|
|
|
The nobility of failure: Tragic heroes in the history of Japan
by Ivan I Morris
Product Group: Book
Publisher: Holt, Rinehart and Winston (1975)
ISBN: 003010811X
EAN: 9780030108112
Unknown Binding: 500 pages
Edition: 1st
SKU: 080709005
Condition: Collectible: Good
Comments: This First Edition copy is in good condition. Page 296 has underlining/reference writings. Otherwise, No visible highlights, tears to text. Tight spine. Beautiful, clean, crisp B & W Photos. Clean Hard Cover, with Light shelf/edge wear. Dust Jacket has chips/tears with lots of shelf/edge wear. Copy can be sold with/out Dust Jacket. Very interesting copy, worth having at an affordable price. (7H-18)
|
Customer Reviews
|
A Rewarding Look at the Unrewarded
Rating  (5)
Date: 2005-05-21
2 out of 2 customers found this reveiw helpful
I lived in Japan for two and a half years, have visited the country several times since, and cannot speak highly enough of this book.
In TNOF, Ivan Morris provides a much-needed look at - to most westerners, anyway - one of the oddest aspects of Japanese culture, the self-immolating hero. TNOF offers a rundown of Japanese populist heroes from the past 2,000 years - all of whom are doomed to complete and utter failure - and provides a convincing analysis of why Japanese culture produces such men, and why their failures actually raise their status in the eyes of many of their fellow citizens.
Morris was perhaps the leading Japan scholar of his day, but even he finds many of his subjects bizaare. He deftly, though not necessarily disrespectfully, pokes fun at the absurdity of many of their situations. Not many scholars can make you laugh while they make you think.
|
|
A rewarding look at the unrewarded
Rating (5)
Date: 1998-09-12
17 out of 17 customers found this reveiw helpful
I lived in Japan for two and a half years, and cannot speak highly enough of The Nobility of Failure.In TNOF, Ivan Morris provides a much-needed look at - to most westerners, anyway - one of the oddest aspects of Japanese culture - the self-immolating hero. TNOF offers a rundown of Japanese populist heroes from the past 2,000 years - all of whom are doomed to complete and utter failure - and provides a convincing analysis of why Japanese culture produces such men, and why their failures actually raise their status in the eyes of many of their fellow citizens. Morris was perhaps the leading Japan scholar of his day, but even he finds many of his subjects bizaare. He deftly, though not necessarily disrespectfully, pokes fun at the absurdity of many of their situations. Not many scholars can make you laugh while they make you think.
|
|
Fascinating study of Japanese history via its failed heroes
Rating (5)
Date: 1996-12-07
12 out of 12 customers found this reveiw helpful
An engrossing, very well written book detailing the somewhat
peculiar nature of the Japanese "failed hero." In contrast
to the Western ideal, the Japanese do not seem to require
their heroes to "win" or "succeed." Ten chapters describe
ten different historical figures (or groups) throughout
Japanese history who fit this oxymoronic label. Anyone
interested in Japanese history would find this book at once
fascinating, inciteful, and educational.
|
|
|
|
|