Audiobooks by Christopher Harding

The Light of Asia: A History of Western Fascination with the East

Brought to you by Penguin. From the time of the ancient Greeks onwards the West's relationship with Asia consisted for the most part in outrageous tales of monsters and giants, of silk and spices trans-shipped over vast distances and an uneasy sense of unknowable empires fantastically far away. By the 20th century much of Asia may have come under Western rule after centuries of warfare, but its intellectual, artistic and spiritual influence was fighting back. The Light of Asia is a wonderfully varied and entertaining history of this vexed, confused but centrally important relationship. From Marco Polo onwards Asia has been both a source of genuine fascination and equally genuine failures of comprehension. China, India and Japan were all acknowledged to be both great civilizations and in crude ways superseded by the West. Christopher Harding's captivating gallery of geniuses, adventurers and con-men celebrates Asia's impact on the West in all its variety. ©2024 Christopher Harding (P)2024 Penguin Audio

Christopher Harding (Author), Christopher Harding, TBD (Narrator)

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Japan: A BBC documentary collection

Japan is a land of complexity, contrast and contradictions. The world's third-largest economy, it is a powerhouse of innovation and a pioneer in technology, fashion and pop culture. But it also has a rich, ancient heritage and a deep reverence for custom, ritual and tradition. This illuminating 2-part radio collection traverses the different aspects of this fascinating country, from its famous historical figures to its diverse cultural landscape. Part 1: History opens with Japan in Five Lives, in which cultural historian Christopher Harding portrays the lives of five colourful characters from the country's past to answer the question 'Who are the Japanese'? In Killing Time in Imperial Japan, he explores early 20th Century Tokyo, a bustling, cosmopolitan capital where the meaning of 'time' was hotly contested. Dark Blossoms sees him examining the doubts and misgivings accompanying Japan's rapid embrace of modernity, while in Japanese Tsunami, broadcasters Richard Lloyd Parry and Matthew Sweet discuss the devastating natural disaster that rocked the country in 2011. In Land of the Rising Sums, Alex Bellos visits Kyoto to ask why Asian cultures seem so much better at maths; in Japan and Religion, Roy Jenkins discusses the place of religious traditions in modern Japan; and in Supernatural Japan, Christopher Harding looks at how the Japanese have used ghosts and ghost stories to make sense of their world. Part 2: Culture celebrates Japan's art, literature and film. In Japan Now 2020, Philip Dodd talks to writers Hiromi Ito and Yukiko Motoya and photographer Tomoko Sawada about women's roles in Japanese culture today. Meanwhile, in Images of Japan, illustrator Fumio Obata and manga translator Jocelyne Allen discuss Japanese comic book imagery, and we join novelists Kyoko Nakajima and Yuya Sato in conversation with Christopher Harding. Landmark: Seven Samurai and Landmark: Rashomon see Matthew Sweet and Rana Mitter investigating the stories behind Akira Kurosawa's two most influential films, in the company of guests including film scholar Ian Christie and authors SF Said, David Peace and Natasha Pulley. The Tale of Genji takes us into the shimmering world of medieval Japan, as Rana Mitter explores Murasaki Shikibu's masterpiece, widely considered to be the world's first novel. Finally, in Godzilla and Hayao Miyazaki, Christopher Harding considers cinematic depictions of Japanese fear, as exemplified by the legendary monster king and the 2013 animated film The Wind Rises. Credits First broadcast on the following dates: Japan in Five Lives Presented by Christopher Harding Produced by Sheila Cook Radio 3: Daimatsu 'The Demon' Hirobumi 26 Jul 2021 Tezuka Osamu: Godfather of Manga 27 Jul 2021 Oda Nobunaga: Warlord 28 Jul 2021 Murasaki Shikibu: Imperial Insider 29 Jul 2021 Himiko: Shaman Queen 30 Jul 2021 Killing Time in Imperial Japan Presented by Christopher Harding Produced by Luke Mulhall Radio 3, 31 Mar 2017 Dark Blossoms Presented by Christopher Harding Produced by Sheila Cook Radio 3: Deer Cry Hall 23 Apr 2018 Happy Families 24 Apr 2018 Rebranding the Buddha 25 Apr 2018 The Art of the Heist 26 Apr 2018 Japan Refusal 27 Apr 2018 Japanese Tsunami With Richard Lloyd Parry and Matthew Sweet Radio 3, 19 Apr 2018 Land of the Rising Sums Presented by Alex Bellos Produced by Alexandra Feachem Radio 4, 29 Oct 2012 Japan and Religion Presented by Roy Jenkins With Erica Baffelli, Christopher Hood, Kiyo Roddis and Nathanael Ayling Radio Wales, 29 Sep 2019 Supernatural Japan Presented by Christopher Harding Produced by Luke Mulhall Radio 3, 22 Apr 2018 Japan Now 2020 Presented by Philip Dodd With Hiromi Ito, Tomoko Sawada, Yukiko Motoya and Motoyuki Shibata Produced by Luke Mulhall Radio 3, 19 Feb 2020 Images of Japan Presented by Christopher Harding With Fumio Obata, Jocelyne Allen, Yuya Sato and Kyoko Nakajima Produced by Luke Mulhall Radio 3, 21 Feb 2019 Landmark: Seven Samurai Presented by Matthew Sweet With Professor Ian Christie, Larushka Ivan-Zadeh, SF Said and Alexander Jacoby Produced by Zahid Warley Radio 3, 25 Mar 2014 Landmark: Rashomon Presented by Rana Mitter With David Peace, Natasha Pulley, Yuna Tasaka and Jasper Sharp Produced by Luke Mulhall Radio 3, 25 Apr 2018 The Tale of Genji Presented by Rana Mitter With Dennis Washburn, Jennifer Guest and Christopher Harding Produced by Luke Mulhall Radio 3, 26 May 2016 Godzilla and The Wind Rises Presented by Matthew Sweet With Christopher Harding Produced by Zahid Warley Radio 3, 13 May 2014 © 2022 Studios Distribution Ltd. (P) 2022 Studios Distribution Ltd.

