Books...Lots of them.
I have been recently saddened by our (my family's) neglect of Japanese literature - there's so much to read, so much to learn, and all of it inaccessable. So, commandeering the credit card and Amazon.com account, I slowly but surely built up a collection of my own (not at the same time - God no). Now, happily, I can call myself mediocrely "read" in Japanese literature, both of a spiritual and literary nature. My current book list includes:
Hagakure
Taiko
Musashi
47 Ronin Story
Rashomon and Other Stories
The Unfettered Mind
Essays in Zen Buddhism
Zen and the Art of Archery
Anyone recommend anything else? This is, as far as I can tell, the basic backbone of Japanese literature, and when I come upon anything else of note, I will read it. I will say right now, if anyone recommends to me any manga or anime, I will do unto them as Oda Nobunaga did unto the Buddhists - and as a Buddhist myself, I know exactly what he did. I don't want to sound draconic, but in my view anime and manga have shredded the world's view of Japanese culture to a point where it is almost unrecognizable through the shroud of Evangelion and Akira novels and movies that everyone seems to distinguish as the cusp of Japanese culture. This may be, and is, rather one-pointed and of a non-understanding nature in terms of appreciating whatever good there is in anime, but for me, keep that stuff away - the conservative bastard that I am, I will not bury myself in this.
Hagakure
Taiko
Musashi
47 Ronin Story
Rashomon and Other Stories
The Unfettered Mind
Essays in Zen Buddhism
Zen and the Art of Archery
Anyone recommend anything else? This is, as far as I can tell, the basic backbone of Japanese literature, and when I come upon anything else of note, I will read it. I will say right now, if anyone recommends to me any manga or anime, I will do unto them as Oda Nobunaga did unto the Buddhists - and as a Buddhist myself, I know exactly what he did. I don't want to sound draconic, but in my view anime and manga have shredded the world's view of Japanese culture to a point where it is almost unrecognizable through the shroud of Evangelion and Akira novels and movies that everyone seems to distinguish as the cusp of Japanese culture. This may be, and is, rather one-pointed and of a non-understanding nature in terms of appreciating whatever good there is in anime, but for me, keep that stuff away - the conservative bastard that I am, I will not bury myself in this.