-shu Overseas Propagation Promotion Association (NOPPA), constitutes all twenty-three writings of Buddhist reformer Nichiren Shonin (1222-1282) included in the Nichiren Shonin Zenshu (Complete Writings of Nichiren Shonin), Volume II: Theology 2, published in Tokyo in 1996. Kyotsu Hori is former professor at Tokyo Rissho Junior College. George Tanabe, Jr., is professor of religion at the University of Hawai'i. (For this item please quote stock ID 18094) ISBN: 9780824825515

[Indent] 'Lively writing, with a broad range of moods and styles' - dannyreviews.com 'Uniquely Okinawan. Yet the success of this book does not depend upon an exotic regionalism. Directness, honesty and inclusiveness are the winning qualities.' - The Japan Times Southern Exposure is the first anthology of Okinawan literature to appear in English translation, and it appears at a propitious time. Although Okinawa Prefecture comprises only one percent of Japan's population, its writers have been winning a disproportionate number of literary awards in recent years - including the prestigious Akutagawa Prize for fiction, which was awarded to Matayoshi Eiki in 1996 and to Medoruma Shun in 1997. Both Matayoshi and Medoruma are represented in this anthology, which includes a wide range of fiction as well as a sampling of poetry from the 1920s to the present day. Modern Okinawa has been forged by a history of conquest and occupation by mainland Japan and the United States. Its sense of dual subjugation and the propensity of its writers to confront their own complicity with Japanese militarism imbues Okinawa's literary tradition with insightful perspectives on a wide range of issues. But this tradition is as deeply rooted in the region's lush semitropical landscape as in the forces of history. As this anthology demonstrates, Okinawan writers often suffuse their works with a lyricism and humour that disarms readers while bringing them face to face with the region's richly ambiguous legacy. Michael Molasky is associate professor of Japanese literature at University of Minnesota, Twin Cities. Steve Rabson is associate professor of Japanese at Brown University. (For this item please quote stock ID 18117) ISBN: 9780824823009

Winner, 1998 Eugene M. Kayden Manuscript Award 'A book that sets new standards for Western criticism of Japanese literature.' - Donald Richie, The Japan Times, 6 February 2001 'A fine comparative study of narrative strategies East and West ... [that] will no doubt trigger interest in interpreting many of the yet unexamined texts in Kafu's collected works.' - Monumenta Nipponica 56 (2001) 'This articulate, elegantly written book ... reassesses the author's reputation as a brilliant writer but second-rate novelist ... [and] makes a convincing case for Kafu's literary debt to Mori Ogai (1862-1922) and for the centrality of the demimonde in Kafu's oeuvre.' - Choice, February 2001 Stephen Snyder examines Kafu's fiction in terms of narrative strategy, placing him squarely within some of the most important currents of literary modernism - at the nexus of Naturalism and the largely antithetical development of the modernist reflexive novel. Stephen Snyder is assistant professor of Japanese at the University of Colorado, Boulder. (For this item please quote stock ID 18130) ISBN: 9780824822361

The premiere book in understanding the Japanese tourist market. (For this item please quote stock ID 18132) ISBN: 9780824817596

In this, the first collection in English of feminist-oriented research on Japanese art and visual culture, an international group of scholars examines representations of women in a wide range of visual work. (For this item please quote stock ID 20700) ISBN: 9780824825720

This is the fourth and final volume in a monumental new series that traces kabuki's changing relations to Japanese society during the premodern era. The 12 plays translated in Volume 4 cover the remarkable Meiji period, which followed the restoration of the emperor as the leader of Japan. They reflect the years in which reform-minded leaders struggled to help Japan catch up with the West. Dramatists no less than others sought ways in which to bring their traditional art into the modern world and to bring international respectability to the national stage. Included are kabuki dance plays that strive to resemble nô and kyôgen; historical dramas that abandon theatrical fantasy and opt for accurate reproduction of ancient manners; domestic dramas featuring colourful heroes and heroines; pieces that introduce faddish Western properties and behavior; and a play that bridges the gap between the conventions of classical kabuki, Shakespeare, and modern psychological drama. Dominating the era are the works of Kawatake Mokuami, the last great kabuki playwright, while the dramaturgy of literary scholar Tsubouchi Shôyô brings kabuki into the twentieth century. James R. Brandon is emeritus professor of Asian theatre at the University of Hawai`i. Samuel L. Leiter is professor of theatre at Brooklyn College, City University of New York, and also teaches at The Graduate Center, City University of New York. (For this item please quote stock ID 20702) ISBN: 9780824825744

[Indent] This volume, a project of the English Translation Committee of the Nichiren-shu Overseas Propagation Promotion Association (NOPPA), constitutes a translation of all 18 writings of Buddhist reformer Nichiren Shonin (1222-1282) included in the Nichiren Shonin Zenshu (Complete Writings of Nichiren Shonin), Volume I: Theology 1, published in Tokyo in 1996. (For this item please quote stock ID 20728) ISBN: 9780824827335

[Indent] Examines literary, linguistic, and cultural representations of Japan's colonial South. Building on the most recent scholarship from Japan, Taiwan, and the West, it takes a cross-cultural, multidisciplinary, comparative approach that considers the views of both coloniser and colonised as expressed in travel accounts and popular writing as well as scholarly treatments of the area's cultures and customs. (For this item please quote stock ID 20735) ISBN: 9780824825928

[Indent] Although still virtually unknown in the West, Ôoka Shôhei (1909-1988) is one of Japan's most important and influential writers and social critics. The Burdens of Survival is both a seminal English-language study of this pre-eminent literary figure and one of the first scholarly works to thoroughly examine the war literature of a major Japanese veteran-author. (For this item please quote stock ID 20736) ISBN: 9780824825409

[Indent] (For this item please quote stock ID 21227) ISBN: 9780824828028

'Every now and then a book comes along that impacts its field in such profound ways that it is a certainty to appear in virtually every subsequent bibliography and to be footnoted ubiquitously ... For any student of Japanese religion, this is a "must read"' - Japanese Journal of Religious Studies. Jacqueline Stone is professor of Japanese religions at Princeton University. (For this item please quote stock ID 21235) ISBN: 9780824827717

[Indent] Doing Fieldwork in Japan taps the expertise of North American and European specialists on the practicalities of conducting long-term research in the social sciences and cultural studies. The volume brings together decades of research experience supported by such major institutions as the Abe program, the Fulbright program, the Japan Foundation, the Japanese Society for the Promotion of Science, the Ministry of Education, the National Science Foundation, and the Social Science Research Council. This is an invaluable resource for anyone - novice or expert, first-time visitor or specialist - planning research in Japan. Theodore Bestor is professor of anthropology and Japanese studies at Harvard University. (For this item please quote stock ID 21237) ISBN: 9780824827342

[Indent] The global age of migration is fast becoming a permanent feature of Japanese life, impacting the country?s economic, social, and political landscape. The 12 essays collected here bring together the most up-to-date, original research on foreign workers and households from a variety of perspectives. Throughout, three key questions are addressed: Does the recent wave of migration constitute a new multicultural age that challenges Japan?s identity as a homogenous society? How do foreign workers confront the many difficulties of living in Japan? How is Japanese society both resisting and accommodating the growing presence of foreign workers in its communities? Japan & Global Migration is a much-needed and timely contribution to the literature on Japan and cultural difference and required reading for anyone concerned with the future of Japanese society. 'Provides a lively and richly informative discussion of the many ramifications of the immigration issues facing Japan ... While this book will be essential reading for anyone concerned with Japan and migration, it should prove invaluable to researchers and students on immigration in other countries too. The broad array of themes, the variety of author approaches and frequent comparative references to experience elsewhere have generated a richly rewarding volume' - Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies. (For this item please quote stock ID 21238) ISBN: 9780824827427

[Indent] Hailed recently as 'the greatest translator of Asian literature ever to have lived,' Arthur Waley (1889-1966) had an immeasurable influence on Western perceptions of Asia and on the development of Asian studies in the West. Waley was the single most important force in creating what the English-speaking public understood to be 'Japanese literature' with his popular and critically acclaimed translations of Japanese poetry, nô plays, and the celebrated 11th-century court romance The Tale of Genji. Orienting Arthur Waley, the first book-length study of Waley and his Japanese translations, provides a provocative examination of Waley's contribution to 20th-century English literature and culture. John de Gruchy examines how social contexts influenced Waley's work, and he further locates Waley's Japanese translations within the political contexts of the japonism movement, British socialism and imperialism, and the development of Japanese studies in England. How a 'cult of things Japanese' in the early modern period in Britain led to the emergence of one of the 20th century's most important translators is a fascinating story in itself. John Walter de Gruchy is associate professor of English language and literature at Kagoshima Immaculate Heart College. (For this item please quote stock ID 21252) ISBN: 9780824825676

[Indent] (For this item please quote stock ID 21284) ISBN: 9784314101486

In the West, classical art - inextricably linked to concerns of a ruling or dominant class - commonly refers to art with traditional themes and styles that resurrect a past golden era. Although art of the early Edo period (1600-1868) encompasses a spectrum of themes and styles, references to the past are so common that many Japanese art historians have variously described this period as a 'classical revival,' 'era of classicism,' or a 'renaissance.' How did 17th-century artists and patrons imagine the past? How did classical manners relate to other styles and themes found in Edo art? In considering such questions, the contributors to this volume hold that classicism has been an amorphous, changing concept in Japan - just as in the West. The authors of the essays collected here are by no means unanimous in their assessment of the use of the label 'classicism.' Although they may not agree on a definition of the term and its applicability to 17th-century Japanese art, all recognise the relevance of recent scholarly currents that call into question methods that privilege Western culture. Their various approaches - from stylistic analysis and theoretical conceptualisation to assessment of related political and literary trends - greatly increase our understanding of the art of the period and its function in society. Contributors: Laura Allen, Karen Gerhart, Elizabeth Lillehoj, Sam Morse, Joshua Mostow, Keiko Nakamachi, Quittman Eugene Phillips, Satoko Tamamushi, Melanie Trede. Elizabeth Lillehoj is associate professor specialising in Japanese art history at DePaul University, Chicago. (For this item please quote stock ID 22679) ISBN: 9780824826994

[Indent] This fifth volume, Japanese Theater of the 1970s, explores six plays. Crime is the dominant subject. Three plays are about homicide, two are about other criminal offenses against public order and society, and one is about survival during times of war. While many of the human relations depicted in these works illustrate exploitation and brutalisation, the touch of the playwrights is often surprisingly light and humorous. These dramas offer serious but enjoyable reading. Contents: The Amida Black Chant Murder Mystery (Fujita Den); The Atami Murder Case (Tsuka Kôhei); Mystery Tour (Komatsu Mikio); The Family Adrift: The Jesus Ark Incident (Yamazaki Tetsu); Ayako: Mom's Cherry Blossoms Never Fall (Okabe Kôdai); Claire de Lune (Takeuchi Jûichirô). (For this item please quote stock ID 22681) ISBN: 9784314101547

'A lasting contribution to the study of Japanese religions and set[s] a high standard of rigorous, exhaustive research' - Helen Hardacre, Reischauer Institute of Japanese Studies, Harvard University. 'A well-written, thoroughly researched book that will become a seminal work in the study of modern Japanese religion' - Richard Jaffe, Duke University. The idea that personal cultivation leads to social and material well-being became widespread in late Tokugawa Japan (1600-1868). Practical Pursuits explores theories of personal development that were diffused in the early 19th century by a network of religious groups in the Edo (Tokyo) area, and explains how, after the Meiji Restoration of 1868, the leading members of these communities went on to create ideological coalitions inspired by the pursuit of a modern form of cultivation. Variously engaged in divination, Shinto purification rituals, and Zen practice, these individuals ultimately used informal political associations to promote the Confucian-style assumption that personal improvement is the basis for national prosperity. This wide-ranging yet painstakingly researched study represents a new direction in historical analysis. Where previous scholarship has used large conceptual units like Confucianism and Buddhism as its main actors and has emphasised the discontinuities in Edo and Meiji religious life, Sawada addresses the history of religion in 19th-century Japan at the level of individuals and small groups. She employs personal cultivation as an interpretive system, crossing familiar boundaries to consider complex linguistic, philosophical, and social interconnections. Janine Tasca Sawada currently teaches at the University of Iowa and is the author of Confucian Values & Popular Zen: Sekimon Shingaku in Eighteenth Century Japan. (For this item please quote stock ID 22688) ISBN: 9780824827526

[Indent] Published in 1930, when Japan was struggling to define and assert its national and cultural identity, The Structure of Iki (Iki no kôzô) re-introduced the Japanese to a sophisticated tradition of urbane and spirited stylishness (iki) that was forged in the Edo period. Upon his return from Europe, Kuki Shûzô (1888-1941) made use of the new theoretical frameworks based on Western Continental methodology to redefine the significance of iki in Japanese society and culture. By applying Heidegger's hermeneutics to this cultural phenomenon, he attempted to recast traditional understanding in the context of Western aesthetic theory and reestablish the centrality of a purely Japanese sense of 'taste'. The three critical essays that accompany this new translation of The Structure of Iki look at various aspects of Kuki, his work, and the historical context that influenced his thinking. Hiroshi Nara first traces Kuki's interest in a philosophy of life through his exposure to Husserl, Heidegger, and Bergson. In the second essay, J. Thomas Rimer compels readers to reexamine The Structure of Iki as a work in the celebrated tradition of zuihitsu (stream-of-consciousness writings) and takes into account French literary influences on Kuki. The philosopher's controversial link with Heidegger is explored by Jon Mark Mikkelsen in the final essay. (For this item please quote stock ID 22706) ISBN: 9780824827359

Eshinni (1182-1268?), a Buddhist nun and the wife of Shinran (1173?1262), the celebrated founder of the True Pure Land, or Shin, school of Buddhism, was largely unknown until the discovery of a collection of her letters in 1921. In this study, James Dobbins, a leading scholar of Pure Land Buddhism, has made creative use of these letters to shed new light on life and religion in medieval Japan. He provides a complete translation of the letters and an explication of them that reveals the character and flavour of early Shin Buddhism. Readers will come away with a new perspective on Pure Land scholarship and a vivid image of Eshinni and the world in which she lived. After situating the ideas and practices of Pure Land Buddhism in the context of the actual living conditions of thirteenth-century Japan, Dobbins examines the portrayal of women in Pure Land Buddhism, the great range of lifestyles found among medieval women and nuns, and how they constructed a meaningful religious life amid negative stereotypes. He goes on to analyse aspects of medieval religion that have been omitted in our modern-day account of Pure Land and tries to reconstruct the religious assumptions of Eshinni and Shinran in their own day. A prevailing theme that runs throughout the book is the need to look beyond idealised images of Buddhism found in doctrine to discover the religion as it was lived and practiced. Scholars and students of Buddhism, Japanese history, women?s studies, and religious studies will find much in this engaging work that is thought-provoking and insightful. James Dobbins is professor of religion and East Asian studies at Oberlin College. (For this item please quote stock ID 23301) ISBN: 9780824828707

~Eshinni (1182-1268?), a Buddhist nun and the wife of Shinran (1173?1262), the celebrated founder of the True Pure Land, or Shin, school of Buddhism, was largely unknown until the discovery of a collection of her letters in 1921. In this study, James Dobbins, a leading scholar of Pure Land Buddhism, has made creative use of these letters to shed new light on life and religion in medieval Japan. He provides a complete translation of the letters and an explication of them that reveals the character and flavour of early Shin Buddhism. Readers will come away with a new perspective on Pure Land scholarship and a vivid image of Eshinni and the world in which she lived. (For this item please quote stock ID 23302) ISBN: 9780824826673

~Dimensions of Asian Spirituality

~Nine out of ten Japanese claim some affiliation with Shinto, but in the West the religion remains the least studied of the major Asian spiritual traditions. It is so interlaced with Japanese cultural values and practices that scholarly studies usually focus on only one of its dimensions: Shinto as a 'nature religion', an 'imperial state religion', a 'primal religion', or a 'folk amalgam of practices and beliefs'. Thomas Kasulis' fresh approach to Shinto explains with clarity and economy how these different aspects interrelate.

