Foreign Images and Experiences of Japan

Book excerpt: The first in a three-volume series, Volume 1 begins with the earliest written reports from China in the first century AD and ends with a survey of Dutch reports from 1841, which marks the point when ‘Japan had been amply described in all major respects’, and at a time when it began to be perceived as a less remote and more important country in Western eyes ‘yet still emphatically closed to all foreign trade except that of the Dutch and the Chinese’. Furthermore, in little more than a decade later the number and variety of accounts were to increase greatly following the American, Russian and British expeditions of 1853/54 – accounts which are to form a key element of Volume 2. The Contents are divided into two parts: chronological and thematic. Part I is devoted to a discussion and analysis of the dominant views and images of Japan found in each historical era. It also provides brief biographical data about those European and American travellers to Japan whose reports are quoted in Part II, including some sixty eyewitness accounts, along with concise summaries and commentaries. Compared to previous surveys, a significant aspect of this volume is the greater amount of biographical information regarding the leading European visitors to Japan that is provided, together with a concise analysis and evaluation of their original accounts by both contemporary and more recent critics. As a further innovation, excerpts from the reports of Russian visitors to Japan, including Adam Laxman and V.M.Golvnin are quoted for the first time alongside those of West European and American accounts. The volume is supported by a significant Glossary and Bibliography, as well as Subject and Name/Place Indexes.