I was captivated not only by the city, but the surroundings and I visited every temple on the tourist map. I enjoyed walking along streets with rows of shops, all selling the same article, whether bamboo baskets, stone badgers, or dusty secondhand books. Most of these shops no longer exist, victims of progress.

My main occupation in Kyoto was studying Japanese literature, but on one occasion I was asked to be a “reporter” at a conference sponsored by the Institute for Pacific Affairs. My task was to make summaries of the statements made by the distinguished people who attended. About half the participants were Japanese; the rest were Americans, Canadians and British.

The Japanese, mainly economists, were convinced that Japan’s future was dismal. They were sure that if there were any improvement in the economy, it would result in demands by workers for rises in pay, and if they obtained more money, this would make Japanese goods more expensive. They seemed to believe that cheap prices were the one factor in the sale of Japanese goods abroad.

The non-Japanese participants did their best to suggest ways for improving the Japanese economy. An American, after praising the Japanese for their skill with their hands, urged them to concentrate on making delicate objects like fishhooks. The Japanese delegates did not seem to think that their economy could be rescued with fishhooks. A British delegate proposed that the Japanese should give more attention to molecules, but no one else showed his enthusiasm for molecules as a cure for a poor economy.

The general impressions of the conference, at least to an outsider like myself, were of resignation on the part of the Japanese and friendly but unhelpful attempts by non-Japanese to cheer them. I could not detect anything positive arising from the discussions.

At no point in the discussions was Japanese culture mentioned. This was perhaps natural in a gathering of economists and politicians, but someone might have pointed out that, despite the hardships that the Japanese people had undergone, the postwar period was a golden age of Japanese culture.

The extraordinary outburst of major literature was largely the result of the freedom that had come with the end of Japanese military rule. Junichiro Tanizaki had begun publishing serially his masterpiece “The Makioka Sisters” in 1942, but after three episodes had appeared, the magazine was ordered to cease publication of the work, on the grounds that it was unsuitable to wartime Japan.

Tanizaki continued to write and privately published the first volume. The whole novel could be published only after the war ended. Kafu Nagai, an extremely popular writer, refused to publish a single work during the war, but in his diary (later published) he expressed his anger and contempt for the military. He returned to publishing in 1949. Tanizaki and Naoya Shiga, a writer worshipped by his admirers, were awarded in 1949 with the Bunka Kunsho, the highest decoration given by the government, an unmistakeable indication of the importance of literature in the postwar period.

Two of the best novels of Yasunari Kawabata, the first Japanese author to win a Nobel Prize, appeared about the time I was living in Kyoto. Younger writers who wrote in the postwar period included Osamu Dazai, Yukio Mishima, Kobo Abe and Kenzaburo Oe. I wonder if there has ever been such a group of novelists working at the same time. I was fortunate to know almost all these writers and became friends with several.

Not only literature, but drama of many varieties flourished during the postwar era. I went regularly to Osaka to see bunraku. The performers — singers, puppet operators and shamisen players — have never been equaled since then.

Kabuki and noh were performed by actors who became legendary. However, the most popular play was “Twilight Crane,” by Junji Kinoshita, based on a Japanese folk tale. This work deeply moved audiences at a time when Japanese traditions seemed to have been negated by defeat in the war; Kinoshita’s discovery of modern meanings in the old traditions made audiences understand the value of what had seemed to be a disgraced culture.

I joined a group in Kyoto of people who worked in various arts. All were eager to revive Japanese culture and the starting point of their discussions was often “Twilight Crane,” as a model of the use of Japanese traditions in new art.

Painting was stimulated by exhibitions of works from foreign museums. Some painters were attracted by their first experience of avant-garde modernism. I remember a painting created by an artist who made a toy car drive around on a canvas. Black paint leaking from the car became the painting.

This work did not inspire my admiration, but I shared in the excitement of the artist’s freedom to paint whatever he chose.

 

In 1959, after another stay in Japan, I wrote “Living Japan,” a book intended to introduce Japan to non-Japanese readers. I did not expect it to be read by Japanese, but it was translated and sold unexpectedly well. Japanese readers were intrigued to learn about life in Japan of 10 or 20 years earlier than I had described. The changes in Japan that occurred even in a short period were startling and people quickly forgot the past or remembered it with nostalgia.

Some things changed completely.

In 1959 there was not a condominium in Tokyo (or anywhere else). Almost everyone lived in private houses. Statements I made in my book on the basis of what I had seen or heard from friends came to be mistaken or even absurd because conditions changed drastically.

For example, I wrote that several Japanese employees were needed to do the work of one stenographer in an American office. I had evidence for this statement, but it soon became untrue, and I naturally could not imagine what one Japanese stenographer could now do with a computer.

In 1959 many Japanese emigrated to Brazil because there was not enough work in their country. I described the jobs that seemed to have been created to give work to surplus people.

“There are girls whose sole function is apparently to keep a cup of tea filled in front of every customer and employee; girls to stand at the entrance to shops and bow a thousand times, ten thousand times a day, with the uniform greeting, ‘Thank you for coming’; girls to pass back and forth interminably on all the trains, sweeping and selling sweets and soft drinks. …”

Such women have mostly disappeared, their jobs taken by machines. It is more pleasant to be welcomed into an elevator by a young woman than by a machine with its endlessly repeated message, but young women have now found better, less monotonous work.

Some unpleasant features of life in the Tokyo of 1959 no longer exist. I wrote about taxi drivers “They send their cars racing through the streets with all but suicidal abandon. They are not simply reckless: they are desperately anxious to pick up even one additional fare.” I do not miss the terrifying experience of kamikaze taxis.

I do miss Kyoto as it was when I first arrived in the city.

 

The beautiful houses in Gion grow fewer each year and will never be replaced. The side streets lined with Japanese-style houses are either mixed with dreary apartments or totally destroyed. Kyoto streets on a Sunday are now jammed with cars. No old lady is advised to cross a street without caution. Greed and a demand for convenience have taken the place of beauty.

But, I tell myself, the people of Kyoto are probably healthier and lead more agreeable lives than the people I knew 60 years ago. I have resolved to remember this whenever I feel like complaining about changes.