Reissue in paperback (with new Introduction) of the 1951 classic analysis of the crucial years leading up to the Meiji restoration in which Britain provided Japan with its wealth and power model.
This pioneering collection of essays by Japanese, British and Canadian scholars demonstrates how individuals, government agencies and non-governmental organizations have confirmed and challenged the ideas of diplomats and statesmen. Case studies of mutual perceptions, feminism, ceremonial, theatre, economic and social thought, fine arts, broadcasting, labour and missionary activity all illustrate how varieties of nationalism and internationalism have shaped the development of Anglo-Japanese relations. Furthermore it reveals the British admiration of Japan and a desire to emulate Japanese efficiency as a recurring theme in debates on the condition of Britain in the twentieth century.
This volume complements other published works about travel by nineteenth-century women writers by locating and creating ‘space’ for Japan which is missing within recent critical discourses on travel writing. It examines the narratives of women writers who travelled to Japan from the mid-1850s onwards, when Japan was first opened to the West, and became a highly desirable travel destination for decades thereafter. Many women travelled in this period, and although most left no record of their journeys, enough did to form a discrete body of literature spanning more than fifty years – from the end of the feudal Tokugawa era to the rise of Meiji Japan as a world power. Their narratives about Japan occupy a culturally significant place, not only in the genre of Victorian female travel writing, but in Victorian travel writing per se. The writers who are the subject of this book are divided into two groups: those who were ‘travellers-by-intent’, namely, Anna D’A, Alice Frere, Annie Brassey, Isabella Bird and Marie Stopes, and those who ‘travelled-by-default’ as the wives of diplomats, namely Mrs Pemberton Hodgson, Mrs Hugh Fraser and Baroness Albert d’Anethan.
"The Cambridge Modern History" is a comprehensive modern history of the world, beginning with the 15th century age of Discovery, published by the Cambridge University Press in the United Kingdom and also in the United States.
Laurence Oliphant lived one of the most remarkable lives of the Victorian era, dedicated to making a real difference for his fellow man–sometimes in very unconventional ways. At the age of 38, Laurence Oliphant, a successful Victorian writer, diplomat and Member of Parliament gave up his glittering career to join an American cult for a life of hard physical labor and sexual mysticism. Then, in his 50’s, Oliphant along with his beautiful wife Alice le Strange spent their final years working to save refugees by establishing a Jewish homeland in Palestine. Oliphant’s obituary in The Times said of him, "Seldom has there been a more romantic or amply filled career; never, perhaps, a stranger or more apparently contradictory personality."
This book examines cities of the Jiangnan region of south-central China between the twelfth and nineteenth centuries, an area considered to be the model of a successfully developing regional economy. The six studies focus on the urban centers of Suzhou, Hangzhou, Yangzhou, and Shanghai. Emphasizing the regional focus, the authors explore the interconnections and sequential relationships between these major cities and analyze common themes such as the development of handicraft industry, transport and commerce, class structure, ethnic diversity and internal immigration, and the social and political pressures generated by developments in manufacturing, taxes, and government politics. The book provides a valuable resource on commercial development and internal economic and social development in pre-modern China, particularly on specific regional development and the historical role of traditional Chinese cities.
Originally a student of Meiji Japan, Gordon Daniels is widely known for his work on the Pacific War and the Occupation of Japan, with particular regard to the world of communications in film and propaganda as well as Japanese sport. He has also been closely involved with the post-war era of international relations and Japan, as well as studies in Japanese history and historiography. In the 1980s he made significant contributions in reporting on the scope and development of Japanese Studies in Britain. His most recent work has been as joint editor (and contributor) with Chushichi Tsuzuki of Social and Cultural Perspectives - the fifth of the five-volume series on the history of Anglo-Japanese Relations (Palgrave, 2002).