Author: Edwin Oldfather Reischauer
Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers
ISBN:
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 392

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Author: Donald Keene
Publisher: Columbia University Press
ISBN: 0231144415
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 203

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"I sometimes think that if, as the result of an accident, I were to lose my knowledge of Japanese, there would not be much left for me. Japanese, which at first had no connection with my ancestors, my literary tastes, or my awareness of myself as a person, has become the central element of my life." In this eloquent and wholly absorbing memoir, the renowned scholar Donald Keene shares more than half a century of his extraordinary adventures as a student of Japan. Keene begins with an account of his bittersweet childhood in New York; then he describes his initial encounters with Asia and Europe and the way in which World War II complicated that experience. He captures the sights, scents, and sounds of Japan as they first enveloped him, and talks of the unique travels and well-known intellectuals who later shaped the contours of his academic career. Keene traces the movement of his passions with delicacy and subtlety, deftly weaving his love for Japan into a larger narrative about identity and home and the circumstances that led a Westerner to find solace in a country on the opposite side of the world. Chronicles of My Life is not only a fascinating tale of two cultures colliding, but also a thrilling account of the emotions and experiences that connect us all, regardless of our individual origins.

Author: Eryk Salvaggio
Publisher: Createspace Independent Publishing Platform
ISBN: 9781489596987
Category : Americans
Languages : en
Pages : 212

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Book Description
Most books about Japan will tell you how to use chopsticks and say "konnichiwa!" Few honestly tackle the existential angst of living in a radically foreign culture. The author, a three-year resident and researcher of Japan, tackles the thousand tiny uncertainties of living abroad. -- Adapted from back cover

Author: Janice P. Nimura
Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
ISBN: 0393248240
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 352

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"Nimura paints history in cinematic strokes and brings a forgotten story to vivid, unforgettable life." —Arthur Golden, author of Memoirs of a Geisha In 1871, five young girls were sent by the Japanese government to the United States. Their mission: learn Western ways and return to help nurture a new generation of enlightened men to lead Japan. Raised in traditional samurai households during the turmoil of civil war, three of these unusual ambassadors—Sutematsu Yamakawa, Shige Nagai, and Ume Tsuda—grew up as typical American schoolgirls. Upon their arrival in San Francisco they became celebrities, their travels and traditional clothing exclaimed over by newspapers across the nation. As they learned English and Western customs, their American friends grew to love them for their high spirits and intellectual brilliance. The passionate relationships they formed reveal an intimate world of cross-cultural fascination and connection. Ten years later, they returned to Japan—a land grown foreign to them—determined to revolutionize women’s education. Based on in-depth archival research in Japan and in the United States, including decades of letters from between the three women and their American host families, Daughters of the Samurai is beautifully, cinematically written, a fascinating lens through which to view an extraordinary historical moment.

Author: Van Jay Symons
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1315500639
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 184

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Book Description
The contributors place the development of Asian studies programs in small colleges in historical context, make a compelling case for the inclusion of Asian studies in the liberal arts curriculum, and consider the challenges faced in developing and sustaining Asian studies programs and ways of meeting such challenges now and in the future.

Author: Edwin O. Reischauer
Publisher: Knopf
ISBN: 0525659420
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 346

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Book Description
In this major revision of his classic history of Japan—from the tribally divided state under the leadership of Yamato in the fifth century through centuries of dynastic rule to the death of Emperor Hirohito in 1989—the eminent Harvard historian and former U.S. Ambassador to Japan Edwin O. Reischauer incorporates nearly a decade's worth of new scholarship. His book is divided into three parts: the first part examines traditional Japan from the early Chinese influences to the flowering of a native culture and the establishment of a feudal system and society; the second looks at Japan in transition from the beginnings of the modern state to the rise of militarism and the advent of World War II; the third section, extensively rewritten to reflect Japan's drastically changed role in world affairs since 1984, deals with postwar Japan from the American Occupation and years of political division and instability to Japan's gradual metamorphosis into an economic giant. The Nakosone and Takeshita years are discussed at length, and the transformation of Japan's economy, hinged upon surging exports to the West, is analyzed. Clear, concise, and enormously informative, Reischauer's Japan: The Story of a Nation encompasses political, social, economic, and cultural history in a superbly readbable narrative.

Author: George R. Packard
Publisher: Columbia University Press
ISBN: 0231512775
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 377

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Book Description
In 1961, President Kennedy named Edwin O. Reischauer the U.S. Ambassador to Japan. Already deeply intimate with the country, Reischauer hoped to establish a more equal partnership with Japan, which had long been maligned in the American imagination. Reischauer pushed his fellow citizens to abandon caricature and stereotype and recognize Japan as a peace-loving democracy. Though his efforts were often condemned for being "too soft," the immensity of his influence (and the truth of his arguments) can be felt today. Having worked as Reischauer's special assistant in Tokyo, George R. Packard writes the definitive and first biography of this rare, charismatic talent. Reischauer reset the balance between two powerful nations. During World War II, he analyzed intelligence and trained American codebreakers in Japanese. He helped steer Japan toward democracy and then wrote its definitive English-language history. Reischauer's scholarship supplied the foundations for future East Asian disciplines, and his prescient research foretold America's missteps with China and involvement in Vietnam. At the time of his death in 1990, Reischauer warned the U.S. against adopting an attitude toward Asia that was too narrow and self-centered. India, Pakistan, and North Korea are now nuclear powers, and Reischauer's political brilliance has become more necessary and trenchant than ever.

Author: Donald Keene
Publisher: Columbia University Press
ISBN: 0231513488
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 203

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Book Description
“Few memoirs have the concision, modesty, and charm that mark this late-life work by . . . America’s most renowned scholar and interpreter of Japan.”—Foreword Reviews In this eloquent and wholly absorbing memoir, the renowned scholar Donald Keene shares more than half a century of his extraordinary adventures as a student of Japan. Keene begins with an account of his bittersweet childhood in New York; then he describes his initial encounters with Asia and Europe and the way in which World War II complicated that experience. He captures the sights, scents, and sounds of Japan as they first enveloped him, and talks of the unique travels and well-known intellectuals who later shaped the contours of his academic career. Keene traces the movement of his passions with delicacy and subtlety, deftly weaving his love for Japan into a larger narrative about identity and home and the circumstances that led a Westerner to find solace in a country on the opposite side of the world. Chronicles of My Life is not only a fascinating tale of two cultures colliding, but also a thrilling account of the emotions and experiences that connect us all, regardless of our individual origins. “Lovingly illustrated by the artist Akira Yamaguchi, the book limns a life inseparably linked to its dominant passion . . . The history is fascinating, and the literary life Keene has doggedly carved out of it, remarkable.”—Time, Asia Edition “Keene’s book soars, largely because of his intriguing, highly personal account of the literary milieu of Japan, particularly its drama, whether on stage or screen . . . [An] engaging and eloquent memoir.”—Times Literary Supplement

Author:
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Japan
Languages : en
Pages : 448

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Author: Kenneth B. Pyle
Publisher: Harvard University Press
ISBN: 0674989082
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 440

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Book Description
No nation was more deeply affected by America’s rise to power than Japan. The price paid to end the most intrusive reconstruction of a nation in modern history was a cold war alliance with the U.S. that ensured American dominance in the region. Kenneth Pyle offers a thoughtful history of this relationship at a time when the alliance is changing.