Clash of civilisations: Iran vs. the West
Iran – or Persia – has frequently been portrayed as a civilisational foe. Yet classical Greek attempts to rationalise their enemy go beyond our own shallow interpretation.
Tag: asia
Little Letterhole: Kyoto, and the importance of myth
ON 30 MAY 1945, Kyoto was given a reprieve. Three months before the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan’sContinue Reading
Closed ports and Christians: Japan’s era of isolation
Distrust of a religious minority, limited interest in international trade, a desire to protect a national identity: this is early modern Japan, a feudal backwater that had cut itself off from the world.
Ear Worms: Solid State Survivor (1979)
In the first of a new series, Letterhole looks at classic albums from around the world. This time, the seminal second album by Japanese pioneers Yellow Magic Orchestra goes under the spotlight.
The phenomenon that caught them all
Pokémon took the world by storm in the 1990s. For my generation, no other cultural phenomenon has come close to its influence. Pokémon GO, riding on a wave of nostalgia, has proved its endurance.
Komnenian reputation: Erdoğan’s Byzantine approach
The increasingly autocratic President of Turkey has been compared to an Ottoman Sultan, but in the relationship with his NATO allies Recep Tayyip Erdoğan is closer to a much older tradition.
