Subj: Perceptions of Japan in Amer Lit--Suggestions?
[1]
Date: Sat, 17 Feb 1996 14:28:21 -0500 (EST)
From: David Strauss <strauss@hobbes.kzoo.edu>
There does seem to be less written on the American literary response to
Japan, but you might try Arthur Christy, "The Orient in American
Transcendetalism" as well as his "The Asian Legacy and American Life." An
interesting and perceptive new work on Hearn is "Lafcadio Hearn and the
Vision of Japan" by Carl Dawson. Also, a more contemporary, but equally
"literary" response to Japan is offered by John Elder in his delightful
account called "Following the Brush: An American Encounter with Classical
Japanese Culture." Among the most interesting American interpreters of
Japan were a group of New Englanders who preceded and influenced Lafcadio
Hearn: namely Percival Lowell, Ernest Fenollosa and Edward Morse. Their own
works are quite interesting as well as the following: on Morse, Robert
Rosenstone, "Mirror in the Shrine;" on Fenollosa, Lawrence Chisolm,
"Fenollosa and the Far East;"; on Lowell, I have done a short article and
am working on a book. I'd be happy to send you a bibliography I provide for
students who take my course on Japanese-American Relations, 1853 to the
Present. David Strauss, History Dept, Kalamazoo College, Kalamazoo, MI
[2]
Date: Sun, 18 Feb 1996 07:50:37 -0800 (EST)
From: Katie Eagan & Jeff Phillips <eaganca@bc.edu>
Peter Feng wrote:
I'm not sure how this is meant to be a perception of Japan -- the novel is
written by a Japanese American, about Japanese Americans (both Issei --
[I] don't think that's what our colleague was looking for.
I didn't see the original request, but _No-No Boy might also be
interesting because of the Americanized sons' disgust for those things
about their parents that seem "Japanese" to them. Their repulsion from
this part of themselves might say something about American perceptions
of Japan.
A lot of Californian literature reveals paranoia over the "yellow
peril"--regarding that, there's a two-year old book out on the "yellow
peril" in film--can't remember the author, but she's a woman and the
name's Italian, and it's published by U.C. Press.
Catherine M. Eagan
Boston College
[3]
Date: Sun, 18 Feb 1996 17:52:30 -0500 (EST)
From: Dennis Moore <dmoore@garnet.acns.fsu.edu>
Is it too late to recommend Hisaye Yamamoto's fine story
"Seventeen Syllables"? It gives students here at Florida
State a memorable, seemingly concrete way to distinguish
generations within immigrant families; it's in vol. 2
of the Heath, and if you're as otherwise unfamiliar w/the
cultural context as I was, you might well want to get the
casebook on the story, ed. by King-Kok Cheung, in Rutgers'
"Women Writers: Texts and Contexts" series. That casebook's
footnotes will lead you to Yuji Ichioka's _The Issei: The
world of First-Generation Japanese Immigrants, 1885-1924_
(Free P, 1988).
Cheers,
--Dennis Moore
<dmoore@garnet.acns.fsu.edu>