Trinitron color TV, the Walkman, the CD. Sony, the company responsible for these and countless other products, has set the standard for consumer electronics. The Japanese company has also become the brand name best known and most highly esteemed by Americans. But how much do we really know about Sony, the company? For the first time in any language, John Nathan takes us behind the scenes at Sony in his groundbreaking book, SONY: The Private Life (Houghton Mifflin; Sept. 28, 1999). Nathan gives us a rare inside look at the makings and workings of this modern business wonder. He portrays the remarkable individuals who built the company as well as the interpersonal relationships that have shaped it.
John Nathan has been engaged with Japan for forty years and has been accused more than once of thinking like a Japanese. In 1963, he entered the Department of Japanese Literature and linguistics as the first American to be admitted as a regular student at Tokyo University. In 1964, he published the first of many translations for Yukio Mishima's The Sailor Who Fell From Grace with the Sea. In 1967, he introduced Kenzaburo Oe to Western readers with his translation of A Personal Matter. Nathan returned to Japan in 1972 to write and co-direct, with Hiroshi Teshigahara, a feature film about American deserters from Vietnam in the Japanese peace underground. In 1974, Nathan received his Ph.D. from Harvard and published, Mishima: A Biography. Thereafter, Nathan devoted himself to making films. He has since written and produced forty documentaries. In 1994, Nathan became the first Takashima Professor Japanese Cultural Studies at U.C. Santa Barbara. Currently, he teaches courses on Japanese film and literature, consults for Japanese and Asian corporations, and continues to translate Japan's Nobel Laureate in Literature for 1994, Kenzaburo Oe.
