Robert Whiting
Encyclopedia
Robert Whiting is an author and journalist who has written several successful books on contemporary Japanese culture - which include topics such as baseball and American gangsters operating in Japan. He was born in New Jersey
, grew up in California
and graduated from Sophia University
in Tokyo
. He has lived in Japan for a total of more than three decades since he first arrived there in the early 1960s. He currently divides his time between homes in Tokyo and California.
in the U-2 program. He graduated from Tokyo's Sophia University
in 1969 with a degree in Japanese politics. His research into the ties binding Japan’s leading politicians to Yakuza
bosses gained him entrée into the Higashi Nakano
wing of Tokyo’s largest criminal gang, the Sumiyoshi-kai
, where he became an “informal advisor.” He worked for Encyclopaedia Britannica Japan as an editor until 1972, whereupon he moved to New York City and wrote his first book, The Chrysanthemum and the Bat. He later worked for Time-Life
in Tokyo for a year before becoming a free-lance author.
You Gotta Have Wa is a work about Japanese society as seen through their adopted sport of baseball. It was a Book of the Month Club
selection, a Casey Award finalist and a Pulitzer Prize
nominee. Though considered an excellent book on baseball (the San Francisco Chronicle
described it as "one of the best-written sports books ever"), like most of Whiting's sports writing it examines much larger issues concerning Japan as well. David Halberstam
stated that "What you read (in You Gotta Have Wa) is applicable to almost every other dimension of American-Japanese relations." The book has been required reading in the Japanese Studies departments of many American universities, as well as at the Japan Desk in the U.S. State Department. It sold 125,000 copies in hardcover and trade paperback and is in its 23rd printing. It was published in Japanese by Kadokawa under the title Wa Wo Motte Nihon To Nasu. It sold 200,000 copies in hardcover and paperback editions. In September 1991 it appeared in a list of the best non-fiction books ever published in Japan, compiled by Hon No Hanasahi magazine. It has sold over 400,000 copies world wide, including Chinese and Korean editions.
The Chrysanthemum and the Bat was chosen by TIME
Magazine editorial staff as the best sports book of the year. Published in Japanese by Simul Publishing Company, as Kiku to Batto it was a best-seller and was reissued in 2005 by Hayakawa Shoten Publishing.
Warren Cromartie
's autobiography, Slugging It Out In Japan (Kodansha International, Tokyo 1991), was co-authored by Whiting. The book was the recipient of a New York Public Library
award for educational merit. Published in Japanese by Kodansha International, as Saraba Samurai Yakyu, it sold 190,000 copies in hardcover.
The Meaning of Ichiro, was published by Warner Books in 2004, and excerpted in Sports Illustrated. It sold 25,000 copies. The Japanese translation, Ichiro Kakumei was published by Hayakawa Shoten and has made many best-seller lists. A revised and updated edition of The Meaning of Ichiro, entitled The Samurai Way of Baseball, was published in trade-paperback form by Warner Books in April, 2005.
Whiting’s most popular work is the nonfiction Tokyo Underworld: The Fast Times and Hard Life of an American Gangster in Japan (Pantheon, N.Y. 1999, Vintage Departures, 2000), an account of organized crime in Japan and the corrupt side of U.S.-Japan relations. Mario Puzo
described the book as "a fascinating look at...fascinating people who show how democracy advances hand in hand with crime in Japan." It was a best-seller on many lists in Tokyo when published in translated form by Kadokawa, selling over 300,000 copies in hardcover and paperback in Japan alone. It is currently being developed into a series by HBO. Martin Scorsese
is slated to direct the pilot, with Harry Ufland serving as executive producer. Whiting is a consultant on the project.
A sequel to Tokyo Underworld, Tokyo Outsiders - about foreign criminals in the Japanese underworld - is in the works.
Whiting has also written 20 books in Japanese, mostly collections of the columns and articles he has written. His works have sold an aggregate of nearly two million copies in North America and Japan combined. In addition, he has authored a Manga
series about a gaijin
(foreign) ballplayer in Japan, entitled Reggie, and published by Kodansha Comic Morning that sold 750,000 copies in graphic novel form.
His latest work is a biography of the Japanese pitcher, Hideo Nomo
, who played in the US Major League
s and was National League
Rookie of the Year
in 1995. The book was published in 2011 by PHP in Japanese. (Whiting has publicly praised Nomo, asserting that the history of Japanese baseball can be split up into “pre-Nomo and post-Nomo” eras.)
