The Coming of the Barbarians: A Story of Western Settlement in Japan, 1853-1870

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Description

Nineteenth-century Japan was pristine, inviolate and feudal, ruled by the legendary Shogun and the sacred puppet-Emperor, the Mikado. Foreigners were despised and feared as 'hairy barbarians'; for more than two hundred years Dutch merchants had been the only settlers, interned on the tiny island of Decima. established a risky presence on Japan's shores, opening up a new frontier for both East and West. Pat Barr's sparkling and vivid narrative spans these twenty years and captures the excitement and wonder, beauty and adventure of Japan at its moment of entry into the modern world. continues the story of Japan in an age of transition in The Deer Cry Pavilion, also reissued by Faber Finds.

Author Bio

Pat Barr was born in Norwich and read English at Birmingham University and University College, London. She lived in Japan for three years before returning to Britain. The Coming of the Barbarians was her first book. This was followed by The Deer Cry Pavilion, A Curious Life for a Lady, To China with Love, The Memsahibs and Taming the Jungle. She then turned her hand to fiction with the immensely successful Chinese Alice, Uncut Jade and Kenjiro, each set in nineteenth-century Japan.