“When a Japanese person tells you that Kyoto, the former capital, is a “beautiful” city, he does not mean that, if you climbed Mount Hiei and looked down at its roofs, you would be struck–as you would be by Florence from Fiesole or Oxford from the tower of the University Church–by a sense that the whole was magically greater than the sum of its parts. When you view Kyoto from any point of vantage, such as the elevated platform where the bullet train deposits you, its ugliness can make you weep. Its tangled, utility-cabled skyline is indistinguishable from that of any other Japanese city of comparable size, and every bit as jolting. The attractions of Japanese cities–if they have attractions–lie in what they contain, not in the prospect they present. Kyoto is “beautiful” because within it there are beautiful things; subtle, sometimes tiny details that resist the cacophony around them and may require a lifetime to unearth.” (Alan Booth in Looking for the Lost p. 53)

Posted on March 24th, 2009 under Japan • Tags: alan booth, kyoto. • RSS 2.0 feed • Both comments and pings are currently closed