Ian Buruma
Ian Buruma | |
---|---|
Born | The Hague, Netherlands | 28 December 1951
Occupation | Writer, historian |
Nationality | Dutch |
Genre | Nonfiction |
Subject | China, Japan, Occidentalism, Orientalism |
Ian Buruma (born 28 December 1951) is a Dutch writer and editor who lives and works in the United States. In 2017, he became editor of The New York Review of Books, but left the position in September 2018.
Much of his writing has focused on the
Early life and education
Buruma was born and raised in
Career
Overview
Buruma lived in Japan from 1975 to 1981, where he worked as a film reviewer, photographer and documentary filmmaker. During the 1980s, he edited the cultural section of the
From 2003 to 2017, Buruma was Luce Professor of Democracy, Human Rights and Journalism at Bard College, New York. In 2017, he became editor of The New York Review of Books, succeeding founding editor Robert B. Silvers.[7][8]
He has been a regular contributor to Project Syndicate since 2001.[9]
New York Review of Books controversy
In September 2018, Buruma left the NYRB position in the wake of a dispute about his decision to publish an essay by the Canadian talk show host Jian Ghomeshi. Ghomeshi was acquitted in 2016 of one count of choking and four counts of sexual assault, after over 20 women complained either to the police or in the media. The publication of the essay was controversial, in part, because Ghomeshi wrote that the allegations against him were "inaccurate".[10] In an interview with Slate magazine, Buruma defended his decision to publish, and denied that the article was misleading because it had failed to mention that Ghomeshi had been required to issue an apology to one of the victims as part of the terms of a case against him. He also denied that the title, "Reflections from a Hashtag", was dismissive of the #MeToo movement; stated that the movement has resulted in "undesirable consequences"; and said: "I'm no judge of the rights and wrongs of every allegation. ... The exact nature of [Ghomeshi's] behavior – how much consent was involved – I have no idea, nor is it really my concern."[11]
In response to outrage over his defense of the article,[12][13][14] The Review later stated that it had departed from its "usual editorial practices", as the essay "was shown to only one male editor during the editing process", and that Buruma's statement to Slate about the staff of the Review "did not accurately represent their views".[15] More than 100 contributors to the Review, including Joyce Carol Oates and Ian McEwan, signed a letter of protest to express fears that Buruma's exit threatened intellectual culture and "the free exploration of ideas".[16][17][18][19][20]
Awards
In 2004, Buruma was awarded an
In 2008, Buruma was awarded the Erasmus Prize, which is awarded to an individual who has made "an especially important contribution to culture, society or social science in Europe".[21] He was included in Foreign Policy magazine's 2010 list of the "100 top global thinkers".[22]
Buruma has won several prizes for his books, including the Los Angeles Times Book Prize and the PEN/Diamonstein-Spielvogel Award for the Art of the Essay for Theater of Cruelty.[8]
Personal life and views
Buruma has been married twice. He and his first wife, Sumie Tani, had a daughter, as did he and his second wife, Eri Hotta.[23][24] Buruma is a nephew of the English film director John Schlesinger, with whom he published a series of interviews in book form.[25]
He argued in 2001 for wholehearted British participation in the European Union because they were the "strongest champions in Europe of a liberal approach to commerce and politics".[26]
Bibliography
- Richie, Donald & Ian Buruma (1980). The Japanese Tattoo. Weatherhill.
- Buruma, Ian (1983). Behind the Mask: On Sexual Demons, Sacred Mothers, Transvestites, Gangsters, Drifters, and Other Japanese Cultural Heroes. New American Library.
- A Japanese Mirror: Heroes and Villains of Japanese Culture. London: ISBN 978-0-224-02049-7.
- Tokyo: Form and Spirit (1986) with James Brandon, ISBN 978-0-8109-1690-6
- God's Dust: A Modern Asian Journey (1989) ISBN 978-0-7538-1089-7
- Great Cities of the World: Hong Kong (1991)
- Playing the Game (1991) novel ISBN 978-0-374-52633-7
- The Wages of Guilt: Memories of War in Germany and in Japan (1994) ISBN 978-0-452-01156-4
- Introduction for Geisha: The Life, the Voices, the Art (1998) by Jodi Cobb ISBN 978-0-375-70180-1
- Voltaire's Coconuts, or Anglomania in Europe (UK title) (1998) ISBN 978-0-375-50206-4
- The Pilgrimage from Tiananmen Square, The New York Times (1999)
- The Missionary and the Libertine: Love and War in East and West (2000) compilation ISBN 978-0-571-21414-3
- De neo-romantiek van schrijvers in exil ("Neoromanticism of writers in exile") (2000) ISBN 978-90-446-0028-5
- ISBN 978-0-679-78136-3
- Inventing Japan: From Empire to Economic Miracle 1853–1964 (2003) ISBN 978-0-679-64085-1
- Occidentalism: The West in the Eyes of Its Enemies (2004) with ISBN 978-0-14-303487-2
- ISBN 978-1-59420-108-0 winner of The Los Angeles Times Book Prizefor the Best Current Interest Book.
- Conversations with John Schlesinger (2006) ISBN 978-0-375-75763-1
- Commentary on the ISBN 978-1-60465-014-3).
- The China Lover (2008) novel ISBN 978-1-59420-194-3
- China's class ceiling, published in the Los Angeles Times
- Taming the Gods: Religion and Democracy on Three Continents (2010) ISBN 978-0-691-13489-5, with some historical examples of the value the separation of religion and national governance with the separation of church and stateas one example.
