CECIL BEATON 1957

LIFE IN TOKYO

JAPAN

Japan: Faces and Places

Arrayed in gold and scarlet brocade and surrounded by miniature attendants whose clothes and white-paste make-up are as rooted in tradition as her own, a Kyoto fille de joie makes a stately progress into the night.  The sumiya, a bordello of great elegance which dates from the eighteenth century, is maintained by the Japanese Government as a national monument.

KAWABATA

whose immensely evocative novel Snow Country is a happy example of the Japanese public's willingness to reward a rare talent with popular success. Once much influenced by the writing of the French Symbolists, Kawabata is today a stauch traditionalist, who collects the works of art of his country and lives in a magnificent Japanese-style house in Kamakura - a resort which has become a gathering place for artists and writers.

Japan: 

     Places and Faces

Cecil Beaton

Harper's Bazaar July 1957