The Inland Sea

by Donald Richie, Yoichi Midorikawa (Photographer)

Overview

A timeless travel-writing classic that inspired the film, with photography by Yoichi Midorikawa.

In this acclaimed travel memoir, Donald Richie paints a memorable portrait of the island-studded Inland Sea. His existential ruminations on food, culture, and love and his brilliant descriptions of life and landscape are a window into an Old Japan that has now nearly vanished.

The book that cemented Donald Richie's reputation as a master of observation. With lucid prose, Richie searches for the heart of Japan among the waters sheltered between Japan's major islands. Included are the twenty black and white photographs by Yoichi Midorikawa that accompanied the original 1971 edition.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781611720242
Publisher:	Stone Bridge Press
Publication date:	10/20/2015
Pages:	320
Product dimensions:	5.90(w) x 8.90(h) x 0.70(d)

About the Author

Donald Richie (1924-2013) lived in Japan from the mid-1940s until his death and was an internationally recognized expert on Japanese culture and film. His many works include The Donald Richie Reader, A Lateral View, and A Hundred Years of Japanese Film, as well as works on the film director Yasujiro Ozu and hundreds of essays and book reviews. The Inland Sea is Donald Richie's personal favorite.

Yoichi Midorikawa (1915-2001) was one of Japan's foremost nature photographers. His work was widely published and received many Japanese and international awards.

Read an Excerpt

From Shodo the islands begin. They stretch westward, hundreds of them, almost as far as the large southern island of Kyushu. The sea is like a lake. The wind ruffles the surface; the water looks shallow. The islands ride upon its lightly broken surface. The boats move back and forth, lines of choppy waves diverging, the wakes like furrows after a plow. It is late afternoon. The port islands catch the sun. Each detail--a rock, a tree, a stretch of sand--stands out, clear, sharp-edged. The starboard islands, the sun behind, are outlines. The nearest is almost black, those farther away a dark gray, the ones behind them purplish, until--islands piled like low thunderheads--the farthest pale into a watered blue, deepest toward the crest, almost white where their far shores meet the horizon.

Table of Contents

THE INLAND SEA
by Donald Richie

Contents

List of Photographs

The Inland Sea

Map of the Inland Sea

Author’s Note to the Original Edition
Author’s Note to the 2002 Edition

Editorial Reviews

"An elegiac prose celebration . . . a classic in its genre."
—Publishers Weekly

"The Inland Sea still gleams with the freshness of discovery. Years ago it was often called one of the great travel books, and so it seems today."
—The National Post

"A welcome reissue of the book Richie published in 1971, which has been celepated as a classic in travel literature."
—Thomas BeVier, Foreword Reviews Winter 2016 Issue

"It is a wonderful reminder of the joys of taking oneself out of one’s usual element, of the comfort of strangers, of drifting without fixed destination, and of those fleetingly satori moments of mindful self-awareness that snatch the solitary traveller."
—Jasper Sharp, All The Anime

"Richie’s book, on its surface a travel account, is a beautiful reflection on all things Japanese by one of the country’s most acute observers. Anyone with an interest in Japan would enjoy this book, and those lucky enough to be on a voyage through the Inland Sea even more so."
—Longitude

"A legendary book in the Japan field. The newest edition by Stone Bridge Press deserves a place of honor on your bookshelf—and in your mind."
—Alexis Agliano Sanborn, JQ Magazine

From the Publisher

Mr. Richie's book is of a breadth and richness that underscore the inadequacy of categorizing it as a travel book.
— New York Times

Vincent Canby

This book earns its place on the very short shelf of books on Japan that are of permanent value.

Times Literary Supplement