A Taste of Zenbu Zen
In Search of Kyoto’s Epicurean Culture
Read MoreWhat the Trees Say
Listen to this poetic ode to trees…
Read MoreNotes of a Crocodile by Qiu Miaojin
Notes of a Crocodile is not a book that shows teenagers how to live a straight life, in any sense of the term. And yet it is intended to be a survival manual for teenagers, for a certain age when reading the right book can save your life…
Read MoreDoctor Stories: Excerpts from the journals of Kenjiro Setoue
Dr. Setoue was a successful surgeon who agreed to take a job at a clinic on a small rugged island off the west coast of Kyushu. For many years the only surgeon on the Lower Koshiki Island, he was the last and only line of defense when there was a medical emergency.
Read MoreJaplish Whiplash
Japlish Whiplash is a book that gleefully transgresses boundaries — the boundaries between the United States and Japan, between English and the Japanese language, between academic poets and slam poets, between “artistic” and “plebian,” between “high” and “low,” and between “avant-garde” and “urban.”
Read MorePhotography, Community, Space: Kyotographie’s Lucille Reyboz and Yusuke Nakanishi
Our theme will be “Tribe,” but not in an ethnic sense—it’s more in the sense of a community that shares the same sense of values.
Read MoreLife Goes On: Fukushima and Dalian, China
Dalian has a long and mixed history with Japan. It is the site of the initial invasion in 1931; the anniversary of the invasion is still observed every September when sirens are sounded at the same time they were originally heard eighty years ago…
Read MoreBuddhism and the Film
There would on the surface be little to connect the Buddhist faith with the cinema. This is an entertainment which is largely based upon satisfying our desire for the various attachments which Buddhism counsels us to give up. There are, however, a few promising areas where some agreement might be detected.
Read MoreYumi Lee
Through my study of this Korean-Japanese issue I have realized that four major factors prevent solutions: the first is Japanese education…
Read MoreRoger Pulvers
When I arrived in Tokyo in 1967 after studying in Poland, I had only $300 left…I came down to Kyoto on the train, rented a little house by Midoro-ga-ike, and started writing short stories….
Read MoreAn Interview with Arai Manta
Born and raised in Tokyo, Arai Manta has spent the last nine years tending bar at Club, a relaxed drinking spot that plays African music, jazz and off-the-wall Japanese pop….
Read MoreListening to Vegetables: The Art of Tanahashi Toshio
The pleasure of shojin is to find freedom within limitation of using only vegetables.
Read MoreFumio’s World
Japanese animator and illustrator Fumio Obata’s take on life abroad
Read MoreJiseung: A Journey into the Korean Art of Weaving Paper
For months, I was at a loss about how to weave so tightly. Then, one day he pressed my thumb down with such force, I felt like a door had smashed it. Only then did I grasp his secret…
Read MoreNagane Aki: Keeper of Tradition
A slim lady wearing oak-coloured clothes draws a tiny bamboo instrument to her mouth, holding it with one hand and gently vibrating it with the other. Haunting sounds fill the air like spirits drawn by the wind. Then, out of a sudden silence, the story begins.
Read MoreThe Hojoki : Witness in a Torn World
The times are calamitous, and it is scarcely less frightening to look back than forward. A horrific earthquake turns the world upside-down.
Read MoreBoys to Men
J-Boys follows 9-year-old Kazuo and his younger brother Yasuo around Tokyo’s Shinagawa Ward from October 1965 to April 1966.
Read MoreIn the Jade Garden
Japanese garden authority Marc P. Keane writes, “To walk the length of a roji (tea garden) is the spiritual complement of a journey from town to the deep recesses of a mountain where stands a hermit’s hut.”
Read MoreAn Aesthetic for Toys
If you visit Japan, you are likely to get the feeling the country is obsessed with characters and toys: children and adults play video games on trains, there seems to be a character mascot for every single product, and a Murakami Takashi toy/sculpture may be exhibiting at the local museum. Toys are everywhere.
Read MoreEmperor Meiji’s Clock Poem
When Emperor Meiji, 122nd Emperor of Japan, reigned from 1868 to 1912, Japan was beginning its modern explosion towards the modern world.
Read MoreMayumi Oda on Energy of Change, Feminization and New Birth of Japan
Mayumi Oda has devoted more than fifty years of her life to her art…her deeply feminist viewpoint also drives her ongoing efforts to promote world peace and eliminate nuclear weapons and other nuclear threats.
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