Alex Bellos, Christopher Harding, David Peace, Matthew Sweet, Natasha Pulley, Philip Dodd, Rana Mitter, Richard Lloyd Parry, Roy Jenkins, SF Said, Sf Said (Author), Various (Narrator)

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The Japanese: A History in Twenty Lives

Brought to you by Penguin. Chris Harding's enormously enjoyable new book distils Japan's long, complex and fascinating history into the stories of twenty remarkable individuals. These vivid and entertaining portraits take the reader from the earliest written accounts of Japan right through to the life of the current empress, Masako. We encounter shamans and warlords, poets and revolutionaries, scientists, artists and adventurers - each offering insights of their own into this extraordinary place. For anyone new to Japan, this book is the ideal introduction. For anyone already deeply involved with it, this is a book filled with surprises and pleasures. © Christopher Harding 2020 (P) Penguin Audio 2020

Christopher Harding (Author), Christopher Harding (Narrator)

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Japan Story: In Search of a Nation, 1850 to the Present

Penguin presents the audiobook edition of Japan Story written and read by Christopher Harding. This is a fresh and surprising account of Japan's culture from the 'opening up' of the country in the mid-nineteenth century to the present. It is told through the eyes of people who greeted this change not with the confidence and grasping ambition of Japan's modernizers and nationalists, but with resistance, conflict, distress. We encounter writers of dramas, ghost stories and crime novels where modernity itself is the tragedy, the ghoul and the bad guy; surrealist and avant-garde artists sketching their escape; rebel kamikaze pilots and the put-upon urban poor; hypnotists and gangsters; men in desperate search of the eternal feminine and feminists in search of something more than state-sanctioned subservience; Buddhists without morals; Marxist terror groups; couches full to bursting with the psychological fall-out of breakneck modernization. These people all sprang from the soil of modern Japan, but their personalities and projects failed to fit. They were 'dark blossoms': both East-West hybrids and home-grown varieties that wreathed, probed and sometimes penetrated the new structures of mainstream Japan. 'How much I admired it, what a lot I learned from it and, above all, how very much I enjoyed it ... Masterly.' Neil MacGregor

Christopher Harding (Author), Christopher Harding (Narrator)

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