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April 11, 2025
 

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Michael Hoffman

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Michael Hoffman
Michael Hoffman is a fiction and nonfiction writer who has lived in Hokkaido by the sea almost as long as he can remember. He has been contributing regularly to The Japan Times for 10 years. His latest novel is "The Naked Ear" (VBW/Blackcover Books, 2012).
Japan Times
JAPAN / Media / BIG IN JAPAN
Oct 14, 2017
Success is elusive on the wrong side of the wealth gap
When the political thinker Alexis de Tocqueville (1805-59) visited the infant United States in 1831, he was struck above all by the "equality of condition" that prevailed there.
Japan Times
JAPAN / History / THE LIVING PAST
Oct 14, 2017
Japan's 'way of the sword' baffles foreign observers
All cultures present aspects that cannot but baffle the foreign observer. For example: nothing in the native tradition equips a Japanese to grasp the concept of the blood of the crucified son of the one God washing believers clean of sin.
JAPAN / Media / BIG IN JAPAN
Sep 23, 2017
Prepare for the future, at your convenience
Japan's first convenience store was not, as many suppose, 7-Eleven in Tokyo in 1974 but Mitsui in Kyoto in 1673.
Japan Times
JAPAN / History / THE LIVING PAST
Sep 16, 2017
The prosaic state of ancient Confucianism
"Confucianism," says historian Hiroshi Watanabe, "is perhaps the most powerful political ideology yet conceived by the human race."
Japan Times
JAPAN / Media / BIG IN JAPAN
Sep 9, 2017
It takes threats from the unstable for us to question security
Adolf Hitler is like that bad tooth you can't keep your tongue off, though it hurts to touch it. Seventy-two years postwar, he keeps surfacing. He fascinates. All the way up and all the way down the age scale — from Deputy Prime Minister Taro Aso, 76, who last week praised Hitler's "motives," to the...
Japan Times
JAPAN / Media / BIG IN JAPAN
Aug 26, 2017
Definition of happiness in Japan remains a mystery
Try defining "happiness." "A state of well-being and contentment," says Merriam-Webster's dictionary, unhelpfully. It's like saying happiness is happiness.
Japan Times
JAPAN / History / THE LIVING PAST
Aug 19, 2017
Wabi lies at the heart of Japanese history
You could spend your entire life in modern Japan without ever hearing the term wabi, though no overview of Japanese history or art is complete without it. It's a beautiful word, hard to define like most beautiful words. Poverty is the heart of it, which sounds dispiriting, but there's the Zen phrase...
Japan Times
JAPAN / Media / BIG IN JAPAN
Aug 12, 2017
The role of rules in a 'moral education'
Human beings are born amoral. Infants know no rules, and obey none. They learn a few at home, then go to school and learn more. Everyone agrees rules are necessary. On what the rules should be there is less agreement; less still on the degree of obedience rules call for. There are times and places where...
Japan Times
JAPAN / Media / BIG IN JAPAN
Jul 29, 2017
Death: We all have to go sometime
"In Japan today, talking about death is taboo," Kobe University medical professor Yoshiyuki Kizawa told the Asahi Shimbun earlier this month.
Japan Times
JAPAN / Media / BIG IN JAPAN
Jul 15, 2017
Who is keeping an eye on Japan's surveillance power?
Utopias and dystopias have this in common: surveillance. From Thomas More's "Utopia" (1516) to George Orwell's "1984" (1949), from Plato's "Republic" (c. 380 B.C.) to Yevgeny Zamyatin's "We" (1921), the view prevails that people behave better under scrutiny. Why conceal good deeds? For no reason. Therefore...
Japan Times
JAPAN / History / THE LIVING PAST
Jul 15, 2017
Harsh lessons learned from Zen meditation
The monk Dogen lived in dreadful times. A revolution culminating in 1185 had brought to power warriors who for centuries had served perhaps the most unwar-like aristocracy in world history, the effete but highly cultured ladies and gentlemen of the Heian Period (794-1185). Their day was done. They were...
Japan Times
JAPAN / Media / BIG IN JAPAN
Jul 1, 2017
Keep your eyes and ears open, and hands inside your pockets
It's a fake world. Alternatively: All the world's a stage.
Japan Times
JAPAN / Media / BIG IN JAPAN
Jun 17, 2017
Living through the golden years has lost its sheen
A man in his 80s suffering mild dementia (the story is courtesy of Shukan Gendai magazine) is cared for by his wife, also in her 80s. She's exhausted. Caregiving drains the prime of life, let alone the end of it.
Japan Times
JAPAN / History / THE LIVING PAST
Jun 17, 2017