~As a philosopher of religion, he first analyses the experiential aspect of Shinto spirituality underlying its various ideas and practices. Second, as a historian of Japanese thought, he sketches several major developments in Shinto doctrines and institutions from prehistory to the present, showing how its interactions with Buddhism, Confucianism, and nationalism influenced its expression in different times and contexts. In Shinto's idiosyncratic history, Kasulis finds the explicit interplay between two forms of spirituality: the 'existential' and the 'essentialist'. Although the dynamic between the two is particularly striking and accessible in the study of Shinto, he concludes that a similar dynamic may be found in the history of other religions as well.

~Two decades ago, Kasulis' Zen Action/Zen Person brought an innovative understanding to the ideas and practices of Zen Buddhism, an understanding influential in the ensuing decades of philosophical Zen studies. Shinto: The Way Home promises to do the same for future Shinto studies.

~Thomas Kasulis is professor in the Department of Comparative Studies at Ohio State University. His publications include the classic Zen Action/Zen Person (University of Hawaii Press, 1981) and more recently Intimacy or Integrity: Philosophy & Cultural Difference (University of Hawaii Press, 2002). (For this item please quote stock ID 23307) ISBN: 9780824828509

~Dimensions of Asian Spirituality

~Nine out of ten Japanese claim some affiliation with Shinto, but in the West the religion remains the least studied of the major Asian spiritual traditions. It is so interlaced with Japanese cultural values and practices that scholarly studies usually focus on only one of its dimensions: Shinto as a 'nature religion', an 'imperial state religion', a 'primal religion', or a 'folk amalgam of practices and beliefs'. Thomas Kasulis' fresh approach to Shinto explains with clarity and economy how these different aspects interrelate. (For this item please quote stock ID 23308) ISBN: 9780824827946

~Studies of the Weatherhead East Asian Institute, Columbia University.

~'This will take its place as a major book in Japanese and Korean history, prompting a reexamination of Japan's controversial annexation of Korea. Dudden's fascinating analysis rests on the sort of transnational research that scholars often talk about, but rarely undertake. Japan's rise as an imperialist power should not be seen as exceptional, she argues, but rather was embedded in the global discourses of the time. She tells the remarkable and unsettling story of how Japanese leaders quickly mastered Western international law in the late nineteenth century, and how they used the new legal norms to legitimise themselves and their colonial project in the eyes of the Western powers' - Sheldon Garon, Princeton University

~'In Japan's Colonization of Korea, Alexis Dudden gives us a very compelling look at how Itô Hirobumi and other Japanese leaders viewed geo-political relationships at the end of the nineteenth century and beginning of the twentieth. In particular, she shows that Euro-American concepts of international law both provided a motive for imperialism in general and supplied an intellectual framework to legitimate Japan's imposition of hegemony over its continental neighbour. Drawing on Korean, Japanese, and Western-language sources, Dudden adds enormously to our understanding of the intellectual foundations of Japanese imperialism, and her work surely will be compared favorably with other landmark studies on Japanese colonialism by Hilroy Conroy, Mark Peattie, and Peter Duus' - James McClain, Brown University

~'Japan's Colonization of Korea makes a powerful case that every step Japan took to erase Korea's sovereignty was 'legal' in the prevailing terms of international conduct at the start of the twentieth century - and that taking Korea as a protectorate was a strategic step in Japan's own efforts to achieve diplomatic parity with the Great Powers of the West. Alexis Dudden deftly dissects colonial rhetoric and practice from Sapporo to Seoul, interweaving biographical with textual analysis and showing a keen attentiveness throughout to Korean as well as Japanese voices. Drawing on legal history, colonial studies, and translation theory, the book is impressive in both heft and range. A compelling addition to the growing field of comparative imperial history' - Karen Wigen, Stanford University

~From its creation in the early twentieth century, policymakers used the discourse of international law to legitimate Japan's empire. Although the Japanese state aggrandizers' reliance on this discourse did not create the imperial nation Japan would become, their fluent use of its terms inscribed Japan's claims as legal practice within Japan and abroad. Focusing on Japan's annexation of Korea in 1910, Alexis Dudden gives long-needed attention to the intellectual history of the empire and brings to light presumptions of the twentieth century's so-called international system by describing its most powerful - and most often overlooked - member's engagement with that system.

~Early chapters describe the global atmosphere that declared Japan the legal ruler of Korea and frame the significance of the discourse of early twentieth-century international law and how its terms became Japanese. Dudden then brings together these discussions in her analysis of how Meiji leaders embedded this discourse into legal precedent for Japan, particularly in its relations with Korea. Remaining chapters explore the limits of these 'universal' ideas and consider how the international arena measured Japan's use of its terms. Dudden squares her examination of the legality of Japan's imperialist designs by discussing the place of colonial policy studies in Japan at the time, demonstrating how this new discipline further created a common sense that Japan's empire accorded to knowledgeable practice.

~This landmark study greatly enhances our understanding of the intellectual underpinnings of Japan's imperial aspirations. In this carefully researched and cogently argued work, Dudden makes clear that, even before Japan annexed Korea, it had embarked on a legal and often legislating mission to make its colonization legitimate in the eyes of the world.

~Alexis Dudden is Sue and Eugene Mercy Assistant Professor of History at Connecticut College. (For this item please quote stock ID 23319) ISBN: 9780824828295

Rhetoric in Modern Japan is the first volume to discuss the role of Western rhetoric in the creation of a modern Japanese oral and narrative style. It considers the introduction of Western rhetoric, clarifying its interactions with the forces and synergies that shaped Japanese literature and culture in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Focusing on the Meiji and Taishô years (1868-1926), it challenges the prevailing view among contemporary scholars that rhetoric did not play a significant role in the literary developments of the period. Massimiliano Tomasi chronicles the blooming of scholarship in the field in the early 1870s, providing the first descriptive analysis and cogently articulated critique of the major rhetorical treatises of the time. In discussing the rise of public speaking in early Meiji society, he unveils the existence of crucial links between the study of rhetoric and the social and literary events of the time, underscoring the key role played by oratory both as a tool for social modernisation and as an effective platform for the reappraisal of the spoken language. The collusion and conflicts characterizing rhetoric and its relationship with the genbun itchi movement, which sought to unify spoken and written language, are explored, demonstrating that their perceived antagonism was the product of a misguided notion of rhetoric and the process of rhetorical signification rather than a true theoretical conflict. Tomasi makes a convincing argument that, in fact, Western rhetoric mediated between these equally compelling pursuits and paved the way toward an acceptable compromise between classical and colloquial written styles. Massimiliano Tomasi is associate professor of Japanese at Western Washington University. (For this item please quote stock ID 23320) ISBN: 9780824827984

~Divisions of Labor positions the ideological and organisational evolution of the Japanese labour movement within the larger historical currents that shaped and organized labour globally in the twentieth century. Interspersing detailed narratives of Japanese labour history with analyses of parallel developments in Western European and international labour movements, Lonny Carlile shows how world views and labour movement strategies were shared across national boundaries and shaped in similar ways in the industrialised West and East. Beyond this, he highlights how in both Western Europe and Japan issues that had divided labour since the 1920s were central to the Cold War, which kept labour movements at odds with themselves internally in systematically similar ways. His book suggests that, to the extent that the historical courses of labour movements diverged, this was as much a product of differences in geopolitical location as any inherent cultural or nationally specific ideological tendency.

~The volume's approach brings to the fore an important new dimension to our existing understanding of post?World War II Japanese labour and political history by outlining the connection between the politics of Japanese labour and the structure and dynamics of global politics. In addition, by drawing out these parallels and similarities, it provides thought-provoking insights into twentieth-century labour movements in general. Divisions of Labor will be of interest not only to students and specialists of Japan and East Asia, but also to readers with a more general interest in labour history and politics, diplomatic history, Cold War history, comparative politics, and sociology.

~Lonny Carlile is associate professor of Asian studies at the University of Hawai`i. (For this item please quote stock ID 23321) ISBN: 9780824824563

In this fascinating collection of translations, Telling Lives looks at the self-writing of five Japanese women who came of age during the decades leading up to World War II. Following an introduction that situates women's self-writing against the backdrop of Japan during the 1920s and 1930s, Loftus takes up the autobiographies of Oku Mumeo, a leader of the prewar women's movement, and Takai Toshio, a textile worker who later became a well-known labour activist. Next is the moving story of Nishi Kyoko, whose Reminiscences tells of her life as a young woman who escapes the oppression of her family and establishes her financial independence. Nishi's narrative precedes a detailed look at the autobiography of Sata Ineko. Sata's Between the Lines of My Personal Chronology recounts her years as a member of a proletarian arts circle and her struggle to become a writer. The collection ends with the Marxist Fukunaga Misao's frank and explosive text Memoirs of a Female Communist, which is examined as a manifesto condemning the male chauvinism of the prewar Japanese Communist Party. Ronald Loftus is chair of the Department of Japanese and Chinese at Willamette University. (For this item please quote stock ID 23322) ISBN: 9780824828349

In this fascinating collection of translations, Telling Lives looks at the self-writing of five Japanese women who came of age during the decades leading up to World War II. (For this item please quote stock ID 23323) ISBN: 9780824827533

'A significant contribution to the field. It is based on superb scholarship, provides elegant translations, and presents original ideas and new information about a body of relatively unknown texts' - Laurel Rasplica Rodd, University of Colorado at Boulder This collection of Japanese women's diary literature (nikki bungaku) begins with The Takemitsu Journal (also known as The Tale of the Tônomine Lesser Captain, c. 962), an important precursor and model for the famous Kagerô Diary, and Tales of Toyokage (c. 971), a fictionalised reworking of his own poems by Regent Koremasa himself. It also includes the first complete English translations of the Hon'in no Jiju and of the narrative section of The Collected Poems of Lady Ise. The volume concludes with the Tales of Takamura (1185-1333), which Mostow describes as a site of struggle between masculine and feminine narrative styles. Joshua Mostow is professor of Asian studies at the University of British Columbia. (For this item please quote stock ID 23324) ISBN: 9780824827786

Winner, 2003 JUSFC Award for Translation of Japanese Literature. In Light of Shadows is the long-awaited second volume of short fiction by the Meiji-Taishô writer Izumi Kyôka. It includes the famous novella Uta andon (A Story by Lantern Light), the bizarre, antipsychological story Mayu kakushi no rei (A Quiet Obsession), and Kyôka's hauntingly erotic final work, Rukôshinsô (The Heartvine), as well as critical discussions of each of these three tales. Translator Charles Inouye places Kyôka's 'literature of shadows' (kage no bungaku) within a worldwide gothic tradition even as he refines its Japanese context. Underscoring Kyôka's relevance for a contemporary international audience, Inouye adjusts Tanizaki Jun'ichirô's evaluation of Kyôka as the most Japanese of authors by demonstrating how the writer's paradigm of the suffering heroine can be linked to his exposure to Christianity, to a beautiful American woman, and to the aesthetic of blood sacrifice. In Light of Shadows masterfully conveys the magical allusiveness and elliptical style of this extraordinary writer, who Mishima Yukio called 'the only genius of modern Japanese letters'. Charles Shirô Inouye is professor of Japanese and former dean of the Colleges for Undergraduate Education at Tufts University. (For this item please quote stock ID 23325) ISBN: 9780824828943

Winner, 2003 JUSFC Award for Translation of Japanese Literature. In Light of Shadows masterfully conveys the magical allusiveness and elliptical style of this extraordinary writer, who Mishima Yukio called 'the only genius of modern Japanese letters'. Charles Shirô Inouye is professor of Japanese and former dean of the Colleges for Undergraduate Education at Tufts University. (For this item please quote stock ID 23326) ISBN: 9780824828240

The self serves as a universally available, effective, and indispensable filter for making sense of the chaos of the world. In her latest book, Takie Lebra attempts a new understanding of the Japanese self through her unique use of cultural logic. She begins by presenting and elaborating on two models ('opposition logic' and 'contingency logic') to examine concepts of self, Japanese and otherwise. Guided by these, she delves into the three layers of the Japanese self, focusing first on the social layer as located in four 'zones' - omote (front), uchi (interior), ura (back), and soto (exterior) - and its shifts from zone to zone. New light is shed on these familiar linguistic and spatial categories by introducing the dimension of civility. The book expands the discussion in relation to larger constructions of the inner and cosmological self. Unlike the social self, which views itself in relation to the 'other', the inner layer involves a reflexivity in which self communicates with self. While the social self engages in dialogue or trialogue, the inner self communicates through monologue or soliloquy. The cosmological layer, which centres around transcendental beliefs and fantasies, is examined and the analysis supplemented with comments on aesthetics. Throughout, Lebra applies her methodology to dozens of Japanese examples and makes relevant comparisons with North American culture and notions of self. Finally, she provides a spirited analysis of critiques of Nihonjinron to reinforce the relevancy of Japanese studies. This volume is the culmination of decades of thinking on self and social relations by one of the most influential scholars in the field. It will prove highly instructive to Japanese and non-Japanese readers alike in a range of disciplines, including anthropology, sociology, and social psychology. Takie Sugiyama Lebra is professor emeritus of anthropology at the University of Hawai`i. (For this item please quote stock ID 23327) ISBN: 9780824828400

[Indent] The publication in 1992 of Miyabe Miyuke's highly anticipated Kasha (translated into English as All She Was Worth) represents a watershed in the history of Japanese women's detective fiction. Inspired by Miyabe's success and the increasing number of Western mysteries in translation, women began writing mysteries of all types, employing the narrative and conceptual resources of the detective genre to depict and critique contemporary Japanese society - and the situation of women in it. Bodies of Evidence examines this recent boom and the ways in which five contemporary authors (Miyabe, Nonami Asa, Shibata Yoshiki, Kirino Natsuo, and Matsuo Yumi) critically engage with a variety of social issues and concerns: consumerism and the crisis of identity, discrimination and harassment in the workplace, sexual harassment and sexual violence, and motherhood. Bodies of Evidence moves beyond the borders of detective fiction scholarship by exploring the worlds constructed by these authors in their novels and showing how they intersect with other political, cultural, and economic discourses and with the lived experiences of contemporary Japanese women. 'Amanda Seaman not only advances the study of Japanese literature by opening the door to a new genre, but also contributes to ongoing discussions of women in contemporary Japanese culture' - Rebecca Copeland, author of Lost Leaves: Women Writers of Meiji Japan. Amanda Seaman is assistant professor of Japanese literature at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. (For this item please quote stock ID 23719) ISBN: 9780824827366

