Review: The Failure of Freedom: A Portrait of Modern Japanese Intellectuals

The Failure of Freedom: A Portrait of Modern Japanese Intellectuals by Tatsuo Arima
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

"Paul, a Jew and a disciple of Jesus the Christ, was a true samurai, the very embodiment of the Spirit of bushido. Said he, "for it were better for me to die, than that any man should make my glorying void." He preferred death to dishonour, to dependency, to begging whatever cause." -Uchimura Kanzo (p. 23)

This book would actually be very useful to someone studying the Taisho era, or pre-war era in general, of Japan. It is a bit too philosophical for me, so I'm afraid that many of the concepts were over my head, plus it mentions many people I'm just not familiar with.

Still, it is interesting to see the reaction in Japan to Marxism, Anarchism, and world-wide events during the first decades of the 20th century. This book covers some Japanese Christian authors, the Naturalists, the Shirakaba-ha, Marxists and others.

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