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Wonderful Fool
is a novel by the Japanese author Shusaku Endō, originally serialized in the newspaper ''Asahi Shimbun'' in 1959. The main character, Gaston Bonaparte (a relative to the famous Napoleon Bonaparte) arrives at the Yokohama seaport to visit an old pen friend of his living in Tokyo. Gaston is a wise fool, an incredibly kind, innocent and naive, which causes different people to like him, help him, or take advantage of him. He never loses faith in humanity, however, and manages to make a deep impression on the most hardhearted persons. Beneath the light humor of the story are many clear references both to Endo's life story and his Christian beliefs. Plot summary One day Takamori, a young man living with his mother and dominant younger sister Tomoe, receives a letter from Singapore. After a while they manage to decipher the unusually poor Japanese, and figure out that Gaston Bonaparte, a man who used to be a pen friend of Takamori during his school days, will soon arrive in Japan. On ...
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Peter Owen Publishers
Peter Owen Publishers is a family-run London-based independent publisher based in London, England. It was founded in 1951.John Self"Peter Owen: Sixty years of innovation" Books Blog, ''The Guardian'', 4 July 2011. History The company was founded in 1951 by Peter Owen, who had previously worked for Stanley Unwin at The Bodley Head. Owen's first editor was Muriel Spark, who would later write a novel called '' A Far Cry From Kensington'' drawing on her experiences working there. Their published authors include Paul Bowles and Jane Bowles, the Japanese Catholic author Shusaku Endo, the Spanish writers Julio Llamazares, José Ovejero, Cristina Fernández Cubas and Salvador Dalí, as well as André Gide, Jean Cocteau, Colette, Anna Kavan, Anaïs Nin, Natsume Sōseki, Yukio Mishima, Gertrude Stein, Hermann Hesse, Karoline Leach, the revisionist biographer of Lewis Carroll, Hans Henny Jahnn, Tarjei Vesaas and Miranda Miller. So far, the independent press has published seven Nobel Priz ...
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Harper & Row
Harper is an American publishing house, the flagship imprint of global publisher HarperCollins based in New York City. History J. & J. Harper (1817–1833) James Harper and his brother John, printers by training, started their book publishing business J. & J. Harper in New York City in 1817. Their two brothers, Joseph Wesley and Fletcher, joined them in the mid-1820s. Harper & Brothers (1833–1962) The company changed its name to "Harper & Brothers" in 1833. The headquarters of the publishing house were located at 331 Pearl Street, facing Franklin Square in Lower Manhattan (about where the Manhattan approach to the Brooklyn Bridge lies today). Harper & Brothers began publishing ''Harper's New Monthly Magazine'' in New York City in 1850. The brothers also published ''Harper's Weekly'' (starting in New York City in June 1857), '' Harper's Bazar'' (starting in New York City in November 2, 1867), and ''Harper's Young People'' (starting in New York City in 1879). George B. M ...
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Asahi Shimbun
is one of the four largest newspapers in Japan. Founded in 1879, it is also one of the oldest newspapers in Japan and Asia, and is considered a newspaper of record for Japan. Its circulation, which was 4.57 million for its morning edition and 1.33 million for its evening edition as of July 2021, was second behind that of the ''Yomiuri Shimbun''. By print circulation, it is the third largest newspaper in the world behind the ''Yomiuri'', though its digital size trails that of many global newspapers including ''The New York Times''. Its publisher, is a media conglomerate with its registered headquarters in Osaka. It is a privately held family business with ownership and control remaining with the founding Murayama and Ueno families. According to the Reuters Institute Digital Report 2018, public trust in the ''Asahi Shimbun'' is the lowest among Japan's major dailies, though confidence is declining in all the major newspapers. The ''Asahi Shimbun'' is one of the five largest ...
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Napoleon I Of France
Napoleon Bonaparte ; it, Napoleone Bonaparte, ; co, Napulione Buonaparte. (born Napoleone Buonaparte; 15 August 1769 – 5 May 1821), later known by his regnal name Napoleon I, was a French military commander and political leader who rose to prominence during the French Revolution and led successful campaigns during the Revolutionary Wars. He was the ''de facto'' leader of the French Republic as First Consul from 1799 to 1804, then Emperor of the French from 1804 until 1814 and again in 1815. Napoleon's political and cultural legacy endures to this day, as a highly celebrated and controversial leader. He initiated many liberal reforms that have persisted in society, and is considered one of the greatest military commanders in history. His wars and campaigns are studied by militaries all over the world. Between three and six million civilians and soldiers perished in what became known as the Napoleonic Wars. Napoleon was born on the island of Corsica, not long afte ...
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Yokohama
is the second-largest city in Japan by population and the most populous municipality of Japan. It is the capital city and the most populous city in Kanagawa Prefecture, with a 2020 population of 3.8 million. It lies on Tokyo Bay, south of Tokyo, in the Kantō region of the main island of Honshu. Yokohama is also the major economic, cultural, and commercial hub of the Greater Tokyo Area along the Keihin region, Keihin Industrial Zone. Yokohama was one of the cities to open for trade with the Western world, West following the 1859 end of the Sakoku, policy of seclusion and has since been known as a cosmopolitan port city, after Kobe opened in 1853. Yokohama is the home of many Japan's firsts in the Meiji (era), Meiji period, including the first foreign trading port and Chinatown (1859), European-style sport venues (1860s), English-language newspaper (1861), confectionery and beer manufacturing (1865), daily newspaper (1870), gas-powered street lamps (1870s), railway station (1 ...