This study involves a 1400-kilometre-long pilgrimage around Japan's fourth largest island, Shikoku. In travelling the circuit of the 88 Buddhist temples that make up the route, pilgrims make their journey together with Kòbò Daishi (774-835), the holy miracle-working figure who is at the heart of the pilgrimage. Once seen as a marginal practice, recent media portrayal of the pilgrimage as a symbol of Japanese cultural heritage has greatly increased the number of participants, both Japanese and foreign. In this absorbing look at the nature of the pilgrimage, Ian Reader examines contemporary practices and beliefs in the context of historical development, taking into account theoretical considerations of pilgrimage as a mode of activity and revealing how pilgrimages such as Shikoku may change in nature over the centuries. This rich ethnographic work covers a wide range of pilgrimage activity and behavior, drawing on accounts of pilgrims travelling by traditional means on foot as well as those taking advantage of the new package bus tours, and exploring the pilgrimage's role in the everyday lives of participants and the people of Shikoku alike. It discusses the various ways in which the pilgrimage is made and the forces that have shaped it in the past and in the present, including history and legend, the island's landscape and residents, the narratives and actions of the pilgrims and the priests who run the temples, regional authorities, and commercial tour operators and bus companies. In studying the Shikoku pilgrimage from anthropological, historical, and sociological perspectives, Reader shows in vivid detail the ambivalence and complexity of pilgrimage as a phenomenon that is simultaneously local, national, and international and both marginal and integral to the lives of its participants. Critically astute yet highly accessible, Making Pilgrimages will be welcomed by those with an interest in anthropology, religious studies, and Japanese studies, and will be essential for anyone contemplating making the pilgrimage themselves. Ian Reader is professor of religious studies at Lancaster University, England. He is the author of numerous books and articles on aspects of Japanese social and religious life. (For this item please quote stock ID 24202) ISBN: 9780824829070

'A superbly translated collection of fiction by a Japanese proletarian writer, a work of artistry and integrity' - Norma Field, University of Chicago. Why is education potentially subversive? How does ethnocentrism facilitate an oppressive status quo? Who actually benefits from war? Questions such as these were integral to the work of writer Kuroshima Denji (1898-1943), one of modern Japan's most dedicated antimilitarist intellectuals. Kuroshima was wholeheartedly committed to fundamental change and produced numerous literary works expressing his passionate opposition to armed force as an instrument of imperialism. His only full-length novel, superbly translated here as Militarized Streets, was censored by both Japan's imperial government and the U.S. occupation authorities. The present volume comprises much of Kuroshima's most highly acclaimed work for the first time in English. (For this item please quote stock ID 24204) ISBN: 9780824829261

This volume, the 11th project of the English Translation Committee of the Nichiren-shu Overseas Propagation Promotion Association (NOPPA), constitutes all 17 writings of Buddhist reformer Nichiren Shonin (1222-1282) included in the Nichiren Shonin Zenshu (Complete Writings of Nichiren Shonin), Volume III: Theology 3, published in Tokyo in 1994. The Nichiren Shonin Zenshu is a modern Japanese version of Nichiren?s original writings, translated and edited with annotations by modern scholars of Nichiren Buddhism. Despite its all-inclusive titles, the Zenshu is highly selective in that it takes into account only writings considered bibliographically authentic (i.e., attested to by original manuscripts). Among such texts, those included in the Showa Teihon Nichiren Shonin Ibun (Writings of Nichiren Shonin Standardized in the Showa Period), compiled by the Rissho Daigaku Nichiren Kyogaku Kenkyu-jo (Center for the Study of Nichiren Buddhism), are considered the most authoritative, and they provide the basic texts for this volume. Kyotsu Hori is former professor at Tokyo Rissho Junior College for Women. Jay Sakashita is instructor of religion at the University of Hawai`i. (For this item please quote stock ID 24208) ISBN: 9780824829315

Nanzan Library of Asian Religion and Culture Published in association with the Nanzan Institute for Religion and Culture, Nanzan University 'Wargo actually makes sense of Nishida's notoriously difficult way of thinking. His is the rare gift of presenting Nishida's often tangled and meandering path of argumentation. Just as important, he thinks along with Nishida, showing where his questions came from and precisely how he went about answering them ... The comparisons and contrasts with Nishida's predecessors, the two Inoue's, with Descartes, Berkeley, Hume, and Kant, as well as with Wittgenstein and Quine, are relevant and illuminating' - John C. Maraldo, University of North Florida The writings of Nishida Kitarô, whose name has become almost synonymous with Japanese philosophy, continue to attract attention around the world. Yet studies of his thought in Western languages have tended to overlook two key areas: first, the influence of the generation of Japanese philosophers who preceded Nishida; and second, the logic of basho (place), the cornerstone of Nishida's mature philosophical system. The Logic of Nothingness addresses both of these topics. Robert Wargo argues that the overriding concern of Nishida's mature philosophy, the attempt to give a reasonable account of reality that includes the reasonableness of that account itself - or what Wargo calls 'the problem of completeness' - has its origins in Inoue Enryo's (1858-1919) and Inoue Tetsujiro's (1855-1944) preoccupation with 'the problem of standpoints.' A translation of one of Nishida's most demanding texts, included here as an appendix, demonstrates the value of Wargo's insightful analysis of the logic of basho as an aid to deciphering the philosopher's early work. Robert J. J. Wargo is professor in the Department of International Studies, Meisei University, Japan. (For this item please quote stock ID 25051) ISBN: 9780824829698

Early Japanese Buddhism was patronised by the literate classes and remained a prerogative of the elite until the end of the 12th century. With the fiscal and political decline of its aristocratic patrons, the Buddhist establishment turned increasingly to lay commoners for financial support, using paintings to accommodate its new, and often subliterate, audiences. One type of preaching, known as etoki (pictorial decipherment), helped bridge the worlds of esoteric Buddhism and lay practice and reveals much about the role of art in the context of didactic storytelling and proselytisation. Beginning with the provocative claim that the popularisation of Buddhism in the medieval period was a phenomenon of visual culture, this volume re-examines the history (and historiography) of medieval Japanese Buddhism. With theoretical sophistication and a full appreciation of the power of imagery to convey and control religious meaning, it investigates a range of aspects of etoki, including the particularly active role of itinerant nuns, whose performances were especially edifying to female audiences, as well as the visual hagiography of the reputed founder of Japanese Buddhism, the pictorial projections of Buddhist paradise and hell, and the explanation, through visual imagery, of sacred mountains. Explaining Pictures is an important groundbreaking work, the first book-length study devoted to the phenomenon of Buddhist art as religious propaganda and pictorial storytelling as a form of popular culture in medieval Japan. A truly interdisciplinary study, it suggests fruitful avenues of discussion between art historians and historians of Japanese Buddhism. Scholars and students with an interest in Japanese Buddhism, art, and social and cultural history will find its examination of significant issues fresh and stimulating. It will also find an appreciative audience among those concerned with the relationship between art and religion, the mechanics of proselytisation, and Asian visual culture. (For this item please quote stock ID 25192) ISBN: 9780824826970

Handmade Culture is the first comprehensive and cohesive study in any language to examine Raku, one of Japan?s most famous arts and a pottery technique practiced around the world. More than a history of ceramics, this innovative work considers four centuries of cultural invention and reinvention during times of both political stasis and socioeconomic upheaval. It combines scholarly erudition with an accessible story through its lively and lucid prose and its generous illustrations. The author's own experiences as the son of a professional potter and a historian inform his unique interdisciplinary approach, manifested particularly in his sensitivity to both technical ceramic issues and theoretical historical concerns. Handmade Culture makes ample use of archaeological evidence, heirloom ceramics, tea diaries, letters, woodblock prints, and gazetteers and other publications to narrate the compelling history of Raku, a fresh approach that sheds light not only on an important traditional art from Japan, but on the study of cultural history itself. Morgan Pitelka is Luce Assistant Professor of Asian Studies at Occidental College, Los Angeles. (For this item please quote stock ID 25197) ISBN: 9780824829704

The Thought War is the first book in English to examine the full extent of Japan's wartime propaganda. Based on a wide range of archival material and sources in Japanese, Chinese, and English, it explores the propaganda programs of the Japanese government from 1931 to 1945, demonstrating the true scope of imperial propaganda and its pervasive influence, an influence that is still felt today. Contrary to popular postwar rhetoric, it was not emperor worship or military authoritarianism that led an entire nation to war. Rather, it was the creation of a powerful image of Japan as the leader of modern Asia and the belief that the Japanese could and would guide Asia to a new, glorious period of reform that appealed to imperial subjects. Kushner analyses the role of the police and military in defining socially acceptable belief and behavior by using their influence to root out malcontents. His research is the first of its kind to treat propaganda as a profession in wartime Japan. He shows that the leadership was not confined to the crude tools of sloganeering and government-sponsored demonstrations but was able instead to appropriate the expertise of the nation's advertising firms to 'sell' the image of Japan as Asia's leader and moderniser. Japanese propaganda frequently conflicted with Chinese and American visions of empire, and Kushner reveals the reactions of these two nations to Japan's efforts and the meaning of their responses. Barak Kushner taught Japanese and Chinese history at Davidson College, North Carolina. He currently lives and works in Washington, D.C. (For this item please quote stock ID 25198) ISBN: 9780824829209

The fall of Singapore and the brilliant victories achieved since the start of the war mean we are protected, but I don't know just how grateful I should be - Takahashi Aiko, housewife, February 1942. This is my final departure from the home islands. I have paid my respects to those who have helped me. I have no regrets - Itabashi Yasuo, navy kamikaze pilot, February 1944. We had rice gruel for lunch again. There was no tofu in it, but there were potatoes ... We went through with the closing ceremony and received our report cards. Everyone was there. From now on, I'll persevere and not fail - Manabe Ichiro, primary school student, July 1944. This collection of diaries gives readers a powerful, firsthand look at the effects of the Pacific War on eight ordinary Japanese. Immediate, vivid, and at times surprisingly frank, the diaries chronicle the last years of the war and its aftermath as experienced by a navy kamikaze pilot, an army straggler on Okinawa, an elderly Kyoto businessman, a Tokyo housewife, a young working woman in Tokyo, a teenage girl mobilised for war work, and two schoolchildren evacuated to the countryside. Samuel Yamashita's introduction provides a helpful overview of the historiography on wartime Japan and offers valuable insights into the important, everyday issues that concerned Japanese during a different and disastrously difficult time. 'The diaries reveal a far richer variety of attitudes toward the war than previous works have shown us; they reveal a thoughtfulness and a down-to-earth approach to life that will surprise those reared on wartime stereotypes. They will be of interest to all students, both scholars and general readers of World War II and wartime Japan' - James Huffman, Wittenburg University. Samuel Hideo Yamashita is the Henry E. Sheffield Professor of History at Pomona College. (For this item please quote stock ID 25199) ISBN: 9780824829773

Murôji, a magnificent temple founded in the eighth century, is known both for its dramatic location and the exceptional quality of its ritual objects and art dating from the ninth and 10th centuries of the Heian period. Sherry Fowler makes extensive use of primary sources to explore the circumstances surrounding the creation and function of the temple's main images and considers why major works of early Heian sculpture were housed in such a remote mountain setting. Employing a multifaceted approach that looks at Murôji's art and architecture in socio-political context, she explores the establishment of the temple, its role in the religious life and power structure of the region, and the ways in which the temple reconfigured its early history to suit its later circumstances. Emerging from Fowler's study are pervasive themes relating to worship and practice at Murôji that highlight plurality of practice (of different schools of Buddhism as well as Shinto); flexibility of practice and its impact on sculptural icons; the relationship of Murôji to other temple/shrine complexes; and the association of the temple with women's worship. Sherry Fowler is associate professor of Japanese art history at the University of Kansas. (For this item please quote stock ID 25220) ISBN: 9780824827922

National surveys indicate that most Japanese, while professing no religious commitment, frequently perform rituals: they regularly tend their family home altars, look after family graves, participate in neighborhood festivals, and visit Shinto shrines and Buddhist temples. Are these rituals mere formalities? Based on 14 months of fieldwork in Kamakura city near Tokyo, Satsuki Kawano examines the power of ritual and its relevance for modern urbanites. She reveals the indebtedness of ritual to forms that create an elevated context and infuse the mundane with a sense of moral order. By employing acts and environments common to everyday life, Kawano argues, ritual evokes morally positive values such as purity, gratitude, respect, and indebtedness. Rather than objectify morality in a sacred text or religious doctrine, ritual embodies and emplaces a sense of what it means to be a good person and creates moments of personal significance and engagement. In Kamakura, belief is therefore a consequence and not a prerequisite of ritual engagement. Ritual Practice in Modern Japan effectively challenges the widespread assumption that ritual in non-Western societies has little moral significance and that, with modernisation, 'traditional' practices inevitably disappear. This is a book that will interest scholars and students of cultural anthropology, ritual studies, and Japanese studies. Satsuki Kawano is assistant professor in the Department of Sociology and Anthropology at the University of Guelph, Ontario. (For this item please quote stock ID 25221) ISBN: 9780824829346

The great noh actor, theorist, and playwright Zeami Motokiyo (ca. 1363-1443) is one of the major figures of world drama. His critical treatises have attracted international attention ever since their publication in the early 1900s. His corpus of work and ideas continues to offer a wealth of insights on issues ranging from the nature of dramatic illusion and audience interest to tactics for composing successful plays to issues of somaticity and bodily training. Shelley Fenno Quinn's impressive interpretive examination of Zeami's treatises addresses all of these areas as it outlines the development of the playwright's ideas on how best to cultivate attunement between performer and audience. Quinn begins by tracing Zeami's transformation of the largely mimetic stage art of his father's troupe into a theatre of poiesis in which the playwright and actors aim for performances wherein dance and chant are re-keyed to the evocative power of literary memory. Synthesising this remembered language of stories, poems, phrases, and their prosodies and associated auras with the flow of dance and chant led to the creation of a dramatic prototype that engaged and depended on the audience as never before. Later chapters examine a performance configuration created by Zeami (the nikyoku santai) as articulated in his mature theories on the training of the performer. Drawing on possible reference points from Buddhist and Daoist thought, the author argues that Zeami came to treat the nikyoku santai as a set of guidelines for bracketing the subjectivity of the novice actor, thereby allowing the actor to reach a certain skill level or threshold from which his freedom as an artist might begin. Shelley Fenno Quinn is associate professor of Japanese in the Department of East Asian Languages & Literatures at The Ohio State University. (For this item please quote stock ID 25224) ISBN: 9780824829681

