G M Thomas FRSA FRAS
@japanauthor.bsky.social
Fellow Royal Society of Arts. Fellow Royal Asiatic Society. Royal Society For Asia Affairs.
The Potsdam Declaration is critical in understanding why the atomic bomb was dropped. grahamthomasauthor.wordpress.com/2020/05/25/t...
The Potsdam Declaration: Stalin and Truman’s cat and mouse game.
Stalin, Truman, Brynes, Mototov. Potsdam July 1945 After the unconditional surrender of the Germans – and the end of the war in Europe – the three key leaders of the Allied nations met …
grahamthomasauthor.wordpress.com
This has become a famous photo, though often it is flipped the wrong way round. It was part of an exhibition in Marugame set up by the local group of the Japan Council against Atomic and Hydrogen Bombs (Gensuikyō). The image was taken by the American photographer Joe O'Donnell.
A set of Hagoita (羽子板 ｢はごいた｣) wooden paddles used to hit shuttlecocks (羽子 ｢はご｣) when playing the traditional game of hanetsuki during the New Year.
Kobo Daishi, the founder of Shingon Buddhism, was born in 774 - in the site of present-day Zentsu-ji Temple in Zentsuji City, Kagawa Prefecture, on Shikoku. This is the Okuden, a small inner sanctum in the Miedo hall built on the site of Kobo Daishi's mother's room where he was born.
The relatively new post office in Deai, Miyoshi, Tokushima Prefecture has closed due to lack of business. This was once a pretty village with a thriving tourist trade: it's in the mountains with hot springs, and good trails. Most of the houses and businesses abandoned. All gone bar memories.
This late Showa sign seen in the Shikoku mountains asks Japanese tourists to behave - including not littering streets and rivers. This morning in Tsunomoricho 津森町Marugame this guy throws his dog 🐕 poo 💩 bag into a stream.
Orphaned and homeless children were left to beg in Hiroshima.
Gosha Myojin Shrine (五社明神社) in Zentsuji Temple and its Torii. The two small wooden shrine structures tucked beneath the tree's roots house five Shinto deities brought to the temple complex to secure spiritual protection for the grounds.
It is simply massive...and very old. At least 1300 years. "Gosha Myojin no Okusu" (The Great Camphor Tree of Gosha Myojin) is 131 feet high or 40 metres, and is an extant example of Shinbutsu-shugo (the syncretism of Shinto and Buddhism) inside Zentsuji Temple.
Very pretty indeed. An advertisement from the late Meiji period for 東京人造肥料会社 (Tōkyō Jinzō Hiryō Kaisha), Japan's first chemical fertilizer manufacturer. I came across it yesterday in Miyanome a small Shikoku village.
Matsuo River high in the Shikoku mountains, and a tributary of the Iya River. Aug 2026. #Tokushima #Japantravel
One telling sign in a tiny village in Shikoku sums up some negative characteristics of Japan - by asking visitors to turn the negatives into positive behaviour. The negatives: - don't be a miserable git - don't litter - don't get trapped in the gift giving cycle
The output of our solar panels is a perfect visualisation of the weather in Marugame over the last three months.
救援をまつもう動けない。だれもが傷つき、すでになくなった人の様で子どものがいたいたしい。8月10日午前10すぎ、塩心から第1.5kmの井間／口割付込、表 撮影=山端康介
This morning's snake in Marugame. Not being a herpetologist I used google which claims it is a Japanese Odd-scaled Snake (Achalinus spinalis).
The Singapore government never changes...Massive Attack respond after Singapore ban over Palestine display www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...
Massive Attack respond after Singapore ban over Palestine display
The UK band says they are "surprised and disappointed" by their treatment over shouting "free Palestine" at a concert there.
bbc.co.uk
#BOTD Peter O'Toole. Pages from a 1973 souvenir programme for when Lawrence of Arabia was shown not in a cinema but in Oxford's New Theatre. 🎥🎬📽️🍿
The final, truly brilliant scene from Army 陸軍 (Director: Keisuke Kinoshita.) youtu.be/peXvugRWTpE?...
1944年 映画「陸軍」ラストまで12分（EN/JP Sub）
YouTube video by nakaco's craft
youtu.be
The Cinema of Kinoshita Keisuke: Films of Joy and Sorrow edited by David Desser and Earl Jackson. A review by Electra Pappa.
The Japan Society - The Cinema of Kinoshita Keisuke: Films of Joy and Sorrow
japansociety.org.uk
The African Queen celebrates its 75th anniversary this year; the director John Houston, was born 120 years ago, on 5 August 1906. Two film pamphlets were published in Japan on its release. “European Picture News” published by the Japanese distributor アメリカ映画宣伝社 (America Movie Publicity Agency).
よみがえる惨禍被から7年後、安芸都坂町では、町の5ヵ所から土に埋められたり、野さらしにされたりした252体の骨が指り出された。1952年7月30日、広島 提供=中国新聞社
I rewatched one of the bleakest films imaginable last week. Fires on the Plain ((野火, Nobi. 1959) is one of my choices for Japan's most important war films, and it can be viewed on the Internet Archive. 🎥🎬 #filmsky #letterboxd grahamthomasauthor.wordpress.com/2025/06/29/a...
A Nation’s Reckoning: Some of the Best Japanese War Films
Twenty Four Eyes. Japanese cinema has a long relationship with the depiction of the Pacific War that continues haphazardly to this day but unlike the largely heroic and jingoistic war films produce…
grahamthomasauthor.wordpress.com
I wouldn't call Marugame a bustling city but it is still hard to imagine that this scene is smack bang in its middle. Unspoilt, and one of Japan's twelve original castles from the Edo period. #丸亀城 #Marugame-jō #Kagawa #VisitJapan #Setouchi
How to spear a film and director...a masterclass.
London Review of Books@lrb.co.uk · 6d ago‘My eyes stayed dry, even for Argos the dog – whose adorableness as a puppy is predictably amped up to suit our animal-loving times. If only the human characters had been treated with such serious attention.’ Emily Wilson reviews Christopher Nolan’s 𝘛𝘩𝘦 𝘖𝘥𝘺𝘴𝘴𝘦𝘺. www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v4...
Personally I never felt this worked as a Bond soundtrack but disassociated from the film the music is very listenable.
Neil S. Bulk@nsbulk.bsky.social · 6d agoArtwork preview here.
'Buckingham Palace, London, seen across the Green Park at dusk' (c.1911) by Yoshio Markino (Victoria and Albert Museum)
The epitome of bisexuality.
Kat Kerlin@katkerlin.bsky.social · last wk.Some avocados are female in the morning and male in the afternoon, while others are on the opposite schedule. This helps them avoid self-pollination. How do they do it? A @ucdavis.bsky.social study explains. www.ucdavis.edu/food/news/st...