In addition to his books, Whiting has been published in numerous periodicals, such as The New York Times
, The Smithsonian, Sports Illustrated
, Newsweek
, TIME
, and US News and World Report. He is also one of very few Westerners to write regular columns in the Japanese press. From 1979-1985, he was a columnist for the Japanese language Daily Sports. From 1988 to 1992, he wrote a weekly column for the popular magazine Shukan Asahi. From 1990-1993, he was a reporter/commentator for News Station, the top-rated news program in Japan. Since 2007, he has written a weekly column for Yukan Fuji, a major evening daily newspaper in Japan. He has published numerous articles in Japan and has written extensively on current issues impacting both Nippon Professional Baseball and Major League Baseball
, including a four-part series, which was published in the Japan Times, followed by an in-depth series on Sadaharu Oh
, Trey Hillman
, Bobby Valentine
and Hideo Nomo
for the same paper.
In October, 2011, he wrote a three-part series in The Japan Times on the talented, but troubled, Japanese pitcher Hideki Irabu
, who had died in California two months earlier of an apparent suicide.
In a shifting era of globalization, Whiting is one of the few sports experts to explore the transnational flows of athletics. In his works he not only examines how different cultures have influenced the game of baseball, but how the game of baseball has helped influence and shape cultural identity across the globe. He is also an insightful commentator on the influence of the Yakuza on the Japanese power structure and the dark side of Japanese-American relations since the end of the Second World War.
, Stanford, Temple University
, Occidental College
, Michigan State University
, the International House of Japan, the American Chamber of Commerce in Japan, CLSA, and the Japan Society of New York, among other institutions. He has has also appeared in numerous documentaries about Japan and on such shows as CNN's Larry King Live
, the PBS Macneil-Lehrer News Hour, Nightline
, ESPN's Sports Central, HBO's RealSports and All Things Considered
.
(UNHCR). In her 25 year career she was posted in Geneva, Mogadishu, Karachi, Tan Jung Pinang and Dhaka, among other locations. Her last post, in Stockholm, was as Representative for Scandinavia, an ambassador-level position.
New Jersey
New Jersey is a state in the Northeastern and Middle Atlantic regions of the United States. , its population was 8,791,894. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York, on the southeast and south by the Atlantic Ocean, on the west by Pennsylvania and on the southwest by Delaware...
, grew up in California
California
California is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...
and graduated from Sophia University
Sophia University
There are several rankings below related to Sophia University.-General Rankings:The university was ranked 61st in 2010 in the ranking Truly Strong Universities by Toyo Keizai...
in Tokyo
Tokyo
, ; officially , is one of the 47 prefectures of Japan. Tokyo is the capital of Japan, the center of the Greater Tokyo Area, and the largest metropolitan area of Japan. It is the seat of the Japanese government and the Imperial Palace, and the home of the Japanese Imperial Family...
. He has lived in Japan for a total of more than three decades since he first arrived there in the early 1960s. He currently divides his time between homes in Tokyo and California.
Background since relocating to Japan
Whiting first came to Japan with U.S. Air Force intelligence in 1962, where he was assigned to work for the National Security AgencyNational Security Agency
The National Security Agency/Central Security Service is a cryptologic intelligence agency of the United States Department of Defense responsible for the collection and analysis of foreign communications and foreign signals intelligence, as well as protecting U.S...
in the U-2 program. He graduated from Tokyo's Sophia University
Sophia University
There are several rankings below related to Sophia University.-General Rankings:The university was ranked 61st in 2010 in the ranking Truly Strong Universities by Toyo Keizai...
in 1969 with a degree in Japanese politics. His research into the ties binding Japan’s leading politicians to Yakuza
Yakuza
, also known as , are members of traditional organized crime syndicates in Japan. The Japanese police, and media by request of the police, call them bōryokudan , literally "violence group", while the yakuza call themselves "ninkyō dantai" , "chivalrous organizations". The yakuza are notoriously...
bosses gained him entrée into the Higashi Nakano
Nakano
-People:Nakano is also a Japanese family name.* Ayako Nakano* Chikayo Nakano* Daisuke Nakano* George Nakano* Hiroko Nakano* Hiroyuki Nakano* Junya Nakano* Kansei Nakano* Kazuo Nakano* Keiko Nakano* Koichi Nakano* Kiyoshi Nakano* Kumiko Nakano...
wing of Tokyo’s largest criminal gang, the Sumiyoshi-kai
Sumiyoshi-kai
The , sometimes referred to as the , is the second-largest yakuza group in Japan with an estimated 20,000 members.The Sumiyoshi-kai is a confederation of smaller gangs. Its current sosai, or president, is Shigeo Nishiguchi. Structurally, the Sumiyoshi-kai differs from its main rival, the...