Terayama Shûji (1935-1983) was one of postwar Japan's most gifted and controversial playwrights/directors. Since his death more than 20 years ago, he has been transformed into a cult hero in Japan. Despite this notoriety, Unspeakable Acts is the first book in any language to analyse the theatre of Terayama in depth. It interrogates postwar Japanese culture and theatre through the creative work of this unique yet emblematic artist. By situating Terayama in his historical milieu and by using tools derived from Japanese and Western theories of psychoanalysis, anthropology, sociology, gender studies, and aesthetics, Carol Fisher Sorgenfrei has woven a sophisticated and provocative study. 'Carol Sorgenfrei's book is a compelling study on the innovative avant-garde work of the great Japanese stage director Terayama Shuji. It offers both a subtle and empathetic analysis of his ground-breaking work by discussing it in the context of the particular situation of postwar Japan as well as older traditions of Japanese culture. This insightful study is completed by the translation of three major theatre texts by Terayama along with excerpts from his theoretical works, which will deepen the reader's understanding to which the author so brilliantly has led him. It reveals Terayama not only as deeply rooted in and permeated by his own culture but also as a truly transcultural artist whose work is provocative to Japanese as well as to Westerners. Sorgenfrei's book is an absolute must for anyone interested in Japanese theatre and culture as well as in international theatre avant-garde movements' - Erika Fischer-Lichte, Institut fuer Theaterwissenschaft, Berlin. 'Terayama Shûji is a giant of modern Japanese theatre and the many other art forms in which he worked. Carol Sorgenfrei has performed a valuable service in making him and his theatre more accessible to the world beyond Japan. Ms. Sorgenfrei, the best-prepared scholar outside Japan to approach the phenomenon of Terayama, has written an important book of original and excellent scholarship that is eminently readable by student, scholar, and professional alike' - John Gillespie, coauthor of Alternative Japanese Drama. Carol Fisher Sorgenfrei is professor of theater at UCLA, where she previously headed both the critical studies and playwriting areas. (For this item please quote stock ID 25233) ISBN: 9780824827960

The Nanzan Guide to Japanese Religions combines, for the first time in any language, state-of-the-field theoretical and critical discussions with concrete resources students and scholars need to conduct research on Japanese religions. Even seasoned scholars typically approach their research in an unsystematic manner, becoming familiar with a particular area of inquiry while remaining largely unaware of what exists in the rest of the field. This inefficient method hinders particularly less-experienced researchers and circumscribes their lines of inquiry. This guide provides both beginners and specialists with a reference that will serve as a basic introduction to Japanese religions and allow them to conduct research more proficiently and in greater depth. Overlapping and thought-provoking chapters, written by leading specialists, offer a variety of perspectives on the complicated and multifaceted field of Japanese religions. The essays are divided into four sections: religious traditions (Japanese religions in general, Shinto, Buddhism, folk religion, new religions, Christianity); the history of Japanese religions (ancient, classical, medieval, early modern, modern, contemporary); major themes (symbolism, ritual and the arts, literature and scripture, state and religion, geography and environment, intellectual history, gender); and 'practical' essays (finding references and using libraries, working with archive collections, conducting fieldwork).A chronology of religion in Japanese history is also provided. Paul Swanson is director and permanent fellow at the Nanzan Institute for Religion & Culture, Nanzan University. Clark Chilson is assistant professor of religion at Pacific Lutheran University. (For this item please quote stock ID 25238) ISBN: 9780824830021

There have been many studies that focus on aspects of the history of Japanese Buddhism. Until now, none have addressed important questions of organisation and practice in contemporary Buddhism, questions such as how Japanese Buddhism came to be seen as a religion of funeral practices; how Buddhist institutions envision the role of the laity; and how a married clergy has affected life at temples and the image of priests. This volume is the first to address fully contemporary Buddhist life and institutions - topics often overlooked in the conflict between the rhetoric of renunciation and the practices of clerical marriage and householding that characterise much of Buddhism in today's Japan. Informed by years of field research and his own experiences training to be a Tendai priest, Stephen Covell skillfully refutes this 'corruption paradigm' while revealing the many (often contradictory) facets of contemporary institutional Buddhism, or as Covell terms it, Temple Buddhism. Covell significantly broadens the scope of inquiry to include how Buddhism is approached by both laity and clerics when he takes into account temple families, community involvement, and the commodification of practice. He considers law and tax issues, temple strikes, and the politics of temple boards of directors to shed light on how temples are run and viewed by their inhabitants, supporters, and society in general. In doing so he uncovers the economic realities that shape ritual practices and shows how mundane factors such as taxes influence the debate over temple Buddhism's role in contemporary Japanese society. In addition, through interviews and analyses of sectarian literature and recent scholarship on gender and Buddhism, he provides a detailed look at priests' wives, who have become indispensable in the management of temple affairs. Stephen Covell is assistant professor in the Department of Comparative Religion at Western Michigan University. 'Both a dedicated participant and academic observer, Covell provides a fascinating and richly informative overview of contemporary temple Buddhism in Japan. Deftly handling the tensions and contradictions between the world-renouncing ideal and ordinary family realities of modern Buddhist temple life, he puts to rest the simplistic ?corruption? paradigm for understanding the role and place of Buddhism in contemporary Japanese society. One gets a clear picture of ordinary people struggling to maintain important traditions while trying to make sense of them in an ultra-modern and rapidly changing society. This book is an important addition to studies on the role of religion in contemporary Japan' - Paul Swanson, Director, Nanzan Institute for Religion and Culture (For this item please quote stock ID 25239) ISBN: 9780824828561

In post-industrial societies, people must consciously define their individuality through the choices they make. Recently, death has become yet another realm of personal choice, making a 'good death' one in which we die in our 'own way.' Does culture matter in these decisions? Final Days represents a new perspective on end-of-life decision-making, arguing that culture does make a difference but not as a checklist of customs or as the source of a moral code. Grounded in rich ethnographic data, the book offers a superb examination of how policy and meaning frame the choices Japanese make about how to die. As an essay in descriptive bioethics, it engages an extensive literature in the social sciences and bioethics to examine some of the answers people have constructed to end-of life issues. Like their counterparts in other post-industrial societies, Japanese find no simple way of handling situations such as disclosure of diagnosis, discontinuing or withholding treatment, organ donation, euthanasia, and hospice. Through interviews and case studies in hospitals and homes, Susan Orpett Long offers a window on the ways in which 'ordinary' people respond to serious illness and the process of dying. Moving beyond stereotypes of stylised samurai violence and Buddhist meditation as Japanese cultural models of dying, Long offers fresh insights into how experiential and social factors mediate between formal cultural rules and what people do. Given the existence of various culturally legitimate scripts on how to die well and the complex nature of human relationships, she makes a convincing and original argument that ambivalence need not be viewed as anomalous. Indeed, ambiguity and a diversity of views are not obstacles to the moral life of a society, but rather are the raw material in post-industrial societies from which people construct meaningful deaths and thus meaningful lives. Susan Orpett Long is professor of anthropology at John Carroll University in Cleveland, Ohio. (For this item please quote stock ID 25240) ISBN: 9780824829100

Hawaii sugar plantation managers endorsed Japanese language schools but, after witnessing the assertive role of Japanese in the 1920 labour strike, they joined public school educators and the Office of Naval Intelligence in labelling them anti-American and urged their suppression. Thus the 'Japanese language school problem' became a means of controlling Hawaii's largest ethnic group. The debate quickly surfaced in California and Washington, where powerful activists sought to curb Japanese immigration and economic advancement. Language schools were accused of indoctrinating Mikadoism to Japanese American children as part of Japan's plan to colonise the United States. Previously unexamined archival documents and oral history interviews highlight Japanese immigrants' resistance and their efforts to foster traditional Japanese values in their American children. They also reveal complex fissures of class and religion within the Japanese communities themselves. The author's comparative analysis of the Japanese communities in Hawaii, California, and Washington presents a clear picture of what historian Yuji Ichioka called the 'distinctive histories' as well as the shared experiences of Japanese Americans. Noriko Asato is associate professor in the Department of Modern Languages and Literatures, University of Nebraska-Lincoln. (For this item please quote stock ID 25243) ISBN: 9780824828981

Using close readings of a range of premodern and modern texts, Atsuko Sakaki focuses on the ways in which Japanese writers and readers revised - or in many cases devised - rhetoric to convey 'Chineseness' and how this practice contributed to shaping a national Japanese identity. The volume begins by examining how Japanese travellers in China, and Chinese travellers in Japan, are portrayed in early literary works. An increasing awareness of the diversity of Chinese culture forms a premise for the next chapter, which looks at Japan's objectification of the Chinese and their works of art from the 18th century onward. Chapter 3 examines gender as a factor in the formation and transformation of the Sino-Japanese dyad. Sakaki then continues with an investigation of early modern and modern Japanese representations of intellectuals who were marginalised for their insistence on the value of the classical Chinese canon and literary Chinese. The work concludes with an overview of writing in Chinese by early Meiji writers and the presence of Chinese in the work of modern writer Nakamura Shin'ichiro. A final summary of the book?s major themes makes use of several stories by Tanizaki Jun'ichiro. Atsuko Sakaki is professor in the Department of East Asian Studies and associate member of the Centre for Comparative Literature at the University of Toronto. (For this item please quote stock ID 25244) ISBN: 9780824829186

'Overwhelming, impressive, and compelling scholarship' - Choice The Japanese have long sought inspiration and legitimacy from the written record of their ancient past. The shaping of bygone eras to contemporary agendas began at least by the early eighth century, when the first court histories, namely the Kojiki and the Nihon shoki, were compiled. Since the late nineteenth century, historians have extensively mined these texts and other written evidence and by the late 1970s had nearly exhausted their meager sources. Fortunately for all those interested in uncovering the origins of Japanese civilisation, archaeologists have been hard at work. Today, thanks to this postwar 'archaeology boom', Japan historians have never been closer to recreating the lives of prehistoric peasants, ancient princes, and medieval samurai. Sacred Texts & Buried Treasures offers substantial new insights into early Japanese history (A.D. 100-800) through an integrated discussion of historical texts and archaeological artifacts. It contends that the rich archaeological discoveries of the past few decades permit scholars to develop far more satisfactory interpretations of ancient Japan than was possible when they were heavily dependent on written sources. William Wayne Farris is professor of history and chairman of the Asian Studies Program at the University of Tennessee at Knoxville. (For this item please quote stock ID 25883) ISBN: 9780824820305

'[This] translation gives a fresh view of Kaempfer and his magnum opus ... Well deserves a place on many shelves' - Monumenta Nipponica 'Robust and meticulously crafted' - The Historian 64 (2002) 'Bodart-Bailey's Kaempfer's Japan not only provides a critical first-hand insight into Tokugawa Japan, but will also serve as the centerpiece of the expanding scholarship on Kaempfer that has achieved a resurgence in Japan, the United States, and Europe over the past two decades' - Journal of Asian Studies, August 2000 Engelbert Kaempfer's History of Japan was a best-seller from the moment it was published in London in 1727. Born in Westphalia in 1651, Kaempfer traveled throughout the Near and Far East before settling in Japan as physician to the trading settlement of the Dutch East India Company at Nagasaki. During his two years residence, he made two extensive trips around Japan in 1691 and 1692, collecting, according to the British historian Boxer, 'an astonishing amount of valuable and accurate information.' He also learned all he could from the few Japanese who came to Deshima for instruction in the European sciences. To these observations, Kaempfer added details he had gathered from a wide reading of travellers' accounts and the reports of previous trading delegations. The result was the first scholarly study of Tokugawa Japan in the West, a work that greatly influenced the European view of Japan throughout the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, serving as a reference for a variety of works ranging from encyclopedias to the libretto of 'The Mikado.' Kaempfer's work remains one of the most valuable sources for historians of the Tokugawa period. The narrative describes what no Japanese was permitted to record (the details of the shogun's castle, for example) and what no Japanese thought worthy of recording (the minutiae of everyday life). However, all previous translations of the History are flawed, being based on the work of an eighteenth-century Swiss translator or that of the German editor some fifty years later who had little knowledge of Japan and resented Kaempfer's praise of the heathen country. Beatrice Bodart-Bailey's impressive new translation of this classic, which reflects careful study of Kaempfer's original manuscript, reclaims the work for the modern reader, placing it in the context of what is currently known about Tokugawa Japan and restoring the humour and freshness of Kaempfer's observations and impressions. In Kaempfer's Japan we have, for the first time, an accurate and thoroughly readable annotated translation of Kaempfer's colourful account of pre-modern Japan. (For this item please quote stock ID 25884) ISBN: 9780824820664

A thousand years ago, most visitors to Japan would have arrived by ship at Hakata Bay, the one and only authorised gateway to Japan. Hakata was the location of the Korokan, an official guest-house for foreign visitors that is currently yielding its secrets to the spades of Japanese archaeologists. Nearby was Dazaifu, the imperial capital of western Japan, surrounded by mountain fortresses and defended by an army of border guards. Over the ages, Hakata was a staging ground for Japanese troops on their way to Korea and ground zero for foreign invasions of Japan. Through the port passed a rich variety of diplomats, immigrants, raiders, and traders, both Japanese and foreign. Gateway to Japan spotlights four categories of cross-cultural interaction - war, diplomacy, piracy, and trade - over a period of 800 years to gain insight into several larger questions about Japan and its place in the world: How and why did Hakata come to serve as the country's 'front door'? How did geography influence the development of state and society in the Japanese archipelago? Has Japan been historically open or closed to outside influence? Why are Japanese so profoundly ambivalent about other places and people? Individual chapters focus on Chinese expansionism and its consequences for Japan and East Asia as a whole; the subtle (and not-so-subtle) contradictions and obfuscations of the diplomatic process as seen in Japanese treatment of Korean envoys visiting Kyushu; random but sometimes devastating attacks on Kyushu by Korean (and sometimes Japanese) pirates; and foreign commerce in and around Hakata, which turns out to be neither fully 'foreign' nor fully 'commerce' in the modern sense of the word. The conclusion briefly traces the story forward into medieval and early modern times. Enriched by fascinating historical vignettes and dozens of maps and photographs, this engagingly written volume explores issues not only important for Japan's early history but also highly pertinent to Japan's role in the world today. Now, as in the period examined here, Japan has one principal entry point (the international airport at Narita); its relationship with the outside world (both East and West) is ambivalent; and, while sometimes astonishingly open-minded, Japanese are at other times frustratingly exclusive in their dealings with non-Japanese. Gateway to Japan will be of substantial interest to all students of Japan, East Asia, and intercultural studies. (For this item please quote stock ID 26127) ISBN: 9780824830298

