Lafcadio Hearn and the Vision of Japan (Parallax: Re-visions of Culture and Society) - Hardcover

Dawson, Professor Carl

9780801843723: Lafcadio Hearn and the Vision of Japan (Parallax: Re-visions of Culture and Society)

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0801843723 ISBN 13: 9780801843723

Publisher: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1992

"Carl Dawson's fascinating and eminently readable account of Hearn and his writings... is an ambitious undertaking, and within the limits of this short book, one that has succeeded."--Rocky Mountain Review of Language and Literature.

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From Library Journal:

Hearn (1850-1904) remains one of the most intriguing and extensively written-about early visitors to Japan. Recent books include Michael Shapiro's Japan: In the Land of the Brokenhearted ( LJ 6/1/89), which weaves Hearn's story in among the accounts of a number of modern visitors to Japan, and Jonathan Cott's excellent new biography, Wandering Ghost: The Odyssey of Lafcadio Hearn (Knopf, 1991). Here, Dawson undertakes a critical study of Hearn's thought as it offers a bridge between Japan and the West. He provides background on Hearn and his arrival in Japan in 1890, contrasts his work with that of other contemporary Western commentators on Japan, and examines the evolution of his own Japanese writings. While readers encountering Hearn for the first time are perhaps best led to Cott's biography, Dawson's well-written study provides an excellent next step for those wishing a deeper analysis of his thought and intellectual journey.
- Scott Wright, Univ. of St. Thomas, St. Paul, Minn.
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Review:

"Although he desperately tried to 'go native'--he took both Japanese citizenship and a Japanese wife--Hearn remains interesting to us today because he couldn't help but be true to himself and his own impressions... Dawson makes the persuasive case that Hearn still matters, both because he asked some of the fundamental questions about Japan and because his own idiosyncratic answers remain provocative and readable." -- David R. Sands, Washington Times

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