- Grenzen aan de vrijheid: van De Sade tot Wilders (Limits to Freedom: From ISBN 978-90-477-0262-7– Essay for the Month of Philosophy in the Netherlands.
- Year Zero: A History of 1945. New York, NY: The ISBN 978-1-59420-436-4.
- "The Man Who Got It Right", The New York Review of Books (2013)
- Theater of Cruelty: Art, Film, and the Shadows of War (2014) ISBN 978-1-59017-777-8
- — (July 20, 2015). "The Sensualist: What Makes 'The Tale of Genji' So Seductive". The Critics. Books. The New Yorker. Vol. 91, no. 20. pp. 64–71.[a]
- Their Promised Land: My Grandparents in Love and War (2016)
- — (June 19, 2017). "Dance with the Dragon: Are the United States and China on a Collision Course?". The Critics. Books. The New Yorker. Vol. 93, no. 17. pp. 61–66.[b]
- A Tokyo Romance. New York, NY: The Penguin Press. 2018. ISBN 978-1-101-98141-2.
- The Churchill Complex: The Rise and Fall of the Special Relationship and the End of the Anglo-American Order. United Kingdom: ISBN 978-1-78649-465-8.[c]
- The Collaborators: Three Stories of Deception and Survival in World War II, Penguin Random House, 2023.
- Spinoza: Freedom's Messiah, Yale University Press, 2024.
Notes
- ^ Title in the online table of contents is "Why 'The Tale of Genji' Is Still Seductive".
- ^ Online version is titled "Are China and the United States Headed for War?".
- ^ "The Churchill Complex - Ian Buruma - 9781786494658". www.allenandunwin.com. Retrieved September 1, 2020.
References
- ^ "Bard Faculty: Ian Buruma". Bard College. Retrieved November 5, 2014.
- ^ Grimes, William (September 13, 2006). "Bumping Into Boundaries in a Land of Tolerance (book review". New York Times. Retrieved January 27, 2016.
- ^ "Their Promised Land: My Grandparents in Love and War | Jewish Book Council". www.jewishbookcouncil.org. 2016. Retrieved March 6, 2021.
- ^ "Ian Buruma Critical Essays - eNotes.com". eNotes. Retrieved March 6, 2021.
- World Affairs Journal
- ^ "Ian Buruma". The Guardian. Retrieved 2 September 2021.
- ^ Schuessler, Jennifer. "Ian Buruma Named Editor of The New York Review of Books", The New York Times, May 18, 2017.
- ^ a b "Contents: Contributors", New York Review of Books, August 17, 2017, Vol. 64, No. 13.
- ^ "Ian Buruma". Project Syndicate. Retrieved March 6, 2021.
- ^ Ghomeshi, Jian (October 11, 2018). "Reflections from a Hashtag". The New York Review of Books.
- ^ Chotiner, Isaac. "Why Did the New York Review of Books Publish That Jian Ghomeshi Essay?", Slate, September 14, 2018.
- ^ Pilkington, Ed. "New York Review of Books editor Ian Buruma departs amid outrage over essay", The Guardian, September 19, 2018.
- ^ Vanderhoof, Erin. "How Ian Buruma's New York Review of Books Ouster Became Inevitable", Vanity Fair, September 19, 2018
- ^ O'Rourke, Meghan. "What Magazines Can't Do in the Age of #MeToo", The Atlantic, September 21, 2018.
- ^ Williams, John. "New York Review of Books Acknowledges 'Failures' in a #MeToo Essay", The New York Times, September 24, 2018.
- ^ Laura Kipnis, "The Perils of Publishing in a #MeToo Moment", The New York Times, September 25, 2018. Retrieved November 26, 2018.
- ^ David Taylor, "How one article capsized a New York literary institution", The Guardian, September 26, 2018. Retrieved November 26, 2018.
- ^ Ed Pilkington, "Acclaimed authors pen letter in protest at 'forced resignation' of Ian Buruma", The Guardian, September 26, 2018. Retrieved November 26, 2018.
- ^ Conor Friedersdorf "The Journalistic Implications of Ian Buruma's Resignation", The Atlantic, September 25, 2018. Retrieved January 15, 2019.
- ISSN 0028-7504. Retrieved 2021-08-31.
- ^ "Former Laureates: Ian Buruma, 2008". Praemium Erasmianum Foundation. Retrieved November 5, 2014.
- ^ "The FP Top 100 Global Thinkers", Foreign Policy, 29 November 2010.
- ^ "A new cosmopolitan". The Jerusalem Post | JPost.com. Retrieved March 6, 2021.
- ^ "Objective subjects". South China Morning Post. Retrieved March 6, 2021.
- ^ Conversations with John Schlesinger. Random House.
- ^ "In praise of Englishness". The Economist. October 23, 2001.
External links
- Official Website, with curriculum vitae
- Column archive at Project Syndicate
- Column archive at The Guardian
- Column archive at The New York Review of Books
- Appearances on C-SPAN
- Ian Buruma at IMDb
- Ian Buruma collected news and commentary at The New York Times
- Article archive at Journalisted
- Interviews
- Voices on Antisemitism Interview with Ian Buruma Archived 2017-08-22 at the Wayback Machine from the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
- Ian Buruma discusses A Murder in Amsterdam FORA.tv