Pictures from the Water Trade
Encyclopedia
Pictures from the Water Trade: An Englishman in Japan (1985) — published in the US as Pictures from the Water Trade: Adventures of a Westerner in Japan — is a novel by John David Morley
, a cultural investigation of Japan
in the 1970s.
, family relations, love rites, shodo
and the mizu-shobai itself — the ‘water trade’ — a seedy night-world of cabarets, bars and brothels.
, novelist Anne Tyler
described the book as “travel literature at its best” and hailed its author as “one of those rare travelers who manages truly to enter the heart of a foreign territory.” "Morley's success places him, with a single book, in the front rank of the world’s travel writers,” wrote Dennis Drabelle in the Smithsonian
. Dutch novelist and travel writer Cees Nooteboom
praised it as “a very special book” in his review in Vrij Nederland Boekenbijlage. "A splendid book," declared Kazuo Ishiguro
in the London Review of Books
, while in the Literary Review
Jonathan Keates
acclaimed it as “maybe the best record of western impressions in a hundred years."
Pictures from the Water Trade was designated a notable book by The New York Times Book Review and featured in Time Magazine's list of the best books of 1985.
John David Morley
-Early life:The third and youngest child of the artist and sculptor Patricia Morley and John Arthur Elwell Morley, an officer in the British Colonial Service, John David Victor Morley was born “in something of a hurry on a bench in a third-class Chinese ward at the Kandang Kerbau Maternity...
, a cultural investigation of Japan
Japan
Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...
in the 1970s.
Summary
Told from the perspective of an authorial alias called ‘Boon’ (‘Bun-san’ to the Japanese), the book describes a series of initiations into Japanese languageJapanese language
is a language spoken by over 130 million people in Japan and in Japanese emigrant communities. It is a member of the Japonic language family, which has a number of proposed relationships with other languages, none of which has gained wide acceptance among historical linguists .Japanese is an...
, family relations, love rites, shodo
Shodo
"Shōdō" is the fortieth single by B'z, released on January 25, 2006. This song is one of B'z many number-one singles in Oricon charts. This song was the opening theme of Case Closed.- External links :*...
and the mizu-shobai itself — the ‘water trade’ — a seedy night-world of cabarets, bars and brothels.
Reception
Writing in The New York Times Book ReviewThe New York Times Book Review
The New York Times Book Review is a weekly paper-magazine supplement to The New York Times in which current non-fiction and fiction books are reviewed. It is one of the most influential and widely read book review publications in the industry. The offices are located near Times Square in New York...
, novelist Anne Tyler
Anne Tyler
Anne Tyler is an American novelist.Tyler, the eldest of four children, was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Her father was a chemist and her mother a social worker. Her early childhood was spent in a succession of Quaker communities in the mountains of North Carolina and in Raleigh...
described the book as “travel literature at its best” and hailed its author as “one of those rare travelers who manages truly to enter the heart of a foreign territory.” "Morley's success places him, with a single book, in the front rank of the world’s travel writers,” wrote Dennis Drabelle in the Smithsonian
Smithsonian (magazine)
Smithsonian is the official journal published by the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C. The first issue was published in 1970.-History:...
. Dutch novelist and travel writer Cees Nooteboom
Cees Nooteboom
Cees Nooteboom is a Dutch author. He has won numerous literary awards and has been mentioned as a candidate for the Nobel Prize in literature.-Life:...
praised it as “a very special book” in his review in Vrij Nederland Boekenbijlage. "A splendid book," declared Kazuo Ishiguro
Kazuo Ishiguro
Kazuo Ishiguro OBE or ; born 8 November 1954) is a Japanese–English novelist. He was born in Nagasaki, Japan, and his family moved to England in 1960. Ishiguro obtained his Bachelor's degree from University of Kent in 1978 and his Master's from the University of East Anglia's creative writing...
in the London Review of Books
London Review of Books
The London Review of Books is a fortnightly British magazine of literary and intellectual essays.-History:The LRB was founded in 1979, during the year-long lock-out at The Times, by publisher A...
, while in the Literary Review
Literary Review
Literary Review is a British literary magazine founded in 1979 by Anne Smith, then head of the Department of English at Edinburgh University. Its offices are currently on Lexington Street in Soho, London, and it has a circulation of 44,750. Britain's principal literary monthly, the magazine was...
Jonathan Keates
Jonathan Keates
Jonathan Basil Keates, is an success English writer, biographer and novelist. He was educated at Bryanston School and went on to read for his undergraduate degree at Magdalen College, Oxford....
acclaimed it as “maybe the best record of western impressions in a hundred years."
Pictures from the Water Trade was designated a notable book by The New York Times Book Review and featured in Time Magazine's list of the best books of 1985.
External links
- http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1050502-1,00.html 'Books: Rising Sun and Shady Nights', Paul Gray, Time Magazine (August 19, 1985)