Freethinker
Subtitle: The Autobiography of Nishimura Isaku
Contributors: Joseph Cronin (Translator)
Publisher: White Tiger Press
Published: 2010
Place of publication: Kyoto, Japan
ISBN-13: 9784434141942
Subjects: Nishimura Isaku 1884-1963
Genres: Autobiography
Description: Nishimura Isaku (1884-1963) had a long and interesting life. He became successor to the immense fortune of a family holding extensive forest in Nara prefecture. He founded his own school Bunka Gakuin in 1921. Many famous writers and artists taught there. The school was co-educational and liberal in its philosophy.

Nishimura was detained for six months in 1943 at the peak of the Pacific War and the school was closed by order of the authorities in September that same year. 'Freethinker:The Autobiography of Nishimura Isaku' is a translation of his autobiography 'Ware ni eki ari: Nishimura Isaku jiden' 「我に益あり: 西村伊作自伝」 (1960).

Joseph Cronin has lived in Japan for more than 20 years. He teaches English in Kyoto. He has also written a biography of Nishimura’s uncle Oishi Seinosuke — 'The Life of Seinosuke: Dr. Oishi and the High Treason Incident' (2007).

Preface
Translator’s Introduction
Acknowledgements
Map
Afterword
1 In the Detention Center
2 Strong Heredity
3 My Mother’s Wedding Procession
4 Female Head of the Household: My Grandmother Mon
5 My Father’s Spiritual Revolution
6 Reform of the Nishimura Family and My Father’s Banishment
7 My Childhood in Shingu
8 The Flood
9 From Shingu to Atsuta
10 Christians are Traitors! Life in Atsuta
11 In an Instant I Lose My Mother and Father
12 Recuperation at Shingu
13 A Mountain Village
14 The First Sino-Japanese War
15 Puberty
16 My Two Uncles
17 High Collar Middle School Student
18 Bicycle and Socialism
19 I Evade the Draft: the Russo-Japanese War
20 My Aunt Okuwa
21 Marriage
22 Educating My Wife
23 My Trip Around the World
24 Life as Art: In Shingu
25 Caught Up in the High Treason Incident
26 Fear of Lung Disease
27 I Escape Being Killed on the Way to Singapore
28 Designing my House: the First World War, Kindergarten
29 Pinocchio: My Children’s Education
30 My Two Younger Brothers
31 The Death of Mon
32 My Grandmother’s Inheritance and My Brothers
33 My Hobbies — Painting, Pottery, Writing
34 The Founding of Bunka Gakuin
35 The Great Kanto Earthquake
36 After the Earthquake: My Brother’s Death
37 The Pencil House
38 Ikedayama: Young Women of Marriageable Age
39 The February 26 Incident: Yuri’s Foreign Travel and Marriage
40 Sono Goes to Europe
41 Bombing: Yone’s International Marriage
42 The Pacific War: Not Cooperative With the War Spirit
43 My Prison Cell
44 Expensive Admission, Bombing Sightseeing
45 The Bombing of Yokohama: Climax of the War
46 The End of the War and Freedom
47 The American Occupation
48 The Reopening of Bunka Gakuin
49 Religion and Education: Bunka Church
50 Life and Death