, where he became an “informal advisor.” He worked for Encyclopaedia Britannica Japan as an editor until 1972, whereupon he moved to New York City and wrote his first book, The Chrysanthemum and the Bat. He later worked for Time-Life
Time-Life
Time–Life is a creator and direct marketer of books, music, video/DVD, and multimedia products. Its products are sold throughout North America, Europe, Australia, and Asia through television, print, retail, the Internet, telemarketing, and direct sales....
in Tokyo for a year before becoming a free-lance author.
Writing career
Whiting's works on baseball include The Chrysanthemum and the Bat: The Game Japanese Play (Dodd, Mead, N.Y. 1977), You Gotta Have Wa (1989 Macmillan, 1990, 2009 Vintage Departures), Slugging It Out In Japan: An American Major Leaguer in the Tokyo Outfield (1991), and The Meaning of Ichiro: The New Wave from Japan and the Transformation of Our National Pastime (2004), all of which have been published in both the English and Japanese languages.You Gotta Have Wa is a work about Japanese society as seen through their adopted sport of baseball. It was a Book of the Month Club
Book of the Month Club
The Book of the Month Club is a United States mail-order book sales club that offers a new book each month to customers.The Book of the Month Club is part of a larger company that runs many book clubs in the United States and Canada. It was formerly the flagship club of Book-of-the-Month Club, Inc...
selection, a Casey Award finalist and a Pulitzer Prize
Pulitzer Prize
The Pulitzer Prize is a U.S. award for achievements in newspaper and online journalism, literature and musical composition. It was established by American publisher Joseph Pulitzer and is administered by Columbia University in New York City...
nominee. Though considered an excellent book on baseball (the San Francisco Chronicle
San Francisco Chronicle
thumb|right|upright|The Chronicle Building following the [[1906 San Francisco earthquake|1906 earthquake]] and fireThe San Francisco Chronicle is a newspaper serving primarily the San Francisco Bay Area of the U.S. state of California, but distributed throughout Northern and Central California,...
described it as "one of the best-written sports books ever"), like most of Whiting's sports writing it examines much larger issues concerning Japan as well. David Halberstam
David Halberstam
David Halberstam was an American Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, author and historian, known for his early work on the Vietnam War, his work on politics, history, the Civil Rights Movement, business, media, American culture, and his later sports journalism.-Early life and education:Halberstam...
stated that "What you read (in You Gotta Have Wa) is applicable to almost every other dimension of American-Japanese relations." The book has been required reading in the Japanese Studies departments of many American universities, as well as at the Japan Desk in the U.S. State Department. It sold 125,000 copies in hardcover and trade paperback and is in its 23rd printing. It was published in Japanese by Kadokawa under the title Wa Wo Motte Nihon To Nasu. It sold 200,000 copies in hardcover and paperback editions. In September 1991 it appeared in a list of the best non-fiction books ever published in Japan, compiled by Hon No Hanasahi magazine. It has sold over 400,000 copies world wide, including Chinese and Korean editions.
The Chrysanthemum and the Bat was chosen by TIME
Time
Time is a part of the measuring system used to sequence events, to compare the durations of events and the intervals between them, and to quantify rates of change such as the motions of objects....
Magazine editorial staff as the best sports book of the year. Published in Japanese by Simul Publishing Company, as Kiku to Batto it was a best-seller and was reissued in 2005 by Hayakawa Shoten Publishing.
Warren Cromartie
Warren Cromartie
Warren Livingston Cromartie is a retired American baseball player.-Baseball career:Warren Cromartie debuted with the Montreal Expos of the Major Leagues on September 6, 1974 after being picked 6th in the 1973 amateur draft...
's autobiography, Slugging It Out In Japan (Kodansha International, Tokyo 1991), was co-authored by Whiting. The book was the recipient of a New York Public Library
New York Public Library
The New York Public Library is the largest public library in North America and is one of the United States' most significant research libraries...
award for educational merit. Published in Japanese by Kodansha International, as Saraba Samurai Yakyu, it sold 190,000 copies in hardcover.
The Meaning of Ichiro, was published by Warner Books in 2004, and excerpted in Sports Illustrated. It sold 25,000 copies. The Japanese translation, Ichiro Kakumei was published by Hayakawa Shoten and has made many best-seller lists. A revised and updated edition of The Meaning of Ichiro, entitled The Samurai Way of Baseball, was published in trade-paperback form by Warner Books in April, 2005.
