A groundbreaking essay on literature’s demise from the award-winning philosopherWhat comes after the death of literature? Kojin Karatani, winner of the 2022 Berggruen Prize, examines the corpse, investigates the cause of death, and offers glimpses of an afterlife from various theoretical perspectives. The End of Modern Literature reimagines the significance and concept of literature.Alongside Karatani’s essential essay comes commentary and response...

In Japan, obsessive adult fans and collectors of manga and anime are known as otaku. When the underground otaku subculture first emerged in the 1970s, participants were looked down on within mainstream Japanese society as strange, antisocial loners. Today otaku have had a huge impact on popular culture not only in Japan but also throughout Asia, Europe, and the United States.Hiroki Azuma’s Otaku offers a critical, philosophical, and historical inquiry into the cha...

A rich and long history of revolutions--the English Civil War, the American War of Independence, the French, Russian, and Chinese revolutions--and their lasting transformations.Revolutions is a sparkling account of political upheaval and the power of history. We think of revolutions in terms of fleeting events, such as the Fall of the Bastille or the Storming of the Winter Palace. In reality they take decades to burn out, if they ever do. One of our great ...

Unlocking a vital understanding of how literary studies and media studies overlap and are bound togetherA synthetic history of new media reception in modern and contemporary Japan, The New Real positions mimesis at the heart of the media concept. Considering both mimicry and representation as the core functions of mediation and remediation, Jonathan E. Abel offers a new model for media studies while explaining the deep and ongoing imbrication of Japan in t...

For decades, we have been told we live in the “information age”—a time when disruptive technological advancement has reshaped the categories and social uses of knowledge and when quantitative assessment is increasingly privileged. Such methodologies and concepts of information are usually considered the provenance of the natural and social sciences, which present them as politically and philosophically neutral. Yet the humanities should and do play an important role in interpreting and cri...

For decades, we have been told we live in the “information age”—a time when disruptive technological advancement has reshaped the categories and social uses of knowledge and when quantitative assessment is increasingly privileged. Such methodologies and concepts of information are usually considered the provenance of the natural and social sciences, which present them as politically and philosophically neutral. Yet the humanities should and do play an important role in interpreting and cri...

The unexpected gift of a favored bottle of shiraz from her husband leads to the adventure of a lifetime for Karen Pond and her family—moving from rural Maine to the largest city in the world: Tokyo, Japan.Getting Genki in Japan is a collection of illustrated travel and culture essays and musings of a Down East Mom's absurd and exhilarating adventures in the Far East. From bewildered and befuddled (and back again) to (somewhat) wise, these narratives recount a journey of cu...

When the alien Mimics invade, Keiji Kiriya is just one of many recruits shoved into a suit of battle armor called a Jacket and sent out to kill. Keiji dies on the battlefield, only to be reborn each morning to fight and die again and again. On his 158th iteration, he gets a message from a mysterious ally--the female soldier known as the Full Metal Bitch. Is she the key to Keiji's escape or his final death?Now a major motion picture starring Tom Cruise!

The first in Eric Hobsbawm's dazzling trilogy on the history of the nineteenth century.Between 1789 and 1848 the world was transformed both by the French Revolution and also by the Industrial Revolution that originated in Britain. This 'Dual Revolution' created the modern world as we know it.Eric Hobsbawm traces with brilliant analytical clarity the transformation brought about in every sphere of European life by the Dual Revolution - in the conduct of war ...

Graphic Design Theory is organized in three sections: "Creating the Field" traces the evolution of graphic design over the course of the early 1900s, including influential avant-garde ideas of futurism, constructivism, and the Bauhaus; "Building on Success" covers the mid- to late twentieth century and considers the International Style, modernism, and postmodernism; and "Mapping the Future" opens at the end of the last century and includes current discussions on legibility, social...

In the second volume of The Origins of Totalitarianism, the political theorist traces the decline of European colonialism and the outbreak of WWI.Since it was first published in 1951, The Origins of Totalitarianism has been recognized as the definitive philosophical account of the totalitarian mindset. A probing analysis of Nazism, Stalinism, and the "banality of evil", it remains one of the most referenced works in studies and discussions of tota...

Noise, an underground music made through an amalgam of feedback, distortion, and electronic effects, first emerged as a genre in the 1980s, circulating on cassette tapes traded between fans in Japan, Europe, and North America. With its cultivated obscurity, ear-shattering sound, and over-the-top performances, Noise has captured the imagination of a small but passionate transnational audience.For its scattered listeners, Noise always seems to be new and to come from somewhere else: ...