Dave Barry Does Japan - Softcover

Barry, Dave

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0449908100 ISBN 13: 9780449908105

Publisher: Ballantine Books, 1993

Synopsis

At a point where it appeared that tensions between Japan and the United States could get no worse, Random House decided to dispatch Dave Barry to Tokyo. The resulting report is the most skillful diplomatic stroke since George Bush lost his cookies in the Japanese prime minister's lap. We thought that encouraging Dave to take his wife and son might be a civilizing influence on our roving correspondent - but when this book appears, we may have found the best use for a relocated Berlin Wall. Dave found qualities to like but little to love in the land of the Japanese Economic Miracle, plastic squid, and the elderly geisha. His take on Japanese baseball, a sport for which the yawn was a necessary invention, or on sumo wrestlers, each of whom seemed built like five Tommy Lasordas before SlimFast, hardly exhausts his commentary on their culture (or his lack of it). Barry's interpretation of kabuki theater and of Japanese rock music or humor are long overdue. He had to wait till the end of each performance. But never underestimate Barry, the keen-eyed reporter. Dave steals the secrets of the Japanese auto industry, here revealed for the first time - for example: they use steel! - and his unsought interview with the head of a powerful governmental organization propels him, despite Dave's disclaimer, headlong into the ranks of today's top investigative journalists (the kind who, as he might say, sometimes physically leave their offices). He admires Japanese manners and subtlety, similar in spirit to his own; remarks on their attitudes toward sex, as expressed in weird comic books; and singles out their attitude toward service, which contrasts neatly with American "sales" clerks who becomeoffended if you break their concentration - or into their conversation. All in all, for a thoughtful, balanced account of the life and culture of a nation that is enormously significant to Americans, you'll have to turn to another book. But to discover what happens when you turn Barry l

About this title

About the Author

From 1983 to 2004, Dave Barry wrote a weekly humor column for The Miami Herald, which in 1988 won a Pulitzer Prize for Commentary. He is the author of more than thirty books, including such bestsellers as the nonfiction Live Right and Find Happiness (Although Beer Is Much Faster), You Can Date Boys When You're Forty, and I'll Mature When I'm Dead; the novels Big Trouble, Tricky Business, and Insane City; the very successful YA Peter Pan novels (with Ridley Pearson); and his Christmas story The Shepherd, the Angel, and Walter the Christmas Miracle Dog. Two of his books--Big Trouble and Dave Barry's Guide to Guys--have been turned into movies. For a while, his life was even a television series, Dave's World, but then it was canceled. The series. Not the life. For many years, Dave was also a guitarist with the late, infamous, and strangely unlamented band the Rock Bottom Remainders.

From the Inside Flap

"One of the funniest peole ever to tap tap on a PC."
PHILADELPHIA INQUIRER
Not since George Bush's memorable dinner with the Japanese prime minister has the Land of the Rising Sun seen the likes of a goodwill ambassador like Dave Barry. Join him as he belts out oldies in a karaoke bar, marries a geriatric geisha girl, takes his first bath in public, bows to just about everyone, and explores culture shock in all its numerous humorous forms, including: Failing to Learn Japanese in Only Five Minutes (Or: "Very Much Good Morning, Sir!"); Humor in Japan (Take My Tofu, Please!); Sports in Japan ("Yo, Batter! Loudly Make it Fly!"), and more.

About this edition

• Publisher: Ballantine Books
• Publication date: 1993
• ISBN 10: 0449908100
• ISBN 13: 9780449908105
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 224