Whiting’s most popular work is the nonfiction Tokyo Underworld: The Fast Times and Hard Life of an American Gangster in Japan (Pantheon, N.Y. 1999, Vintage Departures, 2000), an account of organized crime in Japan and the corrupt side of U.S.-Japan relations. Mario Puzo
Mario Puzo
Mario Gianluigi Puzo was an American author and screenwriter, known for his novels about the Mafia, including The Godfather , which he later co-adapted into a film by Francis Ford Coppola...
described the book as "a fascinating look at...fascinating people who show how democracy advances hand in hand with crime in Japan." It was a best-seller on many lists in Tokyo when published in translated form by Kadokawa, selling over 300,000 copies in hardcover and paperback in Japan alone. It is currently being developed into a series by HBO. Martin Scorsese
Martin Scorsese
Martin Charles Scorsese is an American film director, screenwriter, producer, actor, and film historian. In 1990 he founded The Film Foundation, a nonprofit organization dedicated to film preservation, and in 2007 he founded the World Cinema Foundation...
is slated to direct the pilot, with Harry Ufland serving as executive producer. Whiting is a consultant on the project.
A sequel to Tokyo Underworld, Tokyo Outsiders - about foreign criminals in the Japanese underworld - is in the works.
Whiting has also written 20 books in Japanese, mostly collections of the columns and articles he has written. His works have sold an aggregate of nearly two million copies in North America and Japan combined. In addition, he has authored a Manga
Manga
Manga is the Japanese word for "comics" and consists of comics and print cartoons . In the West, the term "manga" has been appropriated to refer specifically to comics created in Japan, or by Japanese authors, in the Japanese language and conforming to the style developed in Japan in the late 19th...
series about a gaijin
Gaijin
is a Japanese word meaning "non-Japanese", or "alien". This word is a short form of gaikokujin , which literally means "person from outside of the country". The word is composed of two kanji: , meaning "outside"; and , meaning "person". Thus, the word technically means "outsider"...
(foreign) ballplayer in Japan, entitled Reggie, and published by Kodansha Comic Morning that sold 750,000 copies in graphic novel form.
His latest work is a biography of the Japanese pitcher, Hideo Nomo
Hideo Nomo
is a former right-handed pitcher in Nippon Professional Baseball and Major League Baseball from Japan. He achieved early success in Japan, where he played with the Kintetsu Buffaloes from to...
, who played in the US Major League
Major League Baseball
Major League Baseball is the highest level of professional baseball in the United States and Canada, consisting of teams that play in the National League and the American League...
s and was National League
National League
The National League of Professional Baseball Clubs, known simply as the National League , is the older of two leagues constituting Major League Baseball, and the world's oldest extant professional team sports league. Founded on February 2, 1876, to replace the National Association of Professional...
Rookie of the Year
Rookie of the Year award
K-League Rookie of the Year Award is newly established in 1985 that third season in K-League. Many star players were received this award such as Lee Dong-Gook, Lee Chun-Soo, and so on.- Winners :- See also:* K-League MVP Award...
in 1995. The book was published in 2011 by PHP in Japanese. (Whiting has publicly praised Nomo, asserting that the history of Japanese baseball can be split up into “pre-Nomo and post-Nomo” eras.)
In addition to his books, Whiting has been published in numerous periodicals, such as The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
, The Smithsonian, Sports Illustrated
Sports Illustrated
Sports Illustrated is an American sports media company owned by media conglomerate Time Warner. Its self titled magazine has over 3.5 million subscribers and is read by 23 million adults each week, including over 18 million men. It was the first magazine with circulation over one million to win the...
, Newsweek
Newsweek
Newsweek is an American weekly news magazine published in New York City. It is distributed throughout the United States and internationally. It is the second-largest news weekly magazine in the U.S., having trailed Time in circulation and advertising revenue for most of its existence...
, TIME
Time
Time is a part of the measuring system used to sequence events, to compare the durations of events and the intervals between them, and to quantify rates of change such as the motions of objects....
, and US News and World Report. He is also one of very few Westerners to write regular columns in the Japanese press. From 1979-1985, he was a columnist for the Japanese language Daily Sports. From 1988 to 1992, he wrote a weekly column for the popular magazine Shukan Asahi. From 1990-1993, he was a reporter/commentator for News Station, the top-rated news program in Japan. Since 2007, he has written a weekly column for Yukan Fuji, a major evening daily newspaper in Japan. He has published numerous articles in Japan and has written extensively on current issues impacting both Nippon Professional Baseball and Major League Baseball
Major League Baseball
Major League Baseball is the highest level of professional baseball in the United States and Canada, consisting of teams that play in the National League and the American League...
