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This is a fresh and surprising account of Japan's culture from the 'opening up' of the country in the mid-nineteenth century to the present. It is told through the eyes of people who greeted this change not with the confidence and grasping ambition of Japan's modernizers and nationalists, but with resistance, conflict, distress. We encounter writers of dramas, ghost stories and crime novels where modernity itself is the tragedy, the ghoul and the bad guy; surrealist and avant-garde artists sketching their escape; rebel kamikaze pilots and the put-upon urban poor; hypnotists and gangsters; men in desperate search of the eternal feminine and feminists in search of something more than state-sanctioned subservience; Buddhists without morals; Marxist terror groups; couches full to bursting with the psychological fall-out of breakneck modernization. These people all sprang from the soil of modern Japan, but their personalities and projects failed to fit. They were 'dark blossoms': both East-West hybrids and home-grown varieties that wreathed, probed and sometimes penetrated the new structures of mainstream Japan.
A SUNDAY TIMES BOOK OF THE YEAR 2020 'Mightily impressive ... a marvellous read' Sunday Times From the acclaimed author of Japan Story, this is the history of Japan, distilled into the stories of twenty remarkable individuals. The vivid and entertaining portraits in Chris Harding's enormously enjoyable new book take the reader from the earliest written accounts of Japan right through to the life of the current empress, Masako. We encounter shamans and warlords, poets and revolutionaries, scientists, artists and adventurers - each offering insights of their own into this extraordinary place. For anyone new to Japan, this book is the ideal introduction. For anyone already deeply involved with it, this is a book filled with surprises and pleasures.
Pickard County, Nebraska, July 1979. Sheriff's deputy Harley Jensen is restless, looking for something to take his mind off the past. Pam bristles against her role as wife and mother; her husband, Rick, struggles with the wreckage of his youth. Paul Reddick, town miscreant, is flint to Harley's steel. It's just a matter of time before their conflict burns Pickard County to the ground. -- adapted from jacket
Since the late nineteenth century, religious ideas and practices in Japan have become increasingly intertwined with those associated with mental health and healing. This relationship developed against the backdrop of a far broader, and deeply consequential meeting: between Japan’s long-standing, Chinese-influenced intellectual and institutional forms, and the politics, science, philosophy, and religion of the post-Enlightenment West. In striving to craft a modern society and culture that could exist on terms with – rather than be subsumed by – western power and influence, Japan became home to a religion--psy dialogue informed by pressing political priorities and rapidly shifting cultur...
Care is central to life, and yet is all too often undervalued, taken for granted, and hidden from view. This collection of fourteen substantive and highly innovative essays, along with its insightful introduction, seeks to explore the different dimensions of care that shape social, legal and political contexts. It addresses these dimensions in four key ways. First, the contributions expand contemporary theoretical understandings of the value of care, by reflecting upon established conceptual approaches (such as the ‘ethics of care’) and developing new ways of using and understanding this concept. Second, the chapters draw on a wide range of methods, from doctrinal scholarship through eth...
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I say! If you’re a fan of ghastly weather and mysteries wrapped in tweed, then you’ll be delighted at this complete collection from the classic series “Albany & Sturgess,” enhanced with bonus material and extra British flair. Discover bloody murders and plots that will frazzle your nerves, already frayed by the seemingly never-ending British rain. Rivière and Floc’h present an extraordinary combination of smoke and mirrors, of shadows and ghosts, which provokes in the reader an almost voyeuristic pleasure as it reveals the process of literary creation and its mysterious cocktail of reality and imagination. Spiffing!
John England uses the words of the song to bring to life his memories of places and people he has known and loved. The memoirs are a personal account of life, family and career, with reflections on many themes, particularly music. This book will be a surprise to those who know John – and those that don’t. John England uses quotes from a lot of different sources to comment and entertain. It is a very readable account of the life and times of someone who has had a successful professional career and a private life touched by sadness but who has found happiness again.
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