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Alan Booth
Alan Booth
Alan Booth
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Alan Booth (5 December 1946 – 24 January 1993)[1] was an English writer who wrote two books about his journeys on foot through the Japanese countryside. The better-known of the two, The Roads to Sata, published in 1985, is about his travels in 1977 from Cape Sōya, the northern tip of Hokkaidō, to Cape Sata, the southern tip of Kyūshū. The second, Looking for the Lost, was published posthumously in 1995. Booth also wrote a guidebook to Japan, as well as numerous articles on Japan and other topics.

Key Information

Biography

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Booth was born in Leytonstone, London,[2][3] and studied drama at Leyton County High School for Boys. While he was still at school he formed and directed the Leyton Youth Theatre Company, for which Leyton Borough Council provided a grant and free use of public buildings for performances, including productions of Hamlet and Othello.

Booth studied drama at the University of Birmingham, where he became a prominent member of its Guild Theatre Group (GTG). Among the plays he directed for the GTG were Hamlet (First Quarto), done in Booth's version of Noh style, and his own translation of Racine's Phèdre, set in a samurai milieu. He also directed an open-air production of Marlowe's Faustus in Cannon Hill Park. He was a regular contributor to Mermaid, the university's magazine of students' verse, and won the Birmingham Post's Annual Poetry Prize.

In 1970 Booth moved to Japan to study Noh theatre, but soon began writing. For the next 20 years he lived in Tokyo and worked for the Macmillan Press, and as a film reviewer for the Asahi Evening News. He also appeared in the BBC Learning Zone programme Japanese Language and People, episode 6, "On the Road", in which he was interviewed about aspects of life in Japan.[4]

Alan Booth died of colon cancer in 1993, leaving his second wife, Su-chzeng Ong, and their daughter, actress Mirai Booth-Ong.

References

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Alan Booth

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Alan Booth (5 December 1946 – 24 January 1993) was a British travel writer known for his perceptive and unpretentious accounts of long-distance journeys on foot through rural Japan, capturing the nuances of everyday life, culture, and social realities in the late 20th century. Born in London on 5 December 1946, Booth moved to Japan in 1970 initially to study Noh theater after studying drama at the University of Birmingham, but his interests shifted as he settled into expatriate life there. He remained in Japan for more than two decades, working as a film reviewer for the Asahi Evening News starting in 1979 and contributing essays on travel, folklore, festivals, and other topics to English-language publications such as Winds and Tokyo Journal. His writing is celebrated for its honesty, intelligence, and keen observation, earning him recognition as one of the finest English-language chroniclers of Japanese society. Booth's most notable works are The Roads to Sata and Looking for the Lost, which draw on his extensive travels to offer insightful portraits of Japan's rural landscapes and vanishing traditions. He died from cancer on 24 January 1993 in Tokyo at the age of 46, after which posthumous collections of his writings further highlighted his contributions to travel literature and commentary on Japan.

Early life

Birth and background

Alan Booth was born in London in 1946. He studied drama at the University of Birmingham before moving to Japan in 1970 to study Noh theater.

Career

After arriving in Japan in 1970 initially to study Noh theater, Alan Booth's interests shifted away from theater studies. He settled in Tokyo and developed a career in writing and journalism focused on Japanese culture, society, and cinema. Booth worked for Macmillan Press in Tokyo. From 1979, he served as a film reviewer for the English-language Asahi Evening News, a position he held for more than a decade. He reviewed a wide range of Japanese films during the 1980s, including notable works such as Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence, The Grave of the Fireflies, Ran, Akira, and others. He also contributed essays and articles on travel, folklore, festivals, folksongs, politics, Japanese cinema, and rural life to publications including the Japan Airlines inflight magazine Winds and Tokyo Journal. His writing extended to theater reviews and longer-form pieces, such as accounts of walking journeys in regions like Shikoku ("Roads Out of Time"), and detailed essays on specific Japanese festivals (e.g., Sōma Nomaoi, Sanja Matsuri, Oga Namahage, Osorezan Dai-Matsuri) and folk songs, including an interview with musician Takahashi Chikuzan. Booth's most prominent contributions are his travel books The Roads to Sata (1985), detailing a 2,000-mile walk across Japan in 1977, and Looking for the Lost (published posthumously in 1995), which explore rural landscapes and vanishing traditions. After his death in 1993, a posthumous anthology This Great Stage of Fools (2018) collected his uncollected writings, including film and theater reviews, festival essays, and personal reflections on living with cancer.

Filmography

Alan Booth is not known to have any credits as a director, cinematographer, or producer in film or documentaries. The cited sources (including IMDb nm0095633 and NFB credits for The Northern Lights and The Emerging North) refer to a different individual, a Canadian filmmaker born in 1951. The British travel writer Alan Booth (1946–1993) worked as a film reviewer but has no documented filmmaking credits.

Personal life and later years

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