A History of Japan

Blackwell History of the World

by Conrad D. Totman

This is an updated edition of Conrad Totman's authoritative history of Japan from c.8000 BC to the present day. Part of The Blackwell History of the World Series The goal of this ambitious series is to provide an accessible source of knowledge about the entire human past, for every curious person in every part of the world. It will comprise some two dozen volumes, of which some provide synoptic views of the history of particular regions while others consider the world as a whole during a particular period of time. The volumes are narrative in form, giving balanced attention to social and cultural history (in the broadest sense) as well as to institutional development and political change. Each provides a systematic account of a very large subject, but they are also both imaginative and interpretative. The Series is intended to be accessible to the widest possible readership, and the accessibility of its volumes is matched by the style of presentation and production.

Genres: History, Japan, Nonfiction, Japanese Literature, Academic, Historical, World History

720 pages, Paperback

First published May 26, 2000

About the author

A specialist in Japanese history, Conrad Davis Totman is professor emeritus of history at Yale University.

Reviews

[Richard Beasley · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is sound and interesting stuff
A history focusing on the ecological limits to Japanese society, and more focused on the culture than a narrative of who did what. I am up to chapter 16 now.
It is slow going so I take a break every now and then (usually 3 or 4) chapters to keep it fresh

Finished it now - lots of interest, but don't feel I really got a complete story - I read with interest discussion on culture, but it occasionally referred to events I had missed in narrative sections.

Also maps not a lot of help. There were lots of references to locations, towns etc that could not be easily found. As geography is critical to historical development this was problem. But it's a start to understanding the history.

[Thomas H. · Rating 4 out of 5]

With a focus on the ecological, Totman has found an inventive way of telling an otherwise familiar story. The escape from a traditional narrative will alienate some readers, with a focus as much on economic and social change than on individual historical figures. It may not be the easiest or the most enjoyable history of Japan to read, but it is certainly one of the best histories of Japan ever written, and in the over twenty years since its publication, there is still nothing quite like it.

And so, if you want a gripping history, this is not for you (it would be three stars); but if you want to read real solid, factual history, this is a five star read. For this reason it averages out at four stars from me, but this is one history of Japan that should not be passed over for a serious reader of history.

[Franco Victorio · Rating 3 out of 5]

My wife and I are going to visit Japan this year, and since I can only engage with things through my brain, I decided I had to read a long-ass full history of Japan as prep. I spent some time looking around and most options didn't convince me. Some think you are an idiot and need to sound cool to keep you entertained. Others are the opposite and very dry. Others looked good but started from the Edo period (which, in retrospect, seems like a reasonable decision, but I was feeling completionist). Finally I settled for Totman's A History of Japan, which is way longer than I wanted (~700 pages) but whose Introduction is so good that I was hooked.

This is an ecological history of Japan, in the non-hippie sense of the word. Its focus is on the material foundations of civilization (land, resources, climate, population) and how they shape everything else. This means that Totman's interests are... peculiar. The Battle of Okinawa? Boring, let's just mention it in passing. The long-term effects of reforestation? Now that is interesting, let's talk about it for a good couple of pages.

That approach also informs the structure of the book. Totman organizes all of Japanese history into four big ages: foraging, dispersed agriculture, intensive agriculture, industrialism. Each age is in turn divided into a period of growth followed by a period of stasis. Needless to say, this is not the usual periodization of Japan, which uses milestones like the Genpei War, the Battle of Sekigahara, or the Meiji Restoration. In his defense, he's straightforward about this difference and makes a good case for it.

The ecological perspective produces some genuinely interesting insights that, I guess, you won't find in conventional narrative histories. I particularly liked the running argument about how industrialism makes a society suddenly depend on a global resource base, and the endless implications of that switch. There's also the fantastic observation that previous ages used the current productive capacity of the Earth, while industrialism consumes the product of many previous Earths: fossil fuels, mineral deposits, and so on.

So, all in all, I don't regret reading this book and I certainly learned a lot. But it might work better as a second history of Japan than a first. Totman sometimes says things that amount to "everyone knows this, so let's skip it", which is fine if you do, and frustrating if you don't. In hindsight, maybe starting with one of those shallower books that treat you like an idiot and focus on samurai, and then reading Totman, would've been a better sequence.

[Lio Smits · Rating 4 out of 5]

ecologisch perspectief dat de klassieke indeling van japanse geschiedenis interessant in vraag stelt

[Pär Kawaai · Rating 1 out of 5]

Never really goes into depth about any interesting historical topic. Feels like riding a tour bus through Japanese history.

[Mika Bracke · Rating 3 out of 5]

Conrad Totman's book can be seen as a counterpart to Wim Boot's concise overview of Japan's political history ('Emperors and Shōgun: A History of Japan until 1868'). While Boot focuses primarily on the emperors and the elite, Totman turns his attention to ordinary Japanese people, showing how society, economy, and culture collectively shape history. His approach combines a human-ecological perspective with attention to social and economic issues, offering a perspective very different from Boot's.