The Japan Society Review

By Robert Whiting As journalist and author who has lived in Tokyo on and off for more than fifty years, Robert Whiting looks back over that vast spread of years comes in the form of a fascinating memoir, interweaving his personal narrative into the unfolding backdrop of Japan’s own great journey through time. Review by Laurence Green

By John D. Person In this book, John D. Person explores the lives of two of the most notorious right-wing intellectuals responsible for leading such attacks in prewar and wartime Japan: Minoda Muneki (1894-1946) and Mitsui Koshi (1883-1953) of the Genri Nippon (Japan Principle) Society. Review by Francesco Cioffo

A new year has begun, and with this issue of The Japan Society Review in February 2021 we start the 16th year of our publication. We hope so far our readers have enjoyed discovering new books, films and events and learning about Japan. None of this would have been possible without our fantastic reviewers so we want to open this issue with a big thank you to all of them for their help.

By David Watts Barton Japan from Anime to Zen is the latest in a long line of guidebooks and travelogues that attempt to answer that eternal ‘why?’ we have all posed at one point or other when considering what exactly it is that fascinates us so much about Japan. Review by Laurence Green

By Hashizume Bun The Day the Sun Fell is an accessible emotional thriller through which we follow Hashizume and her family and friends as they try to recover from the atomic bomb in Hiroshima. Review by Elizabeth Chappell

By Robert Morton In this well-illustrated biography of Harry Parkes, Robert Morton records his life and achievements, as well as his personality in a balanced and judicious way, and with a biographer’s voice that is an attractive mixture of chatty enthusiasm and rigorous scholarship. Review by David Warren

By Antony Best This is an extremely well-researched book which charts the relationship of Britain and Japan from its earliest days until the demise of the Anglo-Japanese alliance in the early 1920s. Review by Robert Morton

Written and directed by Fukunaga Takeshi Ainu Mosir is a sensitively filmed slice of contemporary Ainu life, as well as a rites-of-passage story set in Lake Akan Ainu Village in Kushiro City, Hokkaido. Review by Susan Meehan

Welcome to the final issue of The Japan Society Review in 2020. This has been a strange and difficult year, but we hope our publication has accompanied you during these uncertain times offering new opportunities to discover, read and learn about Japan.

By Seiichi Takeuchi The Japanese philosophy of impermanence is the subtitle and the core of the book, but I felt the meat of the content only spoke to one aspect of impermanence, the vicissitudes of life buffeting our self-determinations. Review by Chris Arning