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Tokyo
Tokyo (; ja, 東京, , ), officially the Tokyo Metropolis ( ja, 東京都, label=none, ), is the capital and largest city of Japan. Formerly known as Edo, its metropolitan area () is the most populous in the world, with an estimated 37.468 million residents ; the city proper has a population of 13.99 million people. Located at the head of Tokyo Bay, the prefecture forms part of the Kantō region on the central coast of Honshu, Japan's largest island. Tokyo serves as Japan's economic center and is the seat of both the Japanese government and the Emperor of Japan. Originally a fishing village named Edo, the city became politically prominent in 1603, when it became the seat of the Tokugawa shogunate. By the mid-18th century, Edo was one of the most populous cities in the world with a population of over one million people. Following the Meiji Restoration of 1868, the imperial capital in Kyoto was moved to Edo, which was renamed "Tokyo" (). Tokyo was devastate ...
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Wise Fool
The wise fool, or the wisdom of the fool, is a form of literary paradox in which through a narrative a character recognized as a fool comes to be seen as a beholder of wisdom. A recognizable trope found in stories and artworks from antiquity to the twenty-first century, the wisdom of the fool often captures what Intellectualism fails to illuminate of a thing's meaning or significance; thus, the wise fool is often associated with the wisdom found through blind faith, reckless desire, hopeless romance, and wild abandon, but also tradition without understanding, and folk wisdom. In turn, the wise fool is often opposed to learned or elite knowledge. While examples of the paradox can be found in a wide range of early world literature, from Greco-Roman works to the oral traditions of folk culture, the paradox received unprecedented attention from authors and artists during the Renaissance. More than Shakespeare for his range of clownish wise men or Cervantes for his lunatic genius Don ...
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Singapore
Singapore (), officially the Republic of Singapore, is a sovereign island country and city-state in maritime Southeast Asia. It lies about one degree of latitude () north of the equator, off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, bordering the Strait of Malacca to the west, the Singapore Strait to the south, the South China Sea to the east, and the Straits of Johor to the north. The country's territory is composed of one main island, 63 satellite islands and islets, and one outlying islet; the combined area of these has increased by 25% since the country's independence as a result of extensive land reclamation projects. It has the third highest population density in the world. With a multicultural population and recognising the need to respect cultural identities of the major ethnic groups within the nation, Singapore has four official languages: English, Malay, Mandarin, and Tamil. English is the lingua franca and numerous public services are available only in Eng ...
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Japanese Language
is spoken natively by about 128 million people, primarily by Japanese people and primarily in Japan, the only country where it is the national language. Japanese belongs to the Japonic or Japanese- Ryukyuan language family. There have been many attempts to group the Japonic languages with other families such as the Ainu, Austroasiatic, Koreanic, and the now-discredited Altaic, but none of these proposals has gained widespread acceptance. Little is known of the language's prehistory, or when it first appeared in Japan. Chinese documents from the 3rd century AD recorded a few Japanese words, but substantial Old Japanese texts did not appear until the 8th century. From the Heian period (794–1185), there was a massive influx of Sino-Japanese vocabulary into the language, affecting the phonology of Early Middle Japanese. Late Middle Japanese (1185–1600) saw extensive grammatical changes and the first appearance of European loanwords. The basis of the standard dialect moved f ...
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Love Hotel
A love hotel is a type of short-stay hotel found around the world operated primarily for the purpose of allowing guests privacy for sexual activities. The name originates from "Hotel Love" in Osaka, which was built in 1968 and had a rotating sign. Although love hotels exist all over the world, the term "love hotel" is often used to refer specifically to those located within Japan. Distinguishing characteristics Love hotels can usually be identified using symbols such as hearts and the offer of a room rate for a as well as for an overnight stay. The period of a "rest" varies, typically ranging from one to three hours. Cheaper daytime off-peak rates are common. In general, reservations are not possible, and leaving the hotel will forfeit access to the room; overnight-stay rates become available only after 22:00. These hotels may be used for prostitution, although they are sometimes used by budget-travelers sharing accommodation. Entrances are discreet, and interaction with s ...
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Shibuya, Tokyo
Shibuya (渋谷 区 ''Shibuya-ku'') is a special ward in Tokyo, Japan. As a major commercial and finance center, it houses two of the busiest railway stations in the world, Shinjuku Station (southern half) and Shibuya Station. As of April 1, 2022, it has an estimated population of 228,906 and a population density of 15,149.30 people per km2 (39,263.4/sq mi). The total area is 15.11 km2 (5.83 sq mi). The name "Shibuya" is also used to refer to the shopping district which surrounds Shibuya Station. This area is known as one of the fashion centers of Japan, particularly for young people, and as a major nightlife area. History Heian to Edo period Shibuya was historically the site of a castle in which the Shibuya family resided from the 11th century through the Edo period. Following the opening of the Yamanote Line in 1885, Shibuya began to emerge as a railway terminal for southwestern Tokyo and eventually as a major commercial and entertainment center. Meiji to Showa period ...
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