Sake and Satori: Asian Journals -- Japan (The Collected Works of Joseph Campbell) [Hardcover]

Joseph Campbell (Author), David Kudler (Editor), Robert Walter (Editor)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 13, 2002 | Series: The Collected Works of Joseph Campbell

In this second volume of his Asian journals, Campbell reports on his travels through east Asia and his five-month stay in Japan. Sake and Satori includes the never-before-published sequel to Campbell’s Baksheesh and Brahman and covers the author’s journeys through Thailand, Cambodia, Burma, Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Japan. It offers a snapshot of 1950s Asia and its rapidly changing postcolonial and Cold War tensions. Campbell shares his experiences with Noh drama, Kabuki theater, and geisha houses, and explores how Asia absorbs and resists Western notions of gender, pluralism, and wealth. He relates conversations with fellow travelers, scholars, and Japanese people from all walks of life. Along the way, his asides develop into philosophical explorations augmented with photos and drawings.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 350 pages
• Publisher: New World Library (November 13, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1577312368
• ISBN-13: 978-1577312369
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 5.8 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #593,930 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

15 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Amazing insight into Campbell and Japan, December 2, 2002

By A Customer

This review is from: Sake and Satori: Asian Journals -- Japan (The Collected Works of Joseph Campbell) (Hardcover)

This book is a set of journals--heavily illustrated with Campbell's own drawings and photographs-- that follow the master mythologist through an amazing period of epiphany--a crystalization not only of his understanding of his own subject, but of what that subject is and where he wants to go with it. It's also a breath-taking insight into Campbell the man: you follow him into bars, fending off the advances of married American women (and a Frenchman!), into geisha houses (a section where he is shocked to find that he has procured the services not of a masseuse but of a prostitute is both hysterically funny and incredibly touching), into Buddhist temples and Shinto shrines. It even follows him on a working vacation, trailing his beloved wife, dancer Jean Erdman, as she teaches and performs around Japan. In addition to the wonderful pictures, the editor has done a great job of annotation, giving an amazing background for all the erudite references and colorful characters that come and go. I'd read Baksheesh and Brahman when it came out four or five years ago; I've just finished this one and enjoyed it every bit as much, if not more so--it answers many unanswered questions, and takes Campbell off on brand-new adventures.

12 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars A travel diary, August 11, 2004

By 

Zack Davisson "japanreviewed" (Seattle, WA, USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Sake and Satori: Asian Journals -- Japan (The Collected Works of Joseph Campbell) (Hardcover)

"Sake and Satori: Asian Journals, Japan" is a travel journal, containing Joseph Campbell's musings and reflections during his 1950s Asian journey through Sri Lanka, Cambodia, Taiwan, Thailand and mostly Japan. The Japanese journey takes up around 75% of the book.

During his Japanese stay, encompassing several months, Campbell was taken around Japan by a variety of people, from American Buddhists to Japanese Professors. He saw many of the major sights of Japanese religion, in areas such as Tokyo, Nara and Kyoto. He was shown Japanese traditional arts such as Noh and Kabuki theatre, as well as hostess bars and houses of prostitution. Along with this are intricate discussions on Buddhism in Japan with local experts, and a mental ordering of ideas that was later to become "The Masks of God."

Frankly, the book is not as interesting as I was hoping. I wanted to peek into Campbell's mind, and hear his reflections on Japanese culture and religion. I wanted insights and personal thoughts about the temples and monuments of Japan that he was seeing, such as the Great Buddha of Nara. Instead, more attention is paid in the journal to which restaurants he went to that day, and how he is progressing with his Japanese language studies, and what old friends he met that day and such. He goes to restaurants and studies Japanese more than anything else, but even with these there is little insight, and mostly statements of facts.

A standard entry is along the lines of "Tuesday: Had breakfast at cute old inn. Very delicious. Was taken to see Great Buddha at Todaiji in Nara in the afternoon. Came back to Kyoto for dinner, a nice Indian restaurant. In the evening, wrote letters to Jean, and studied Japanese. I think I am getting the hang of it!"

There is much more insight and process of Indian culture than Japanese, and Campbell is clearly still bitter about his journey to India. There are many comparisons of Indian and other Asian cultures, reflecting how they got it "right" and Indian culture is stuck in a quagmire. Reading the first volume of the Asian Journals will help put all of this into perspective.

There is some good stuff here, and it is an interesting read, but it is probably more for those interested in Campbell as a person than those hoping for unique insights into Japan and Japanese culture. In one passage, Campbell wonders if he has not perhaps wasted his trip to Japan by spending long hours studying Japanese language rather than experiencing the country. I could not help but think the same thing.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Companion to Baksheesh and Brahman, December 3, 2002

By 

G. James (Colorado Springs, Colorado United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Sake and Satori: Asian Journals -- Japan (The Collected Works of Joseph Campbell) (Hardcover)

This is the long awaited 2nd part of Joseph Campbell's journals of his trip to the Orient in the Fifties. The first, Baksheesh and Brahman, told of India, and this book tells of other countries but mainly Japan. The book reads like a journal with varied entries about traveling, people and places of interest, etc. The post-war mood is obvious, and the political climate is interesting.
This book is less naive than the first where JC was disappointed by the spiritual/caste hypocrisy of India, and more insightful of modern Oriental life.