“What I have done is to draw and redraw my portrait in front of the backdrop of Japan. I have exemplified what Helen Mears devoted Japan, Mirror for Americans to. You look into this country and find yourself reflected. It… — Donald Richie Copy Share Image
“Leo Rubinfein over to ask questions for his book. He asked me what I most regretted, having lived half a century here, and witnessed all the change. I said that I most regretted the loss of a kind of symbiosis between people and where they lived, a kind of agreement to respect each other. I again mention the paradigm—the builders… — Donald Richie Copy Share
“When I started to learn how to read, I discovered the same kind of power. I could create an environment that I didn't have, and I could order this environment in the way that I couldn't in my actual life. Then, when I learned to write, I learned that I could do this not only for myself, but for other… — Donald Richie Copy Share
“What do I want to be when I grow up? An attractive role would be that of the bunjin. He is the Japanese scholar who wrote and painted in the Chinese style, a literatus, something of a poetaster - a pose popular in the 18th century. I, however, would be a later version, someone out of the end of the… — Donald Richie Copy Share
“In the same way both Lincoln and the Japanese regard people. These are also a kind of currency. A man is worth what he does. Lincoln upon hearing a new name asks, “What does he do?” Almost never, “What has he done?” Much more often, “What does he want to do?” He invests in people—as do the Japanese, and just… — Donald Richie Copy Share
“As always, so polite that he is at the beginning distant, and yet always determined. This is because he has uses for us all. Yukio is not only a dramatist but also a practicing stage director. For the drama of his life, he has cast us in our various roles, those demanded by the rigor of the script. Each of… — Donald Richie Copy Share
Midlife crisis begins sometime in your 40s, when you look at your life and think, 'Is this all?' And it ends about 10 years… — Donald Richie Copy Share Image
“What happened was that sometimes I was, from a young age, put in the theater to watch movies because they kept me quiet and they kept me entertained, and they got me out from under the feet of my parents. So from a very early age, I went to the movies and I soon grew to prefer the life of… — Donald Richie Copy Share
“Having lived most of my life in the most crowded city in the world, I have become used to this constant physical proximity. Wherever… — Donald Richie Copy Share Image
“Late, going home, I pass a group of squatting high schoolers. One of the boys, obviously seeking to impress the girls, says that foreigners… — Donald Richie Copy Share Image
“In the bath the attitude toward sex is representative. No people have it more firmly in place. They are a bit puritanical sometimes, and… — Donald Richie Copy Share Image
“Owen is utterly out of whatever closet he may once have been in. Is resident Concerned Gay Medical Personnel, or some such. This being… — Donald Richie Copy Share Image
“Here we would notice that what we would call Japanese aesthetics (in contrast to Western aesthetics) is more concerned with process than with product,… — Donald Richie Copy Share Image
