Japan As Part of the Ancient Mediterranean: Some Japanese Essays and Book Recommendations (Patreon)

We're definitely reaching "peak history" in terms of the number of times it's coming up as topic or metaphor here. But...anyway, whatever. 

So, there's tons of literature out there comparing the United States of America to Rome.

And there's slightly less literature comparing Europe (1500-1945) to the squabbling nationlings of Ancient Greece, particularly in the 4th and 5th centuries BCE, from around the time of the Peloponnesian War to the rise of Alexander III of Macedon (Amaury de Riencourt comes to mind).

But, in English especially, there is even less literature that locates Japan in any Ancient Mediterranean context.

Enter Japanese. There is a bit of a running tradition (post-1945) of comparing Japan to Carthage, the great African trading city-state. And here are some Japanese essays that do that:

• [日本はまさに「現代のカルタゴ」=滅亡 | Re ナポレオンヒルを読んだだめ男の日記　] https://amba.to/2MGLD4v
• [今の日本が｢滅びた国々｣に酷似しているワケ | ブックス・レビュー | 東洋経済オンライン | 経済ニュースの新基準] http://bit.ly/2MJ5jVo
• [カルタゴ滅亡をトレースする現代日本 ( その他政界と政治活動 ) - 平成中野学校 - Yahoo!ブログ] http://bit.ly/2MGMzWG

Funnily enough, I don't like war and I don't like wars. I think it's a common (but intellectually lazy) way of doing history. But it's what we do so I'll let it slide for now. 

Fortunately, all is not lost -- it never is, huh?

There is a savior (lol) -- an awesome Japanese book that "re-sees" history from the perspective of finance and tax revenue, written by a former Japanese tax official. Now, I know how that sounds. It sounds like the epitome of boring -- a bureaucrat writing about bureaucracy? GTFOH! It sounds like a setup for a Terry Gilliam movie about boredom!

But this book is anything but boring -- in fact, I loved it so much that I read it about three times back to back, and then bought the audiobook as well. If you pester me about it, I may cover it in more detail later, I dunno. A decent translation of the title would be: " Understanding the History of the World Through the Flow of Money: How Wealth, Economies and Power Moved":

• [お金の流れでわかる世界の歴史　富、経済、権力……はこう「動いた」 | 大村 大次郎 | ビジネス・経済 | Amazon.co.jpホーム | Amazon] https://amzn.to/2UawVnb
• "お金の流れでわかる世界の歴史 富、経済、権力……はこう「動いた」" [Amazonオーディオブック : Audible (オーディブル)｜最初の１冊は無料｜Audible.co.jp公式サイト] http://bit.ly/2UaxCNj

We all love a good hero; I'm a yuuuge hero-worshipper myself. But movies and scholastic history lie to us twofold. First of all, there is no honor in killing and enslaving people and stealing land, even if you look and sound like a bada$$ doing it. Secondly, our Caesars, Napoleons and Alexanders, all pretensions to greatness aside, were actually operating under serious financial constraints: they started and stopped fighting because of money. The same goes for many other people and developments in history. Read the book to find out.

There have also been some great English-language books that have seen history through lenses other than battle dates (like, literally, WTF?), sort of like James Burke's "Connections" did on TV [I think that started out as a book as well, but don't quote me on it], and many of them even have Japanese translations. Front of the line is definitely Tom Standage's work:

• [歴史を変えた6つの飲物 ビール、ワイン、蒸留酒、コーヒー、茶、コーラが語る もうひとつの世界史 | トム スタンデージ, 新井 崇嗣 |本 | 通販 | Amazon] https://amzn.to/2U8M8oO
• [Amazon | A History of the World in 6 Glasses | Tom Standage | Wine & Winemaking] https://amzn.to/2Ub7HFb