Japanese artists, musicians, actors, and authors have written much over the centuries about the creation, meaning, and appreciation of various arts. Most of these works, however, are scattered among countless hard-to-find sources or make only a fleeting appearance in books devoted to other subjects. Compiled in this volume is a wealth of original material on Japanese arts and culture from the prehistoric era to the Meiji Restoration (1867). These carefully selected sources, including many translated here for the first time, are placed in their historical context and outfitted with brief commentaries, allowing the reader to make connections to larger concepts and values found in Japanese culture. The book is a treasure trove of material on the visual and literary arts, but it contains as well primary texts on topics not easily classified in Western categories, such as the martial and culinary arts, the art of tea, and flower arranging. More than 60 colour and black and white illustrations enrich the collection and provide further insights into Japanese artistic and cultural values. Stephen Addiss is professor of Japanese art at the University of Richmond. Gerald Groemer teaches Japanese music history and ethnomusicology at the University of Yamanashi, Kofu, Japan. J. Thomas Rimer is professor emeritus at the University of Pittsburgh. (For this item please quote stock ID 26128) ISBN: 9780824820183

In Imperial Japan, as elsewhere in the modernising world, answering this perennial question meant relying on age-old solutions. Funerals, burials, and other mortuary rites had developed over the centuries with the aim of building continuity in the face of loss. As Japanese coped with the economic, political, and social changes that radically remade their lives in the decades after the Meiji Restoration (1868), they clung to local customs and Buddhist rituals such as sutra readings and incense offerings that for generations had given meaning to death. Yet death, as this highly original study shows, was not impervious to nationalism, capitalism, and the other isms that constituted and still constitute modernity. As Japan changed, so did its handling of the inevitable. Following an overview of the early development of funerary rituals in Japan, Andrew Bernstein demonstrates how diverse premodern practices from different regions and social strata were homogenised with those generated by middle-class city dwellers to create the form of funerary practice dominant today. He describes the controversy over cremation, explaining how and why it became the accepted manner of disposing of the dead. He also explores the conflict-filled process of remaking burial practices, which gave rise, in part, to the suburban 'soul parks' now prevalent throughout Japan; the (largely failed) attempt by nativists to replace Buddhist death rites with Shinto ones; and the rise and fall of the funeral procession. In the process, Bernstein shows how today?s 'traditional' funeral is in fact an early 20th-century invention and traces the social and political factors that led to this development. These include a government wanting to separate itself from religion even while propagating State Shinto, the appearance of a new middle class, and new forms of transportation. As these and other developments created new contexts for old rituals, Japanese faced the problem of how to fit them all together. What to do with the dead? is thus a question tied to a still broader one that haunts all societies experiencing rapid change: What to do with the past? Modern Passings is an impressive and far-reaching exploration of Japan?s efforts to solve this puzzle, one that is at the heart of the modern experience. Andrew Bernstein is assistant professor of history at Lewis and Clark College. (For this item please quote stock ID 26132) ISBN: 9780824828745

Reading a Japanese Film, written by a pioneer of Japanese film studies in the United States, provides viewers new to Japanese cinema with the necessary tools to construct a deeper understanding of some of the most critically acclaimed and thoroughly entertaining films ever made. In her introduction, Keiko McDonald presents an historical overview and outlines a unified approach to film analysis. Sixteen 'readings' of films currently available on DVD with English subtitles put theory into practice as she considers a wide range of work, from familiar classics by Ozu and Kurosawa to the films of a younger generation of directors. Keiko McDonald is professor of Japanese cinema and literature at the University of Pittsburgh. 'I know of no other work on Japanese cinema in English that covers such a wide range of important films. Each chapter ... provides background information on the director and the historical period in which the film was made and places each film within a socio-cultural framework. Keiko McDonald is an important scholar and critic of Japanese cinema with a writing style that is engaging, insightful, and, at the same time, highly accessible. Her close, and caring, readings help bring the films to life for beginning students and experienced viewers alike' - Linda Ehrlich, Case Western Reserve University. 'Here is a much needed book, an expert's explication of the Japaneseness of the Japanese film, and an adroit teaching on how to read and to savour the ensuing experience' - Donald Richie, author of A Hundred Years of Japanese Film. (For this item please quote stock ID 26148) ISBN: 9780824829933

'Wayne Farris provides a challenging, well argued, and impressively documented study of what he calls a 'medieval Japanese meta-morphosis', the key element of which was population growth. He contends that, while Japan's medieval age may have been marked by warfare, famine, and disease, it was, overall, a period of great social and economic growth and transformation. His book is a thoughtful examination of the variables that may have affected and derived from the increase in population. This is a major contribution to Japanese historical studies, not just medieval Japanese studies' - Martin Collcutt, Princeton University This volume charts a course through never-before-surveyed historical territory: Japan's medieval population, a topic so challenging that neither Japanese nor foreign scholars have investigated it in a comprehensive way. And yet, demography is an invaluable approach to the past because it provides a way - often the only way - to study the mass of people who did not belong to the political or religious elite. By synthesising a vast cache of primary and secondary sources, William Wayne Farris constructs an important analysis of Japan?s population from 1150 to 1600 and considers social and economic developments that were life and death issues for ordinary Japanese. Impressive in his grasp of detail and the scope of his inquiry, Farris makes the argument that, although this age initially witnessed the continuation of a centuries-old demographic stasis, a far-reaching transformation began around 1280 and eventually gained momentum until it swept through the Japanese archipelago. Between 1280 and 1600, Japan's population approximately trebled, growing from 6 million to 17 million. Crucial to the demographic breakthrough was the resolution of two central problems facing both the rulers and the ruled. The first was how to supply a burgeoning population with sufficient food; the second, how to keep the peace. Japan's Medieval Population will be required reading for specialists in pre-modern Japanese history, who will appreciate it not only for its thought-provoking arguments, but also for its methodology and use of sources. William Wayne Farris is Sen Soshitsu XV Chair in Traditional Japanese Culture and History in the Department of History, University of Hawai'i. (For this item please quote stock ID 26734) ISBN: 9780824829735

'I have tried to prepare [Professor Yagi's] articles as I believe he himself would have wished to, so as to make available his knowledge, his sensibility, his advice, and his admonitions. He wanted haiku in English to flourish, but to flourish as true haiku, worthy of the name and heritage. This collection is offered in that spirit' - From the Preface (For this item please quote stock ID 26931) ISBN: 9780942668346

On September 13, 1912, the day of Emperor Meiji?s funeral, General Nogi Maresuke committed ritual suicide by seppuku (disembowelment). It was an act of delayed atonement that paid a debt of honor incurred 35 years earlier. The revered military hero?s wife joined in his act of junshi ('following one?s lord into death'). The violence of their double suicide shocked the nation. What had impelled the general and his wife, on the threshold of a new era, to resort so drastically, so dramatically, to this forbidden, anachronistic practice? The nation was divided. There were those who saw the suicides as a heroic affirmation of the samurai code; others found them a cause for embarrassment, a sign that Japan had not yet crossed the cultural line separating tradition from modernity. While acknowledging the nation's sharply divided reaction to the Nogis' junshi as a useful indicator of the event's seismic impact on Japanese culture, Doris Bargen in the first half of her book demonstrates that the deeper significance of Nogi's action must be sought in his personal history, enmeshed as it was in the tumultuous politics of the Meiji period. Suicidal Honor traces Nogi?s military career (and personal travail) through the armed struggles of the collapsing shôgunate and through the two wars of imperial conquest during which Nogi played a significant role: the Sino-Japanese War (1894?1895) and the Russo-Japanese War (1904?1905). It also probes beneath the political to explore the religious origins of ritual self-sacrifice in cultures as different as ancient Rome and today's Nigeria. Seen in this context, Nogi's death was homage to the divine emperor. But what was the significance of Nogi's waiting 35 years before he offered himself as a human sacrifice to a dead rather than living deity? To answer this question, Bargen delves deeply and with great insight into the story of Nogi's conflicted career as a military hero who longed to be a peaceful man of letters. In the second half of Suicidal Honor Bargen turns to the extraordinary influence of the Nogis' deaths on two of Japan?s greatest writers, Mori Ôgai and Natsume Sôseki. Ôgai's historical fiction, written in the immediate aftermath of his friend's junshi, is a profound meditation on the significance of ritual suicide in a time of historical transition. Stories such as 'The Sakai Incident' ('Sakai jiken') appear in a new light and with greatly enhanced resonance in Bargen's interpretation. In Sôseki's masterpiece, Kokoro, Sensei, the protagonist, refers to the emperor's death and his general's junshi before taking his own life. Scholars routinely mention these references, but Bargen demonstrates convincingly the uncanny ways in which Sôseki's agonised response to Nogi's suicide structures the entire novel. By exploring the historical and literary legacies of Nogi, Ôgai, and Sôseki from an interdisciplinary perspective, Suicidal Honor illuminates Japan's prolonged and painful transition from the idealised heroic world of samurai culture to the mundane anxieties of modernity. It is a study that will fascinate specialists in the fields of Japanese literature, history, and religion, and anyone seeking a deeper understanding of Japan?s warrior culture. Doris G. Bargen is professor of Japanese literature and culture and director of Asian Languages and Literatures at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. (For this item please quote stock ID 27084) ISBN: 9780824829988

'Woman Critiqued will make us wonder why we thought we could grasp modern Japanese literature without concerted attention to what men and women had to say about women's literary production. This remarkable collection is full of surprises, even where predictable arguments are being made. Careful translations of writings by the familiar and the obscure, together with thought-provoking introductions and supporting apparatus, make this an indispensable text for the study of modern Japanese culture and society' - Norma M. Field, University of Chicago Over the past 30 years translations of Japanese women?s writing and biographies of women writers have enriched and expanded our understanding of modern Japanese literature. But how have women writers been received and read in Japan? To appreciate the subterfuges, strategies, and choices that the modern Japanese woman writer has faced, readers must consider the criticisms levelled against her, the expectations and admonitions that have been whispered in her ear, and pay attention to the way she herself has responded. What did it mean to be a woman writer in 20th century Japan? How was she defined and how did this definition limit her artistic sphere? Woman Critiqued builds on existing scholarship by offering English-language readers access to some of the more salient critiques that have been directed at women writers, on the one hand, and reactions to these by women writers, on the other. The grouping of the essays into chapters organised by theme clarifies how the discussion in Japan has been framed by certain assumptions and how women have repeatedly tried to intervene by playing with, undercutting, or attempting to exceed these assumptions. Chapter introductions contextualise the translated essays historically and draw out aspects that warrant particular scrutiny or explication. Although the translators do not cover all aspects or genres identified with women's literary endeavours in the 20th century, they provide a significant understanding of the evaluative systems under which Japanese women writers have worked. Woman Critiqued will be eagerly read by specialists in modern Japanese literature and those interested in comparative literature, women's studies, gender studies, and history. Featured writers: Akitsu Ei, Akiyama Shun, Hara Shiro, Hasegawa Izumi, Kobayashi Hideo, Kora Rumiko, Matsuura Rieko, Mishima Yukio, Mitsuhashi Takajo, Mizuta Noriko, Miwata Masako, Oguri Fuyo, Okuno Takeo, Ooka Makoto, Saito Minako, Shibusawa Tatsuhiko, Setouchi Harumi, Takahara Eiri, Takahashi Junko, Takahashi Takako, Tanaka Miyoko, Tomioka Taeko, Tsujii Takashi, Tanizaki Jun?ichiro, Tsushima Yoko, Yosano Akiko. Translators: Tomoko Aoyama, Jan Bardsley, Janine Beichman, Rebecca L. Copeland, Mika Endo, Joan E. Ericson, Barbara Hartley, Maryellen Toman Mori, Yoshiko Nagaoka, Kathryn Pierce, Laurel Rasplica Rodd, Amanda Seaman, Eiji Sekine, Judy Wakabayashi. Rebecca Copeland is associate professor of Japanese literature at Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri. (For this item please quote stock ID 27085) ISBN: 9780824830380

[Indent] The defeat of Japan by the United States in 1945 locked these nations in a dramatically unequal relationship. Artists were among the many whose lives and accomplishments were deeply affected by this juncture of native and alien cultures. Art in the Encounter of Nations is the first book-length study of interactions between the Japanese and American art worlds in the early postwar years. In his analysis of works of art as well as writings by a wide range of artists, critics, curators, and journalists, Bert Winther-Tamaki brings to light a rich exchange of opinions and debates regarding the relationship between the art of the two nations. He begins with an examination of the Japanese margins of American Abstract Expressionism. Taking a contrapuntal approach, he investigates four abstract painters: two Japanese artists who moved to the United States (Okada Kenzo and Hasegawa Saburo) and two European Americans whose work is often associated with Japanese calligraphy (Mark Tobey and Franz Kline). He then looks at the work of two young scions of the calligraphy and pottery worlds of Japan - Morita Shiryo and Yagi Kazuo - and argues that their radical innovations in these ancient arts were, in part, provoked by their sense of a threat posed by Euro-American modernity. The final chapter is devoted to the career of Japanese American sculptor and designer Isamu Noguchi, whose feeling of affiliation was directed to both the U.S. and Japan in shifting ratios through a series of public and private places, each posing unique opportunities for exploring national distinctions. (For this item please quote stock ID 15987) ISBN: 9780824824006

The fall of Singapore and the brilliant victories achieved since the start of the war mean we are protected, but I don't know just how grateful I should be - Takahashi Aiko, housewife, February 1942. This is my final departure from the home islands. I have paid my respects to those who have helped me. I have no regrets - Itabashi Yasuo, navy kamikaze pilot, February 1944. We had rice gruel for lunch again. There was no tofu in it, but there were potatoes ... We went through with the closing ceremony and received our report cards. Everyone was there. From now on, I'll persevere and not fail - Manabe Ichiro, primary school student, July 1944. This collection of diaries gives readers a powerful, firsthand look at the effects of the Pacific War on eight ordinary Japanese. Immediate, vivid, and at times surprisingly frank, the diaries chronicle the last years of the war and its aftermath as experienced by a navy kamikaze pilot, an army straggler on Okinawa, an elderly Kyoto businessman, a Tokyo housewife, a young working woman in Tokyo, a teenage girl mobilised for war work, and two schoolchildren evacuated to the countryside. Samuel Yamashita's introduction provides a helpful overview of the historiography on wartime Japan and offers valuable insights into the important, everyday issues that concerned Japanese during a different and disastrously difficult time. 'The diaries reveal a far richer variety of attitudes toward the war than previous works have shown us; they reveal a thoughtfulness and a down-to-earth approach to life that will surprise those reared on wartime stereotypes. They will be of interest to all students, both scholars and general readers of World War II and wartime Japan' - James Huffman, Wittenburg University. Samuel Hideo Yamashita is the Henry E. Sheffield Professor of History at Pomona College. (For this item please quote stock ID 25200) ISBN: 9780824829360