, including a four-part series, which was published in the Japan Times, followed by an in-depth series on Sadaharu Oh
Sadaharu Oh
Sadaharu Oh, or Wang Chenchih , is a retired Japanese-Taiwanese baseball player and manager. He batted and threw left-handed and primarily played first base. Oh, who was born in Sumida, Tokyo the son of a Taiwanese father and a Japanese mother, had originally signed with the powerhouse Yomiuri...
, Trey Hillman
Trey Hillman
Thomas Brad "Trey" Hillman is the current bench coach for the Los Angeles Dodgers. He has previously been the manager of both the Hokkaido Nippon Ham Fighters in Japan's Pacific League and the Kansas City Royals in the American League.-Playing career:Hillman signed with the Cleveland Indians in...
, Bobby Valentine
Bobby Valentine
Robert John "Bobby V" Valentine is an American professional baseball manager and former player who is currently the manager of the Boston Red Sox. He previously managed the Texas Rangers and New York Mets as well as the Chiba Lotte Marines in Japan...
and Hideo Nomo
Hideo Nomo
is a former right-handed pitcher in Nippon Professional Baseball and Major League Baseball from Japan. He achieved early success in Japan, where he played with the Kintetsu Buffaloes from to...
for the same paper.
In October, 2011, he wrote a three-part series in The Japan Times on the talented, but troubled, Japanese pitcher Hideki Irabu
Hideki Irabu
was a professional baseball player of Okinawan and American mixed ancestry. He played professionally in both Japan and the United States.-Early life:...
, who had died in California two months earlier of an apparent suicide.
In a shifting era of globalization, Whiting is one of the few sports experts to explore the transnational flows of athletics. In his works he not only examines how different cultures have influenced the game of baseball, but how the game of baseball has helped influence and shape cultural identity across the globe. He is also an insightful commentator on the influence of the Yakuza on the Japanese power structure and the dark side of Japanese-American relations since the end of the Second World War.
Other professional activities
In addition to his work as a writer, Whiting has delivered speeches at Wharton School of the University of PennsylvaniaWharton School of the University of Pennsylvania
The Wharton School is the business school of the University of Pennsylvania, an Ivy League university in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Wharton was the world’s first collegiate business school and the first business school in the United States...
, Stanford, Temple University
Temple University
Temple University is a comprehensive public research university in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. Originally founded in 1884 by Dr. Russell Conwell, Temple University is among the nation's largest providers of professional education and prepares the largest body of professional...
, Occidental College
Occidental College
Occidental College is a private, coeducational liberal arts college located in the Eagle Rock neighborhood of Los Angeles, California. Founded in 1887, Occidental College, or "Oxy" as it is called by students and alumni, is one of the oldest liberal arts colleges on the West Coast...
, Michigan State University
Michigan State University
Michigan State University is a public research university in East Lansing, Michigan, USA. Founded in 1855, it was the pioneer land-grant institution and served as a model for future land-grant colleges in the United States under the 1862 Morrill Act.MSU pioneered the studies of packaging,...
, the International House of Japan, the American Chamber of Commerce in Japan, CLSA, and the Japan Society of New York, among other institutions. He has has also appeared in numerous documentaries about Japan and on such shows as CNN's Larry King Live
Larry King Live
Larry King Live is an American talk show hosted by Larry King on CNN from 1985 to 2010. It was CNN's most watched and longest-running program, with over one million viewers nightly....
, the PBS Macneil-Lehrer News Hour, Nightline
Nightline
Nightline, or ABC News Nightline is a late-night news program broadcast by ABC in the United States, and has a franchised formula to other networks and stations elsewhere in the world. It airs weeknights, usually for 31 minutes. Created by Roone Arledge, the program featured Ted Koppel as its main...
, ESPN's Sports Central, HBO's RealSports and All Things Considered
All Things Considered
All Things Considered is the flagship news program on the American network National Public Radio. It was the first news program on NPR, and is broadcast live worldwide through several outlets...
.
Family
Whiting is married to Machiko Kondo, who recently retired as an officer for the United Nations High Commissioner for RefugeesUnited Nations High Commissioner for Refugees
The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees , also known as The UN Refugee Agency is a United Nations agency mandated to protect and support refugees at the request of a government or the UN itself and assists in their voluntary repatriation, local integration or resettlement to...
(UNHCR). In her 25 year career she was posted in Geneva, Mogadishu, Karachi, Tan Jung Pinang and Dhaka, among other locations. Her last post, in Stockholm, was as Representative for Scandinavia, an ambassador-level position.