Tracing the decline of a beautiful Japan
Two irreconcilable views of patriotism were given their classic expressions by two Englishmen: Lord Byron, the poet (1788-1824), and Dr. Johnson, the lexicographer and jack-of-all-literary-trades (1709-84). Byron said, "He who loves not his country can love nothing." And Johnson: "Patriotism is the last...
JAPAN / Media / BIG IN JAPAN
Jun 3, 2017
Is Japan slipping into prewar politics?
"The recent flurry of legislation, including a proposed anti-conspiracy amendment to the organized crime law, recalls prewar Japan," Kobe University criminal law scholar Hirofumi Uchida told the Asahi Shimbun in an interview in March.
Japan Times
JAPAN / Media / BIG IN JAPAN
May 20, 2017
The miserable case of unhappiness surging in Japan
This is the happiest time in the history of the world, and Japan is among the happiest of countries.
Japan Times
JAPAN / History / THE LIVING PAST
May 20, 2017
Hokkaido's ancient place in the modern world
"Even the birds do not fly to Ezo," went a popular 19th-century saying about Japan's northernmost island. "Ezo" means "land of barbarians." Settlement tamed it into "Hokkaido" — "north sea road." But it was a rough passage.
Japan Times
JAPAN / Media / BIG IN JAPAN
May 6, 2017
Corporate zombies need 'rich brains'
Japan has lost something. That's a stark but uncontroversial statement. Few whose memory goes back a generation or more will disagree. Controversy arises when the talk turns to what was lost; when, how and why it was lost; whether the nation is the better or worse for having lost it; and, if the former,...
JAPAN / Media / BIG IN JAPAN
Apr 22, 2017
Could Japan become a future cultural melting pot?
Why not welcome 10 million immigrants to Japan by 2050? That's Hidenori Sakanaka's pitch, but it's a hard sell.
Japan Times
JAPAN / Media / BIG IN JAPAN
Apr 15, 2017
Tying the knot is unraveling in Japan
Love, marriage; marriage, love. It was so simple, once upon a time.
Takayasu’s latest heartbreak makes sumo history
Takayasu during the one-day Annual Sumo Tournament at the Ryogoku Kokugikan in Tokyo on Feb 9, 2020
Trump's tariff gambit leaves Asia stunned and scrambling
U.S. President Donald Trump speaks as he attends the National Republican Congressional Committee dinner in Washington on Tuesday. Trump allowed new tariffs — including a 24% levy on Japan — to go into effect as scheduled on Wednesday.
Tokyo cheers Trump’s tariff U-turn with second-biggest market gain ever
U.S. President Donald Trump looks on after signing an executive order in the Oval Office of the White House on Wednesday in Washington.
Banks freeze withdrawals for foreign nationals upon expiration of visas
Foreign residents who fail to renew their residential statuses before their expiry may find that they won’t be able to withdraw cash from their bank accounts.
Japanese badminton ace Shida blasts 'stalker' Chinese fans
Chiharu Shida of Japan in action during the bronze medal match with Nami Matsuyama against Pearly Tan and Muralitharan Thinaah of Malaysia at the 2024 Olympic Games in Paris, France on Aug. 03, 2024
Who is Ryosei Akazawa, Japan's tariffs negotiator?
Economic revitalization minister Ryosei Akazawa, who Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba has appointed Japan's tariff negotiator, is one of his closest allies and busiest ministers.
After a tumultuous buildup, a first look at the Osaka Expo
A large statue of Osaka Expo mascot Myaku Myaku sits near the east entrance of the event's venue in Yumeshima island, Osaka, on Wednesday.
Japan gets a new U.S. ambassador — and he has his work cut out for him
George Glass, U.S. President Donald Trump's pick to be ambassador to Japan, attends a Senate Foreign Relations Committee confirmation hearing in Washington on March 13.
Online art scene eager to go offline, at least for the moment
Digital artist Polygon1993 revels in the physicality of nostalgic technology, making art out of materials such as miniature CDs, holographic prints layered with plexiglass shards and a giant custom-made floppy disk.
Tottori takes a bold leap forward in the arts
The city of Kurayoshi in Tottori Prefecture celebrated the opening of its public art museum with festivities such as a parade that drew 1,000 revelers.

Podcast

One of the many entrances to the Kabukicho neighborhood in Tokyo’s Shinjuku Ward.
Kabukicho: Tokyo’s ‘stadium of desire’

Longform

An ongoing shortage of rice has resulted in rising prices for Japan's main food staple.
Why Japan is running out of rice — and farmers to grow it
By Alex K.T. Martin

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