Handmade Culture is the first comprehensive and cohesive study in any language to examine Raku, one of Japan?s most famous arts and a pottery technique practiced around the world. More than a history of ceramics, this innovative work considers four centuries of cultural invention and reinvention during times of both political stasis and socioeconomic upheaval. It combines scholarly erudition with an accessible story through its lively and lucid prose and its generous illustrations. The author's own experiences as the son of a professional potter and a historian inform his unique interdisciplinary approach, manifested particularly in his sensitivity to both technical ceramic issues and theoretical historical concerns. Handmade Culture makes ample use of archaeological evidence, heirloom ceramics, tea diaries, letters, woodblock prints, and gazetteers and other publications to narrate the compelling history of Raku, a fresh approach that sheds light not only on an important traditional art from Japan, but on the study of cultural history itself. Morgan Pitelka is Luce Assistant Professor of Asian Studies at Occidental College, Los Angeles. (For this item please quote stock ID 25201) ISBN: 9780824828851

National surveys indicate that most Japanese, while professing no religious commitment, frequently perform rituals: they regularly tend their family home altars, look after family graves, participate in neighborhood festivals, and visit Shinto shrines and Buddhist temples. Are these rituals mere formalities? Based on 14 months of fieldwork in Kamakura city near Tokyo, Satsuki Kawano examines the power of ritual and its relevance for modern urbanites. She reveals the indebtedness of ritual to forms that create an elevated context and infuse the mundane with a sense of moral order. By employing acts and environments common to everyday life, Kawano argues, ritual evokes morally positive values such as purity, gratitude, respect, and indebtedness. Rather than objectify morality in a sacred text or religious doctrine, ritual embodies and emplaces a sense of what it means to be a good person and creates moments of personal significance and engagement. In Kamakura, belief is therefore a consequence and not a prerequisite of ritual engagement. Ritual Practice in Modern Japan effectively challenges the widespread assumption that ritual in non-Western societies has little moral significance and that, with modernisation, 'traditional' practices inevitably disappear. This is a book that will interest scholars and students of cultural anthropology, ritual studies, and Japanese studies. Satsuki Kawano is assistant professor in the Department of Sociology and Anthropology at the University of Guelph, Ontario. (For this item please quote stock ID 25222) ISBN: 9780824828776

The great noh actor, theorist, and playwright Zeami Motokiyo (ca. 1363-1443) is one of the major figures of world drama. His critical treatises have attracted international attention ever since their publication in the early 1900s. His corpus of work and ideas continues to offer a wealth of insights on issues ranging from the nature of dramatic illusion and audience interest to tactics for composing successful plays to issues of somaticity and bodily training. Shelley Fenno Quinn's impressive interpretive examination of Zeami's treatises addresses all of these areas as it outlines the development of the playwright's ideas on how best to cultivate attunement between performer and audience. Quinn begins by tracing Zeami's transformation of the largely mimetic stage art of his father's troupe into a theatre of poiesis in which the playwright and actors aim for performances wherein dance and chant are re-keyed to the evocative power of literary memory. Synthesising this remembered language of stories, poems, phrases, and their prosodies and associated auras with the flow of dance and chant led to the creation of a dramatic prototype that engaged and depended on the audience as never before. Later chapters examine a performance configuration created by Zeami (the nikyoku santai) as articulated in his mature theories on the training of the performer. Drawing on possible reference points from Buddhist and Daoist thought, the author argues that Zeami came to treat the nikyoku santai as a set of guidelines for bracketing the subjectivity of the novice actor, thereby allowing the actor to reach a certain skill level or threshold from which his freedom as an artist might begin. Shelley Fenno Quinn is associate professor of Japanese in the Department of East Asian Languages and Literatures at The Ohio State University. (For this item please quote stock ID 25225) ISBN: 9780824818272

'A superb study that reveals much about human-animal interactions and relationships among humans ... [Chapters consider] human-wildlife relations by focusing on harm caused by wild boars, monkeys, deer and serow (a goat-antelope), and bears ... [The book] also looks at wolves and the debate over their possible reintroduction ... Those interested in gaining insight about the social repercussions of environmental issues and the symbolic and material connections among humans and other creatures are sure to find this book to be essential reading' - Journal of Asian Studies 'Waiting for Wolves in Japan is one of the finest studies of human-animal relations to appear in recent years' - Anthrozoös 'This book is more than a story of human-wildlife conflict because it provides tremendous detail about the lives and habits of hunters, farmers, foresters, and animal-lovers of many sorts, as well as valuable insights into the behavior of Japanese wild pigs, deer, serow, macaques, and bears. For this reason, Knight's book will interest those studying the human dimensions of biodiversity conservation, community natural resource management, and the behaviour and conservation of large mammals in human-dominated landscapes' - Conservation Biology 'John Knight successfully introduces welcome sophistication into the discussion of human-wildlife relations. Yet he writes with admirable cogency and simplicity to reach a wider audience in environmental anthropology, cultural studies of nature, and the world of conservation policymakers. This fine book should receive a large and appreciative audience' ? Journal of Japanese Studies John Knight is reader in anthropology, Queen?s University, Belfast. (For this item please quote stock ID 27086) ISBN: 9780824830960

Masterpieces of Kabuki contains 18 outstanding dramas taken from the landmark four-volume series Kabuki Plays On Stage. Together they cover the entire spectrum of kabuki drama from 1697 to 1905, the period during which kabuki's dramaturgy flourished prior to the onset of Western dramatic influence. Major playwrights, chronological periods of playwriting, and a variety of play types (history, domestic, and dance dramas) and performance styles are represented. All but one are in the current repertory and regularly staged. The volume includes introductions to each play and a new general introduction highlighting kabuki's historical development and relating the plays to their performance context. As the subtitle implies, the plays are translated as if 'on stage.' Stage directions indicate major scenic effects, stage action, costuming, makeup, music, and sound effects. In some cases, complex stage actions such as stage fights are given in detail. The plays collected here are all marvellous examples of dramatic writing, intended to be acted on the stage before audiences. They reveal kabuki's eras of brilliance and bravado, villainy and vengeance, darkness and desire, and restoration and reform. All continue to stir audiences to admiration and excitement. James Brandon is emeritus professor of Asian theatre at the University of Hawai`i. Samuel Leiter is distinguished professor of theatre at Brooklyn College, City University of New York, and also teaches at The Graduate Center, City University of New York. (For this item please quote stock ID 22680) ISBN: 9780824827885

Ogyu Sorai (1666-1728) was one of the greatest philosophers of early modern Japan. This volume, a monumental work of scholarship, offers for the first time in any Western language unabridged and fully annotated translations of Sorai's masterpieces. The Bendo (Distinguishing the Way) and Benmei (Distinguishing Names) are works of political philosophy that define the theoretical foundation for a leadership exercising total power, the best remedy, in Sorai's view, for a regime in crisis. The translations are based on the 1740 (Genbun 5) woodblock edition, the first major edition of these seminal texts published during the Tokugawa period. In his commentary, John Tucker situates the Bendo and Benmei in relation to Neo-Confucianism via what is known as 'philosophical lexicography.' This genre, which links Sorai's thinking with Neo-Confucianism, is traced to the early-thirteenth-century Song dynasty text the Xingli ziyi (The Meanings of Neo-Confucian Terms) by Chen Beixi (1159-1223). Although Sorai was an unrelenting critic the Neo-Confucian formulations of the great Song synthesiser Zhu Xi (1130-1200), his thinking remained, due to its genre, methodology, and conceptual repertory, essentially a radical revision of Neo-Confucian discourse. Tucker's introduction also examines the reception of Sorai's two Ben during the remainder of the Tokugawa, calling attention to radical tendencies in later developments of Sorai's thought as well as to the increasingly scathing critiques of his 'Chinese' approach to philosophy, language, and politics. Finally, it traces the vicissitudes of the two Ben in modern Japanese intellectual history and their role in the formation of the ideas of Meiji intellectuals such as Nishi Amane (1829-1897) and Kato Hiroyuki (1836-1916). As before, however, Sorai came under attack ? this time for his supposed irreverence toward the throne, the Japanese people, and the imperial nation-state. Though an unpopular philosophy in early 20th century Japan, in the postwar years Sorai?s thought was interpreted (by Maruyama Masao and others) as an important modernising force. While it critiques such ideologically grounded attempts to cast Sorai?s Bendôand Benmei as theoretical contributions to political modernisation, Tucker?s study nevertheless acknowledges that Sorai?s masterworks, in their concern for language analysis as the way to solve philosophical problems, share significant common ground with the analytic approach to philosophy pioneered by various 20th century Anglo-American philosophers. John Tucker is associate professor of history at East Carolina University, Greenville, North Carolina. (For this item please quote stock ID 26139) ISBN: 9780824829513

'Capitalscapes is an important contribution to both the study and teaching of later Japanese painting. Combining rigorous textual scholarship, painstaking visual analysis, and boldness of interpretation, it powerfully illuminates a major pictorial genre - pairs of screens presenting detailed, panoramic views of Japan's great cities, especially Kyoto. It argues convincingly that visual content and historical circumstances can be linked at a previously unsuspected level of specificity, opening the eyes of even the specialist not only to new ways of understanding specific examples, but also to approaching the entire genre. At the same time, the book's copious illustrations and careful explications at last make 'capitalscapes' truly accessible to non-readers of Japanese. Matthew McKelway deserves our gratitude as does the University of Hawai'i Press for devoting the resources needed to make the text a practical guide as well as a fine work of original scholarship' - Quitman Eugene Phillips, University of Wisconsin Following the destruction of Kyoto during the civil wars of the late 15th century, large-scale panoramic paintings of the city began to emerge. These enormous and intricately detailed depictions of the ancient imperial capital were unprecedented in the history of Japanese painting and remain unmatched as representations of urban life in any artistic tradition. Capitalscapes, the first book-length study of the Kyoto screens, examines their inception in the 16th to early 17th centuries, focusing on the political motivations that sparked their creation. Close readings of the Kyoto screens reveal that they were initially commissioned by or for members of the Ashikaga shogunate and that urban panoramas reflecting the interests of both prevailing and moribund political elites were created to underscore the legitimacy of the newly ascendant Tokugawa regime. Matthew McKelway's analysis of the screens exposes their creators' masterful exploitation of ostensibly accurate depictions to convey politically biased images of Japan's capital. His overarching methodology combines a historical approach, which considers the paintings in light of contemporary reports (diaries, chronicles, ritual accounts), with a thematic one, isolating individual motifs, deciphering their visual language, and comparing them with depictions in other works. McKelway's combined approach allows him to argue that the Kyoto screens were conceived and perpetuated as a painting genre that conveyed specific political meanings to viewers even as it provided textured details of city life. Students and scholars of Japanese art will find this lavishly illustrated work especially valuable for its insights into the cityscape painting genre, while those interested in urban and political history will appreciate its bold exploration of Kyoto's past and the city's late-medieval martial elite. Matthew Philip McKelway is assistant professor in the Department of Fine Arts, New York University. (For this item please quote stock ID 26739) ISBN: 9780824829001

Constructive Living is a Western approach to mental health education based in large part on adaptations of two Japanese psychotherapies, Morita therapy and Naikan therapy. Constructive Living (CL) presents an educational method of approaching life realistically and thoughtfully. The action aspect of CL emphasizes accepting reality (including feelings), focusing on purposes, and doing what needs doing. The reflection aspect of CL enables us to understand the present and past more clearly and to live in recognition of the support we receive from the world. (For this item please quote stock ID 25996) ISBN: 9780824808716

[Indent] (For this item please quote stock ID 18074) ISBN: 9780824821852

[Indent] Embracing the Firebird is the first book-length study in English on Yosano Akiko (1878-1942), the most famous post-classical woman poet of Japan. It follows Yosano from childhood to her twenties, as she freed herself from the alienation and frustration that shadowed her early years and, to use her own words, ?danced out into the light? of poetry and self-liberation. Less than a year after meeting the poet Yosano Tekkan, who became her mentor and later her husband, Yosano moved to Tokyo, where she finished writing the poems that would be included in Tangled Hair (1901), her most famous work. An extraordinary book for its time, Tangled Hair is a hymn to art, love, beauty, youth, and, above all, the individual. In it we see, perhaps for the first time, a Japanese woman consciously and persistently grappling in her creative work with her own individuality. It became a classic of modern Japanese poetry and marked the starting point of Yosano's career as a recognised poet and feminist critic for the next forty years. A representative selection of Yosano's poetry, expertly translated by Janine Beichman, offers a real and convincing vision of the original poems. (For this item please quote stock ID 18089) ISBN: 9780824823474

[Indent] Embracing the Firebird is the first book-length study in English on Yosano Akiko (1878-1942), the most famous post-classical woman poet of Japan. It follows Yosano from childhood to her twenties, as she freed herself from the alienation and frustration that shadowed her early years and, to use her own words, ?danced out into the light? of poetry and self-liberation. (For this item please quote stock ID 18090) ISBN: 9780824822088

[Indent] (For this item please quote stock ID 18091) ISBN: 9780824826086

[Indent] In this first synthetic, comprehensive survey of Japanese sports in English, the authors are attentive to the complex and fascinating interaction of traditional and modern elements. In the course of tracing the emergence and development of sumo, the martial arts, and other traditional sports from their origins to the present, they demonstrate that some cherished ?ancient? traditions were, in fact, invented less than a century ago. (For this item please quote stock ID 17077) ISBN: 9780824824648

[Indent] On July 29, 1643, ten crew members of the Dutch yacht Breskens were lured ashore at Nambu in northern Japan. Once out of view of their ship, the men were bound and taken to the shogun, Tokugawa Iemitsu, in Edo, where they remained imprisoned for four months. Later the Japanese government forced the Dutch East India Company representative in Nagasaki to acknowledge that the sailors had in fact been saved from shipwreck and that official recognition of the rescue (i.e., a formal visit from a Dutch ambassador) was in order. Prisoners from Nambu provides a lively, engrossing narrative of this relatively obscure incident, while casting light on the history of the period as a whole. Expertly constructing his tale from primary sources, the author examines relations between the Dutch East India Company and the shogunal government immediately following the promulgation of the ?seclusion laws? (sakokurei) and anti-Christian campaigns. Reiner H. Hesselink is associate professor of history at the University of Northern Iowa. 'The story has many of the qualities of a thriller. Based on exhaustive archival research, Hesselink's narrative of this almost forgotten incident becomes the means through which to view a fascinating and detailed picture of the thinking regarding international relations at the court of Iemitsu, the third Tokugawa shogun.' - Herman Ooms, University of California, Los Angeles (For this item please quote stock ID 17090) ISBN: 9780824824631

[Indent] The Moneylenders of Late Medieval Kyoto examines the large community of sake brewer-moneylenders in Japan?s capital city, focusing on their rise to prominence from the mid-1300s to 1550. Their guild tie to overlords, notably the great monastery Enryakuji, was forged early in the medieval period, giving them a protected monopoly and allowing them to flourish. (For this item please quote stock ID 17093) ISBN: 9780824819293

