The Roads to Sata: A 2000-Mile Walk Through Japan [Paperback]

Alan Booth (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: August 14, 1997

ALAN BOOTH'S CLASSIC OF MODERN TRAVEL WRITING

Traveling only along small back roads, Alan Booth traversed Japan's entire length on foot, from Soya at the country's northernmost tip, to Cape Sata in the extreme south, across three islands and some 2,000 miles of rural Japan. The Roads to Sata is his wry, witty, inimitable account of that prodigious trek.

Although he was a city person-he was brought up in London and spent most of his adult life in Tokyo - Booth had an extraordinary ability to capture the feel of rural Japan in his writing. Throughout his long and arduous trek, he encountered a variety of people who inhabit the Japanese countryside-from fishermen and soldiers, to bar hostesses and school teachers, to hermits, drunks, and tramps. His wonderful and often hilarious descriptions of these encounters are the highlights of these pages, painting a multifaceted picture of Japan from the perspective of an outsider, but with the knowledge of an insider.

The Roads to Sata is travel writing at its best, illuminating and disarming, poignant yet hilarious, critical but respectful. Traveling across Japan with Alan Booth, readers will enjoy the wit and insight of a uniquely perceptive guide, and more importantly, they will discover a new face of an often misunderstood nation.

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal

Sata is the cape at the southernmost tip of Kyushu in southwest Japan. Booth, an Englishman living in Japan, walked there from Cape Soya at the northernmost tip of Hokkaido in northern Japan. It took him 128 days, following a mostly rural route down the eastern side of the islands. His book is a delightful series of encounters with and impressions of local people who were astonished to find a foreigner speaking Japanese. He was treated as a friend by many, and as a freak by some. Booth has much to say about modern Japanese life that fails to come out in the more numerous books on urban and industrialized Japan. And thanks to Booth's ability with both Japanese and English, his book is much more enjoyable to read. Recommended for all libraries wanting good books about Japan. Harold M. Otness, Southern Oregon State Coll. Lib., Ashland
Copyright 1986 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Review

"A marvelous glimpse of the Japan that rarely peeks through the country's public image."-Washington Post Book World

"An illuminating book."-The Economist

"Alan Booth has given us a memorable, oddly beautiful book."-Asian Wall Street Journal

Fluent in the language, well-informed and disabused, [Booth] is in the fine tradition of hard-to-please travelers like Norman Douglas, Evelyn Waugh, and V.S. Naipaul. A sharp eye and a good memory for detail...give an astonishing immediacy to his account."-Frank Tuohy, Times Literary Supplement

"Alan Booth was not only the best travel writer on Japan, but one of the best travel writers in the English language."-Ian Buruma, author of The Wages of Guilt

"[Booth] achieved an extraordinary understanding of life as it is lived by ordinary Japanese....Frequently brilliant in his insights."-F.G. Notehelfer, The New York Times Book Review

"One of the best foreign observers of Japan today...his book is unsurpassed."-Far Eastern Economic Review

"To Travel with Alan Booth is to travel in very civilized company indeed, but also close to the ground. He has a mind that illuminates and enlivens everything it encounters."-Nigel Barley, author of The Innocent Anthropologist

"Booth's capacity for rueful, discerning observation will keep him in the front ranks of travel writers for years to come."-Kirkus

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 304 pages
• Publisher: Kodansha USA (August 14, 1997)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1568361874
• ISBN-13: 978-1568361871
• Product Dimensions: 8.2 x 5.6 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (34 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #169,926 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #63 in Books > Travel > Asia > Japan

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

23 of 23 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Brilliant!!!!, August 19, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: The Roads to Sata: A 2000-Mile Walk Through Japan (Paperback)

I can't remeber how many times I've read this book, the first being when I was living in Japan but not yet speaking the language and I almost gave up on my classes there and then. Even though Alan Booth made his epic trip at a time when foreigners were still relatively rare in Japan, some of his experiences are still conceievable today. A must-read for anyone who's interested in Japan/travel/other cultures; my favourite episode involves the conversation with an inn keeper, in fluent Japanese, detailing the reasons why Booth can't stay there "We don't havce beds, only futon/ we don't eat meat and you foreigners can't eat raw fish/ we don't have knives and forks" etc etc, all of which are rebuffed in perfect Japanese. Finally the aged inn keeper says "But we don't speak English!" Having had many equally frustrating experiences, I could only laugh, as I did many times during this book. On a sad note, Alan Booth died several years ago while still in his 40's- I felt like I had lost a partner in crime, as well as being cheated of further insights on the country I sometimes loved... just read it!

29 of 31 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A very accurate description, August 2, 2001

By 

Linda Oskam "dutch-traveller" (Amsterdam Netherlands) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Roads to Sata: A 2000-Mile Walk Through Japan (Paperback)

The late Alan Booth was married to a Japanese woman, spoke fluent Japanese and had lived in Japan for quite some time when he decided to walk all the way from the north to the south of the country. He walked gruelling distances (up to 40 kilometers a day with a heavy backpack) and slept in real Japanese ryokans, eating Japanese food, soaking in Japanese baths and drinking Japanese drinks. The ultimate Japan experience.

I read this book while travelling through Japan and it described exactly what I was experiencing. I did not speak a word of Japanese (this in stark contrast to the author). People were very friendly and helpful, but you always felt the distance they were keeping because to Japanese foreigners are really strange. Alan Booth has at times hilarious accounts in the book of ryokan-owners who do not want to give him a room because "he does not speak Japanese" (the conversation is in Japanese), "a foreigner cannot sleep on a futon" (he has one at home), " a foreigner will not like Japanese food" (he has been living and eating in Japan for a long time) and 1001 other fake reasons. On the other hand he meets lots of very friendely people who overcome their xenophobia and help him along.

The book mainly focusses on the first part of his hike. At the end of the book the account of the trip becomes too intermittent for my taste: I wanted to learn more about the southern part of the country.

If you decide to travel to Japan, read this book, it will make you understand better what is happening to you. And if you do not travel to Japan, read it anyway because it a wonderful account of a hiking-trip through a very special country.

22 of 23 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Entertaining & Insightful, January 24, 2000

By 

Todd Bass (USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Roads to Sata: A 2000-Mile Walk Through Japan (Paperback)

"The Roads to Sata" is a foreigner's (British) account of his 2,000 mile walking journey from the country's northernmost to southernmost tip along the, mostly rural, Japan Sea side of the country in the early 1980s. What makes the book especailly enjoyable is what Mr. Booth brings to the table: fluency in Japanese; a familarity with the country and its culture from having lived there for half his life; a wry wit and an observant, thoughful mind.

Most of the narrative deals with Mr. Booth's encounters with Japanese from all walks of life along the road and in the inns and bars he visits.

Having lived in the country and revisted it on numerous occassions the book generated quite a bit of nostalgia for me and I also enjoyed Mr. Booth's take on the country and its society. If you've never been to Japan and you're looking for a book to help you get a real feel for the Japanese people you couldn't do much better than this book.