"A family history of surpassing beauty and power: Ian Buruma's account of his grandparents' enduring love through the terror and separation of two world wars. During the almost six years England was at war with Nazi Germany, Winifred and Bernard Schlesinger, Ian Buruma's grandparents, and the film director John Schlesinger's parents, were, like so many others, thoroughly sundered from each other. Their only recourse was to write letters back and forth....

1984 Pantheon Books hardcover, Ian Buruma (Year Zero: A History of 1945). Lots about the difference between Japanese Buddhist aristocratic culture and Shinto popular culture--with examples from films, plays, novels, prostitution--pegged, indeed chained, to the familiar idea that "hedonism is held in check by social taboos." I.e., "what one sees on the screen, on stage and in comic-books is usually precisely the reverse of normal behavior.