[Indent] Of the many eccentric figures in Japanese Zen, the Sòtò Zen master Tòsui Unkei (d. 1683) is surely among the most colourful and extreme. Variously compared to Ryòkan and Francis of Assisi, Tòsui has been called ?the original hippie.? After many grueling years of Zen study and the sanction of a distinguished teacher, Tòsui abandoned the religious establishment and became a drifter. The arresting details of Tòsui?s life were recorded in the Tribute (Tòsui oshò densan), a lively and colloquial account written by the celebrated scholar and Sòtò Zen master Menzan Zuihò. Menzan concentrates on Tòsui?s years as a beggar and labourer, recounting episodes from an unorthodox life while at the same time opening a new window on seventeenth-century Japan. The Tribute is translated here for the first time, accompanied by woodblock prints commissioned for the original 1768 edition. Peter Haskel?s introduction places Tòsui in the context of the Japanese Zen of his period - a time when the identities of early modern Zen schools were still being formed and a period of spiritual crisis for many distinguished monks who believed that the authentic Zen transmission had long ceased to exist. A biographical addendum offers a detailed overview of Tòsui?s life in light of surviving pre-modern sources. (For this item please quote stock ID 17288) ISBN: 9780824824402

[Indent] As part of its program to promote democracy in Japan after World War II, the American Occupation, headed by General Douglas MacArthur, undertook to enforce rigid censorship policies aimed at eliminating all traces of feudal thought in media and entertainment, including kabuki. Faubion Bowers (1917-1999), who served as personal aide and interpreter to MacArthur during the Occupation, was appalled by the censorship policies and anticipated the extinction of a great theatrical art. He used his position in the Occupation administration and his knowledge of Japanese theatre in his tireless campaign to save kabuki. Largely through Bowers?s efforts, censorship of kabuki had for the most part been eliminated by the time he left Japan in 1948. Although Bowers is at the centre of the story, this lively and skillfully adapted translation from the original Japanese treats a critical period in the long history of kabuki as it was affected by a single individual who had a commanding influence over it. It offers fascinating and little-known details about Occupation censorship politics and kabuki performance while providing yet another perrspective on the history of an enduring Japanese art form. (For this item please quote stock ID 17292) ISBN: 9780824824419

[Indent] This provocative collection of essays is a comprehensive study of the ?father-daughter dynamic? in Japanese female literary experience. Its contributors examine the ways in which women have been placed politically, ideologically, and symbolically as ?daughters? in a culture that venerates ?the father.? They weigh the impact that this daughterly position has had on both the performance and production of women?s writing from the classical period to the present. Conjoining the classical and the modern with a unified theme reveals an important continuum in female authorship - a historical approach often ignored by scholars. The essays devoted to the literature of the classical period discuss canonical texts in a new light, offering important feminist readings that challenge existing scholarship, while those dedicated to modern writers introduce readers to little-known texts with translations and readings that are engaging and original. (For this item please quote stock ID 17298) ISBN: 9780824824389

[Indent] Most Japanese literary historians have suggested that the Meiji Period (1868-1912) was devoid of women writers but for the brilliant exception of Higuchi Ichiyò (1872-1896). Rebecca Copeland challenges this claim by examining in fascinating detail the lives and literary careers of three of Ichiyò's peers, each representative of the diversity and ingenuity of the period: Miyake Kaho (1868-1944), Wakamatsu Shizuko (11864-1896), and Shimizu Shiki (1868-1933). In a carefully researched introduction, Copeland establishes the context for the development of female literary expression. She follows this with chapters on each of the women under consideration. Interspersed throughout are excerpts from works under discussion, most never before translated, offering an invaluable window into this forgotten world of women's writing. Final chapters situate the Meiji woman writer in historical and social contexts. Copeland draws together the numerous, complex strands of Meiji literary history in an incisive and provocative analysis that scrutinizes the origins of modern Japanese women's writing. With admirable clarity, she presents a new assessment not only of the beginnings of modern Japanese literature amidst great social change but also, and most importantly, a cogent and thoughtful appraisal of the significance of women's contributions to those beginnings. Rebecca L. Copeland is associate professor of Japanese language and literature at Washington University in St. Louis. (For this item please quote stock ID 17344) ISBN: 9780824822910

[Indent] A Tale of False Fortunes is a masterful translation of Enchi Fumiko's (1905-1986) modern classic, Namamiko monogatari. Written in 1965, this prize-winning work of historical fiction presents an alternative account of an imperial love affair narrated in the eleventh-century romance A Tale of Flowering Fortunes (Eiga monogatari). Both stories are set in the Heian court of the emperor Ichijò (980-1011) and tell of the ill-fated love between the emperor and his first consort, Teishi, and of the political rivalries that threaten to divide them. While the earlier work can be viewed largely as a panegyric to the all-powerful regent Fujiwara no Michinaga, Enchi's account emphasizes Teishi's nobility and devotion to the emperor and celebrates her 'moral victory' over the regent, who conspired to divert the emperor's attentions toward his own daughter, Shòshi. The narrative of A Tale of False Fortunes is built around a fictitious historical document, which is so well crafted that it was at first believed to be an actual document of the Heian period. Throughout Enchi's innovation and skill are evident as she alternates between modern and classical Japanese, interjecting her own commentary and extracts from A Tale of Flowering Fortunes, to impress upon the reader the authenticity of the tale presented within the novel. Subplots abound involving servants, ladies-in-waiting, and most importantly female mediums, whose spiritual possession-both feigned and real-propels the momentum of the story toward an unexpected resolution. Roger K. Thomas is associate professor at Illinois State University, where he teaches Japanese language and culture. (For this item please quote stock ID 17346) ISBN: 9780824821876

[Indent] Japanese gardens are fascinating expressions of landscape art. Their beauty speaks to everyone. What is behind this beauty? Why do the gardens of Japan speak to us so strongly? This volume delves into questions of beauty and ideas of nature expressed in the visual and literary arts of Japan as well as notions of taste and creativity in garden making. It goes beyond the popular understanding of Japanese gardens and locates them in a larger social and cultural context, revealing not only how gardeners conceived their works, but also how gardens functioned during key periods in classical, medieval, and early modern Japanese history. Revised and thoroughly updated, Themes in the History of Japanese Garden Art presents new, thought-provoking interpretations of the evolution of Japanese garden art. Its depth and much-needed emphasis on a practical context for garden creation will appeal to art and literary historians as well as scholars, students, practitioners, and appreciators of garden and landscape art, Asian and Western. Wybe Kuitert is a practicing garden architect currently living in the Netherlands and a visiting professor at Kyoto University of Art and Design. (For this item please quote stock ID 18052) ISBN: 9780824823122

'An incredibly impressive work. Particularly noteworthy is the author's ability to combine biographical details with a grasp of philosophical ideas. It is important as well in removing the stain that Nishida nurtured militaristic and pro-facist leanings.... A philosophical biography of high calibre.' - Fred R. Dallmayr, Packey J. Dee Professor of Political Theory, University of Notre Dame 'At long last a standard reference work on the first and greatest of Japan's twentieth-century philosophers.' - James W. Heisig, Director, Nanzan Institute for Religion and Culture 'This is a magnificent intellectual biography of one of the great philosophers of the twentieth century. The scholarship is meticulous and the writing engaging. It promises to be the definitive life of Nishida for the foreseeable future.' - Graham Parkes, University of Hawai'i This is the definitive work on the first and greatest of Japan's twentieth-century philosophers, Nishida Kitaro (1870-1945). Interspersed throughout the narrative of Nishida's life and thought is a generous selection of the philosopher's own essays, letters, and short presentations, newly translated into English. Michiko Yusa is professor in the Department of Modern and Classical Languages and the Center for East Asian Studies at Western Washington University. (For this item please quote stock ID 18053) ISBN: 9780824824594

[Indent] Modern Japanese Aesthetics is the first work in English on the history of the Japanese philosophy of art, from its inception in the 1870s to the present. In addition to the historical information and discussion of aesthetic issues that appear in the introductions to each of the chapters, the book presents English translations of otherwise inaccessible major works on Japanese aesthetics, beginning with a complete and annotated translation of the first work in the field, Nishi Amane's Bimyogaku Setsu (The Theory of Aesthetics). In its four sections (The Subject of Aesthetics, Aesthetic Categories, Poetic Expression, Postmodernism and Aesthetics), Modern Japanese Aesthetics discusses the momentous efforts made by Japanese thinkers to master, assimilate, and transform Western philosophical systems to discuss their own literary and artistic heritage. Readers are introduced to debates between the unconditional supporters of Western ideas (Onishi Hajime) and more cautious approaches to the literary and artistic past (Okakura Kakuzo, Tsubouchi Shoyo). The institutionalisation of aesthetics as an academic subject is discussed and the work of some of Japan's most distinguished professional aestheticians (Onishi Yoshimori, Imamichi Tomonobu), philosophers (Kusanagi Masao, Nishitani Keiji, Sakabe Megumi), and literary critics (Karatani Kojin) is included. Modern Japanese Aesthetics is a sophisticated and energetic volume on the process that led to the construction of aesthetic categories used by Japanese and, later, Western scholars in discussing Japanese literature and arts. This important work will be essential reading for anyone concerned with the formation of a critical vocabulary in Japan. Michele Marra is professor of Japanese literature at the University of California, Los Angeles. (For this item please quote stock ID 18071) ISBN: 9780824820770

[Indent] This volume affords a fascinating and rare look at the sensitive issue of nuclear diplomacy between two critical Cold War allies, the United States and Japan, during the 1960s. Challenging the silence of the official bureaucracies in Washington and Tokyo, Wakaizumi Kei reveals the truth behind the secret 1969 agreement that ensured the eventual reversion of Okinawa to Japanese jurisdiction in 1972. Revelation of this secret accord created considerable controversy in Japan when Wakaizumi's memoir was first published in 1994. With the publication of this translation, his description of the events leading up to the closed-door agreement is available to an English-language audience for the first time. At a time when security matters are once again predominant in the U.S.-Japan alliance, Professor Wakaizumi's account is a timely reminder of the gap between official, media-filtered descriptions of diplomatic relations and the private discussions of national leaders. The long-standing reluctance of the Japanese government to declassify its postwar diplomatic records has meant that Japan's side of its relationship with the U.S. has been only partially revealed. The Best Course Available attempts to correct this shortcoming and at the same time provides insight into the complicated and arcane process of foreign policymaking, national leadership, and domestic politics in Japan after 1945. Wakaizumi Kei (1930-1996) was professor of international relations at Kyoto Sangyo University. John Swenson-Wright is lecturer in modern Japanese politics and fellow of Darwin College at the University of Cambridge. (For this item please quote stock ID 18073) ISBN: 9780824821463

Kabuki Plays On Stage represents a monumental achievement in Japanese theatre studies, being the first collection of kabuki play translations to be published in twenty-five years. The twelve plays translated in Volume 2 cover a brief period, but one that saw important developments in kabuki architecture, acting, dance, and the manipulation of characters and themes.

(For this item please quote stock ID 31317) ISBN: 9780824824136

'A judicious, detailed, and highly informative account of a complicated history.' - Journal of Japanese Studies 27 (2001) 'An impressive contribution on many levels' - The Journal of Religion, October 2001 'A major study that sheds important light on the world of medieval Japan.' - Paul Groner, University of Virginia 'A very impressive piece of scholarship.... The author writes authoritatively, advancing a series of interpretations that in some cases revise views long held by historians, both Japanese and Western.' - Paul Varley, University of Hawai`i '[Adolphson's] ideas are often very interesting and deserve to be considered by those who teach survey courses in Japanese and East Asian history as well as by ? specialists' - American Historical Review, December 2001 'The Gates of Power offers new insights into the dimensions of government in premodern Japan. While focusing on the crucial role of Buddhism from the 11th through the 14th centuries, it also prompts the reader to reflect on the intricate balance between power elites and the complex interdependencies of religion and politics.' - Florian Coulmas, The Japan Times, 22 April 2001 The political influence of temples in premodern Japan, most clearly manifested in divine demonstrations - where rowdy monks and shrine servants brought holy symbols to the capital to exert pressure on courtiers - has traditionally been condemned and is poorly understood. In an impressive examination of this intriguing aspect of medieval Japan, the author employs a wide range of previously neglected sources to argue that religious protest was a symptom of political factionalism in the capital rather than its cause. It is his contention that religious violence can be traced primarily to attempts by secular leaders to rearrange religious and political hierarchies to their own advantage, thereby leaving disfavoured religious institutions to fend for their accustomed rights and status. In this context, divine demonstrations became the preferred negotiating tool for monastic complexes. For almost three centuries, such strategies allowed a handful of elite temples to maintain enough of an equilibrium to sustain and defend the old style of rulership even against the efforts of the Ashikaga Shogunate in the mid-fourteenth century. By acknowledging temples and monks as legitimate co-rulers, The Gates of Power provides a new synthesis of Japanese rulership from the late Heian (794-1185) to the early Muromachi (1336-1573) eras, offering a unique and comprehensive analysis that brings together the spheres of art, religion, ideas, and politics in medieval Japan. Mikael Adolphson is assistant professor in the Department of East Asian Languages and Civilisations at Harvard University. (For this item please quote stock ID 15123) ISBN: 9780824823344

Grand Tea Master Sen Soshitsu begins his examination of tea's origins and development from the eighth century through the Heian and medieval eras. This volume illustrates that modes of thinking and practices now associated with the Japanese Way of Tea can be traced to China - where from the classical period tea was imbued with a spiritual quality. 'Basing his writing on extensive research into the primary historical records, [Dr. Sen] tells his story both as a historian and as one of the leading practitioners of chanoyu in Japan and the world. In this dual role of historian and leading practitioner, Dr. Sen is able to deal with chanoyu with a sensitivity and insight not likely to be found in the writings of others. The Japanese Way of Tea will surely take its place at the forefront of writings in English on chanoyu' - From the Foreword by Paul Varley. (For this item please quote stock ID 12468) ISBN: 9780824819903

[Indent] This collection of twenty-one essays constitutes the first history of modern Japanese aesthetics in any language. It introduces readers through lucid and readable translations to works on the philosophy of art written by major Japanese thinkers from the late nineteenth century to the present. Selected from a variety of sources (monographs, journals, catalogues), the essays cover topics related to the study of beauty in art and nature. (For this item please quote stock ID 15915) ISBN: 9780824823993

Uno Koji, a literary figure of the first rank in twentieth-century Japan, was a maverick who defied literary conventions by combining the playfulness and stylistic verve of pre-Meiji literature with the often tortured self-reflection of modern fiction.

Elaine Gerbert's startlingly evocative and graceful translation is preceded by an interpretive introduction that places Uno's writing in critical perspective. Here at last is a translation that makes accessible for the first time in English two of the most representative works of this acute, eccentric, and always entertaining author, whose versatility and deft control of language earned him a reputation as one of the great stylists of modern Japanese literature.

