Problem: Chinese Influences: The Japanese were forced out of the Korean peninsula in the sixth century, but not before the Koreans had bequeathed to the Yamato court copies of the sacred images and scriptures of Chinese Buddhism. Just as Christianity introduced Mediterranean culture into northern Europe, so Buddhism brought Chinese culture into Japanese society. Throughout the seventh and eighth centuries numerous Japanese monks, scholars, and artists made the perilous trip west across the Sea of Japan to study Chinese religion, history, music, literature, and paintinglater to be brought back for further development in Japan. An outstanding figure of this time was Prince Shotoku, who in 604 developed the "Seventeen-Article Constitution," outlining a code of human conduct and the ideals of state as a basic law for the nation. He also established relations with the Sui dynasty in China. Through him, the Japanese imperial court developed Chinese patterns of centralized government, with its formal bureaucracy of eight court ranks. The Chinese calendar was used to calculate the year of Japan's foundation by counting back the 1,260 years of the Chinese cosmological cycle. Thus, 660 b.c. is still the official date celebrated nationwide. At this early stage in its history Japan was already (for the most part) only nominally ruled by the emperor. De facto power was exercised by the militarily and economically strongest family. The Sogas had promoted Buddhism as an imperially sanctioned counterweight to the native Shinto religion, along with the new Chinese customs, to weaken the influence of their more conservative rivals. But they in turn were ousted in a.d. 645 by Nakatomi Kamatari, founder of the great Fujiwara clan, which was to rule Japanese affairs for hundreds of years and provide prominent advisers to the emperor even up to the 19th century.

Question: "The religion brought to Japan from China"

Answer: "Chinese Buddhism"
Answer: yes

Problem: I had drunk too much, I confess, though we all had. Somehow, Tasha and I began to argue the worth of Solevgrad jazz, as inconsequential a topic as I can imagine. She had studied it in school, so she thought herself as an expert. I once had a neighbor who played it constantly, loudly, and badly, so I thought I knew it better. Malaquez tried to mediate, but I saw him as siding with Tasha. So, I think, did she. The subject shifted from music to Tasha's obsession with fame, undoubtedly by a leap that I made. She had no choice but to follow. (I do not remember any of this well, just now, nor do I care to. Those who are truly curious may look at the last act of "Captured Moments.") I remember suggesting, with characteristic tact, that she add Emil to her small list of major accomplishments. Malaquez glanced away, embarrassed. Tasha looked at me as if to say, "I will." She said, "I feel sorry for you, Nardo. I'll see Emil home." "Yes," I said, "Do that," and did not care what she did, or why. Emil asked, "You're all right?" I muttered something he must have interpreted as assent. They both walked up to Emil's home while I watched the scarlet moonlight ripple on distant waves. Disgusted with Tasha but more disgusted with myself, I finally realized she would not return that night and went into The Sleeping Flamingo to drink myself to sleep. She had not come home when I woke in mid-morning.

Question: "Why did Nardo think himself an expert in Solevgard jazz?"

Answer: "He played it constantly, loudly, and badly"
Answer: no

Problem: Modern criticism of Pope focuses on the man, his circumstances and motivations, prompted by theoretical perspectives such as Marxism, feminism and other forms of post-structuralism. Brean Hammond focuses on Pope's singular achievement in making an independent living solely from his writing. Laura Brown (1985) adopts a Marxist approach and accuses Pope of being an apologist for the oppressive upper classes. Hammond (1986) has studied Pope's work from the perspectives of cultural materialism and new historicism. Along Hammond's lines, Raymond Williams explains art as a set of practices influenced by broad cultural factors rather than simply the vague ideas of genius alone. Hayden Carruth, wrote that it was "Pope's rationalism and pandeism with which he wrote the greatest mock-epic in English literature." In Politics and Poetics of Transgression (1985) Peter Stallybrass and Allon White charge that Pope drew upon the low culture which he despised in order to produce his own "high art". They assert Pope was implicated in the very material he was attempting to exclude, not dissimilar to observations made in Pope's time. Colin Nicholson reads the poetry in terms of the Financial Revolution, showing how Pope responded to the corruption of the traditional 'landed interest' by the newly dominant 'moneyed interest'. Feminists have also criticised Pope's works. Ellen Pollak's The Poetics of Sexual Myth (1985) argues that Pope followed an anti-feminist tradition, that regarded women as inferior to men both intellectually and physically. Carolyn Williams contends that a crisis in the male role during the 18th century in Britain impacted Pope and his writing.

Question: "Pope is being criticized/supported for what type of work?"

Answer: "His writing"
Answer:
yes