Lesley Downer, author of The Shortest History of Japan, visits the Samurai exhibition at the British Museum and discovers that it’s “an exhibition of treasures” which show that the samurai were patrons of the arts as well as warriors. Prepare to be dazzled! A magnificent and ferocious-looking samurai in full armour stands guard at the […]
Review: Silk Roads exhibition
Lesley Downer reviews the Silk Roads exhibition at the British Museum, open until February, 2025. There’s something irresistibly romantic about the Silk Roads. The very name conjures up images of caravans of camels, piled high with baggage, wending their way across desert and steppes. It makes you want to pack your bags and set off […]
The Shortest History of Japan by Lesley Downer
Ever since US Commodore Matthew Perry forced Japan to open its borders in 1853, the culture of this remarkable and distant archipelago has enriched western life. At the same time the country has embraced foreign institutions, from baseball to barber shops. Yet for centuries, under the rule of the shoguns, the islands were largely sealed […]
Japan’s court ladies, warrior women and courtesans
Lesley Downer, the author of The Shortest History of Japan, looks at different roles taken by women during that country’s long history: court ladies, warrior women and courtesans. She shows how, through the ages, they have found ways to use their skills to make their voices heard. Court ladies More than a thousand years ago, […]
Van Gogh and Japan
Lesley Downer visits the new exhibition at the Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam. ‘All my work is based to some extent on Japanese art,’ wrote Vincent Van Gogh. This absorbing and beautiful exhibition at the glitzy Van Gogh Museum explores Van Gogh’s fascination with Japanese art and with Japan – you could almost call it obsession […]
The Shogun’s Queen by Lesley Downer
The year is 1853, and a young Japanese girl’s world is about to be turned upside down. When black ships carrying barbarians arrive on the shores of Japan, the Satsuma clan’s way of life is threatened. But it’s not just the samurai who must come together to fight: the beautiful, headstrong Okatsu is also given […]
Historia Q&A: Lesley Downer
Lesley Downer is a novelist and journalist who has written numerous books, both fiction and non-fiction, about Japan and Asia. She is the author of The Shogun Quartet, four novels telling the stories of four different women who are caught up in the cataclysmic events when the shogunate collapsed and Japan leapt into the modern western […]
Hokusai: Beyond The Great Wave
Lesley Downer visits the new Hokusai exhibition at the British Museum. The British Museum Hokusai exhibition is full of dazzling works yet The Great Wave still leaps out. Its strong, rhythmic, instantly recognisable lines have made it quite simply iconic. The froth of the waves, as Vincent Van Gogh wrote to his brother Theo, is […]