(For this item please quote stock ID 17826) ISBN: 9780824817565

'Dr Liao has not only provided highly informative and stimulating discussions on the impact of think tanks on Chinese foreign policy towards Japan, but has also produced a useful conceptual framework in analysing China's transition in its politics and foreign policy formation. This book has filled an important hole in the field, and should be read widely by academics and practitioners alike' - Zhao Quansheng, American University, Washington DC The proliferation of think tanks and NGOs has been a recent trend in the Chinese socio-political landscape. Does this signal the growth of a civic and pluralistic society or are they just 'flower vases' for decorative purposes? How much a foreign-policy debate is possible between scholars and senior bureaucrats who are also senior officials in the Chinese Communist Party? The author examines the influence of these foreign policy think tanks and their role vis-a-vis China's Japan policy for two decades subsequent to the Open Door Policy since the late 1970s. She demonstrates, through empirical cases with memories and interviews, that there is a growing pluralistic trend in foreign policy decision-making in the post-Mao China. Liao Xuanli studied history in Peking University and international relations at the International University of Japan in Niigata, before earning her Ph.D. in International Relations from the University of Hong Kong in 2002. She is currently a lecturer in international relations and engine security at the University of Dundee, Scotland. Her research interests include Chinese foreign policy and its related apparatus and China's international energy strategy. (For this item please quote stock ID 26234) ISBN: 9789629962661

(For this item please quote stock ID 11126) ISBN: 9780824821296

Enduring Identities is an attempt to understand the continuing relevance of Shinto to the cultural identity of contemporary Japanese. The enduring significance of this ancient yet innovative religion is evidenced each year by the millions of Japanese who visit its shrines. They might come merely seeking a park-like setting or to make a request of the shrine's deities, asking for a marriage partner, a baby, or success at school or work; or they might come to give thanks for benefits received through the intercession of deities or to legitimate and sacralise civic and political activities. Through an investigation of one of Japan's most important and venerated Shinto shrines, Kamo Wake Ikazuchi Jinja (more commonly Kamigamo Jinja), the book addresses what appears through Western and some Asian eyes to be an exotic and incongruous blend of superstition and reason as well as a photogenic juxtaposition of present and past. Combining theoretical sophistication with extensive fieldwork and a deep knowledge of Japan, John Nelson documents and interprets the ancient Kyoto shrine's yearly cycle of rituals and festivals, its sanctified landscapes, and the people who make it viable. At local and regional levels, Kamigamo Shrine's ritual traditions (such as the famous Hollyhock Festival) and the strategies for their perpetuation and implementation provide points of departure for issues that anthropologists, historians, and scholars of religion will recognise as central to their disciplines. These include the formation of social memory, the role of individual agency within institutional politics, religious practice and performance, the shaping of sacred space and place, ethnic versus cultural identity, and the politics of historical representation and cultural nationalism. Nelson links these themes through a detailed ethnography about a significant place and institution, which until now has been largely closed to both Japanese and foreign scholars. In contrast to conventional notions of ideology and institutions, he shows how a religious tradition's lack of centralised dogma, charismatic leaders, and sacred texts promotes rather than hinders a broad-based public participation with a variety of institutional agendas, most of which have very little to do with belief. He concludes that it is this structural flexibility, coupled with ample economic, human, and cultural resources, that nurtures a reworking of multiple identities - all of which resonate with the past, fully engage the present, and, with care, will endure well into the future. John K. Nelson teaches at the Department of Religious Studies and Theology, University of San Francisco. 'Informative and erudite ... a valuable book.' - Choice, November 2000 'A welcome addition to the growing literature on Shinto.' - Monumenta Nipponica 55 'One of the most sophisticated available bodies of work on Shinto.... [I]t goes far to demystify this heavily politicized religious tradition.' - Journal of Asian Studies, February 2001 'Its depth of historical and ethnographic detail make it highly suitable for a course on East Asian religions. Yet it also addresses broader issues of cultural identity, the construction of social memory, the delineation of sacred space, and the exercise of individual agency within a structured institutional environment, all of which make it equally suitable for cross-cultural comparative purposes.' - Japanese Journal of Religious Studies, Spring 2001 (For this item please quote stock ID 18104) ISBN: 9780824822590

Here, in plain language, is the definitive guide for taking control of your life and imbuing it with greater meaning and productivity. Constructive Living is an action-based way of looking at the world that combines good, old-fashioned straight talk and the celebrated Japanese psychotherapies Morita and Naikan. David Reynolds, the father of this brilliantly simple and effective therapy, shows us how to live thoughtfully and economically, to regard our actions as if they were divine rituals, and to perform them with the utmost care. He contends that contentment is achieved, not bestowed - attaining peace and satisfaction takes daily practice and learning. With user-friendly anecdotes, practical exercises, and a sense of humor, he refreshes the experienced student and takes the novice to the beginning, laying out the essence of Constructive Living. David K. Reynolds is the founder of Constructive Living and the director of the Constructive Living Center in Coos Bay, Oregon. He is the only Westerner to have been awarded the Kora Prize and the Morita Prize by the Japanese Morita Therapy Association. He is the author of Constructive Living (1984) and The Quiet Therapies: Japanese Pathways to Personal Growth (1980), both published by Hawaii University Press. (For this item please quote stock ID 18092) ISBN: 9780824826000

What is Japan? Who are its people? These questions are among those addressed in Bruce Batten's ambitious study of Japan's historical development through to the 19th century. Traditionally, Japan has been portrayed as a homogenous society formed over millennia in virtual isolation. Social historians and others have begun to question this view, emphasising diversity and interaction, both within the Japanese archipelago and between Japan and other parts of Eurasia. Until now, however, no book has attempted to resolve these conflicting views in a comprehensive, systematic way. To the Ends of Japan tackles the 'big questions' on Japan by focusing on its borders, broadly defined to include historical frontiers and boundaries within the islands themselves as well as the obvious coastlines and oceans. Batten provides compelling arguments for viewing borders not as geographic 'givens', but as social constructs whose location and significance can, and do, change over time. By giving separate treatment to the historical development of political, cultural, and ethnic borders in the archipelago, he highlights the complex, multifaceted nature of Japanese society, without losing sight of the more fundamental differences that have separated Japan from its nearest neighbours in the archipelago and on the Eurasian continent. Bruce Batten is professor of Japanese history and director of the Centre for International Studies at Obirin University, Tokyo. (For this item please quote stock ID 19866) ISBN: 9780824824471

Gambling with Virtue rings with the voices of women speaking openly about their struggle to be both modern and Japanese in the late twentieth century. It brings to the fore the complexity of women's everyday lives as they navigate through home, work, and community. Meanwhile, women fashion selves that acknowledge and challenge the social order. Nancy Rosenberger gives us their voices and experiences interspersed with introductions to public ideas of the last three decades that contribute significantly to the opportunities and risks women encounter in their journeys. Rosenberger uses the stage as a metaphor to demonstrate how everyday life requires Japanese women to be skilled performers. She shows how they function on stage in their accepted roles while effecting small but significant changes backstage. Over the last thirty years, Japanese women have expanded their influence and extended this cultural process of multiple arenas to find compromises between the old virtues of personhood and new ideals for self. They conform, maneuver, and make choices within these multiple stages as they juggle various concerns and desires. By the 1990s their personal choices have made a difference, calling into question the very nature of these multiple arenas. Nancy Rosenberger is associate professor of anthropology and co-director of the Business Anthropology Program at Oregon State University. Asia/Japan/Sociology [Indent] (For this item please quote stock ID 15464) ISBN: 9780824823887

[Indent] In this rich and absorbing analysis of the transformation of political thought in nineteenth-century Japan, Douglas Howland examines the transmission to Japan of key concepts - liberty, rights, sovereignty, and society - from Western Europe and the United States. Because Western political concepts did not translate well into their language, Japanese had to invent terminology to engage Western political thought. This work of westernisation served to structure historical agency as Japanese leaders undertook the creation of a modern state. Where scholars have previously treated the introduction of Western political thought to Japan as a simple migration of ideas from one culture to another, Howland undertakes an unprecedented integration of the history of political concepts and the semiotics of translation techniques. He demonstrates that Japanese efforts to translate the West must be understood as problems both of language and action - as the creation and circulation of new concepts and the usage of these new concepts in debates about the programs and policies to be implemented in a westernising Japan. Translating the West will interest scholars of East Asian studies and translation studies and historians of political thought, liberalism, and modernity. Douglas R. Howland is associate professor of history at DePaul University. (For this item please quote stock ID 16587) ISBN: 9780824824624

Patricia Wetzel offers in this volume a comprehensive examination of a frequently discussed yet much misunderstood aspect of the Japanese language. Keigo, or 'polite language,' is often viewed as a quaint accessory to Japanese grammar and a relic of Japan's feudal past. Nothing, Wetzel contends, could be further from the truth. It is true that Japan has a long history of differentiating linguistic form on the basis of social status, psychological detachment, emotional reserve, and a host of other context-dependent factors. But, as is made clear in this unique and broadly framed study, modern keigo consciousness and keigo grammar emerged out of Japan's encounter with Western intellectual trends in the mid- to late 19th century. Keigo in Modern Japan presents a finely nuanced linguistic and political review of keigo available nowhere else in English. The first chapter outlines the ways in which keigo has become a problem in Western linguistics through the application of structuralist analysis and its offshoots. But keigo's presence in the English-language literature does not begin to compare with the place it occupies in the Japanese linguistic canon. Wetzel describes the historical roots and growth of keigo and the popularity of how-to manuals, which, she contends, are less about overt instruction than reinforcing what people already believe. Patricia Wetzel is professor of Japanese and director of the Institute for Asian Studies, Portland State University. (For this item please quote stock ID 21249) ISBN: 9780824826024

[Indent] The literary writings of Mori Ôgai (1862-1922), one of the giant figures of the Meiji period, have become increasingly well known to readers of English through a number of recent translations of his novels and short stories. Ôgai was more than a writer of fiction, however. He has long been regarded in Japan as one of the most influential intellectual and artistic figures of his period, possessing a wide range of enthusiasms and concerns, many developed through his early European experiences. Not a Song Like Any Other attempts to reveal the full range of Ôgai's creative endeavour, providing trenchant examples of his remarkable range, from dramatist and storyteller to poet and polemicist, all translated into English for the first time. The first of seven parts, 'The Author Himself', offers a variety of self portraits and other insights into Ôgai's character through his essay - laconic, ironic, detached - written over the course of his career. 'Mori Ôgai in Germany' reveals his responses to living in Germany in the 1880s and seeing for the first time how his country was being interpreted from the outside. It includes his celebrated and spirited defense of his country, originally published in a German newspaper. 'Mori Ôgai and the World of Politics' relates his uneasy reactions to Japanese society at a later phase in his career. The fourth section provides some of the first information available in English concerning his lifelong interest in painting and other aspects of the visual arts in the Japan of his day. Ôgai's theatrical experiments are briefly chronicled in Part 5. 'Four Unusual Stories' offers new evidence of the range of the writer's interests and ambitions. The final section includes some of the first translations of Ôgai's poetry available in English. Contributors: Richard Bowring, Sarah Cox, Sanford Goldstein, Andrew Hall, Mikiko Hirayama, Helen Hopper, Marvin Marcus, Keiko McDonald, J. Thomas Rimer, Hiroaki Sato, William Tyler. J. Thomas Rimer is professor of Japanese literature at the University of Pittsburgh. (For this item please quote stock ID 22704) ISBN: 9780824827021

[Indent] The publication in 1992 of Miyabe Miyuke's highly anticipated Kasha (translated into English as All She Was Worth) represents a watershed in the history of Japanese women's detective fiction. Inspired by Miyabe's success and the increasing number of Western mysteries in translation, women began writing mysteries of all types, employing the narrative and conceptual resources of the detective genre to depict and critique contemporary Japanese society - and the situation of women in it. Bodies of Evidence examines this recent boom and the ways in which five contemporary authors (Miyabe, Nonami Asa, Shibata Yoshiki, Kirino Natsuo, and Matsuo Yumi) critically engage with a variety of social issues and concerns: consumerism and the crisis of identity, discrimination and harassment in the workplace, sexual harassment and sexual violence, and motherhood. Bodies of Evidence moves beyond the borders of detective fiction scholarship by exploring the worlds constructed by these authors in their novels and showing how they intersect with other political, cultural, and economic discourses and with the lived experiences of contemporary Japanese women. 'Amanda Seaman not only advances the study of Japanese literature by opening the door to a new genre, but also contributes to ongoing discussions of women in contemporary Japanese culture' - Rebecca Copeland, author of Lost Leaves: Women Writers of Meiji Japan. Amanda Seaman is assistant professor of Japanese literature at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. (For this item please quote stock ID 22705) ISBN: 9780824828066

Kuki Shûzô (1888-1941), one of Japan's most original thinkers of the 20th century, is best known for his interpretations of Western Continental philosophy. His works on and of poetry are less well known but equally illuminating. During his eight years studying in Europe in the 1920s, Kuki spent time in Paris, where he wrote several collections of poetry and many short poems in the tanka style.

Included in this volume are these Paris poems as well as other verses that Kuki appended to a long essay on poetry, Rhymes in Japanese Poetry, written in 1931. Included as well are translations of two of Kuki's major critical essays on poetry, The Genealogy of Feelings: A Guide to Poetry (1938) and The Metaphysics of Literature (1940).

Michael Marra, one of the West's foremost authorities on modern Japanese aesthetics, prefaces his translations with an important essay that gives an account of the current state of Kuki studies in English and presents an intriguing and original interpretation of Kuki's writings. Marra argues that there is an unresolved tension in Kuki's thought between a desire to overcome the rigid schemes of metaphysics, garnered from his knowledge of French and German philosophy, on the one hand, and a constant hesitation to let those schemes go, which is expressed in his verse.

Michael Marra is professor of Japanese literature, aesthetics, and hermeneutics at the University of California, Los Angeles.

(For this item please quote stock ID 22707) ISBN: 9780824827557

"These five accurately and excellently translated plays are representative of the kabuki theater in its 'purest' form." --Earle Ernst While its actors made their entrace down the Flower Way over three hundred years ago, little of kabuki's repertory has been available to English readers. Not only are adequate translations difficult to produce, but also because the spoken parts of the drama constitute but a portion of that grand spectacle, English renderings often have an elliptical quality. These five plays, however, were translated from tapes made by James Brandon at actual performances, imparting to them an unusual immediacy. The superb translations are further enhanced by detailed commentary and stage directions that reflect music and sound effects as well as positions of actors on stage and their stylized gestures and posturing, all of which are such a vital part of a live performance. A concise introduction includes the history of kabuki, its religious background and ties with prostitution, its themes and playwriting systems, and its performance conventions, actors, music, and dance. Appendixes provide a fascinating focus on various sound effects and music cues in performance. More than one hundred production photographs vividly convey the action and emotion of one of the world's greatest stage arts. First published in 1975, this volume remains a classic. A reprint to the 1975 edition. Accepted into the UNESCO Collection of Representative Works, Japanese Series. A concise introduction includes the history of kabuki, its religious background and ties with prostitution, its themes and playwriting systems, and its performance conventions, actors, music, and dance. Appendixes provide a fascinating focus on various sound effects and music cues in performance. More than one hundred production photographs vividly convey the action and emotion of one of the world's greatest stage arts. First published in 1975, this volume remains a classic. A reprint to the 1975 edition. Accepted into the UNESCO Collection of Representative Works, Japanese Series. (For this item please quote stock ID 18069) ISBN: 9780824814267