The Japan Society Review

Project Japan and Art Media, Edo to Now by Graham Cooper, with essays contributed by Japanese architects Fumihiko Maki, Kisho Kurokawa, Tadao Ando, Kengo Kuma and Makoto Sei Watanabe, Images Publishing, Australia, 2009, 240 pages, numerous colour illustrations, ISBN 978 1 86470 300 2 Review by Sir Hugh Cortazzi Graham Cooper introduced his book […]

By Ian Nish 454 pp including index and appendices ISBN 978-1-905246-87-8, Global Oriental, 2011 Ian Nish, Professor Emeritus in International History at LSE, spent two years with the British Commonwealth Occupation Force in Japan from 1946-48. He arrived in Kure in October 1946 as an interpreter-translator attached to the Combined Services Direct Interrogation Centre (CSDIC) […]

Britain and Japan: Biographical Portraits VII. Complied & Edited by Sir Hugh Cortazzi, Global Oriental and the Japan Society 2010, 665 pages, ISBN: 978-1906876265. Review by Sean Curtin.

Private Yokoi’s War and Life on Guam, 1944-1972, The Story of the Japanese Imperial Arm’s Longest WWII Survivor in the Field and Later Life, by Omi Hatashin, Global Oriental, 2009, 237 pages including index and a black and white plate section, ISBN 978-1-905246-69-4.

"My Work: 10 Years as the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees and Construction of Peace (私の仕事 ― 国連難民高等弁務官の十年と平和の構築)"

A Life in Aikido: The Biography of Founder Morihei Ueshiba. By Kisshomaru Ueshiba (植芝 吉祥丸). Kodansha International, 2008, 320 pages, ISBN-13: 978-4770026170 Review by Hugh Purser

Translated by Mary E. Foster I-House Press, Tokyo, 2010 290 pages including index, references and tables. ISBN 978-4-903452-18-0 Review by Sir Hugh Cortazzi “Japan suffers today from a high inequality in income distribution and a lack of equal opportunity. Simply put, Japan is a class society.” These are the thought-provoking first words of this sociological […]

Translated by Carl Freire Routledge, 2010 214 pages, ISBN: 978-0-415-55688-0 (Hardback), £75.00. Review by Sean Curtin In this impressive study Yu Uchiyama meticulously dissects the highly successful and by Japanese standards long lived administration of Junichiro Koizumi (26 April 2001 – 26 September 2006). Since stepping down from office, no Japanese prime minister has lasted […]

By Shunji Yanai Born in 1937 in Tokyo into a diplomatic family, Yanai spent his childhood in pre-war Germany, Switzerland, and Colombia, where his family was held with other Japanese as prisoners of war after Japan attacked Pearl Harbor [...] Review by Fumiko Halloran

Edited by Harumi Kimura Global Oriental, 2009 pages 251 including index, ISBN 978-1-905246-86-1. Review by Sir Hugh Cortazzi. The seventy short essays in this book deal with aspects of the everyday life of ordinary Japanese people. Even those of us who have lived in Japan for a few years will find in this book some […]