Japanese Interwar Travel Writing and Ocean Liners : Passage to Europe, Korea and the South Sea

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A number of Japanese travelogues were published during the 1920s and the 1930s. They were closely related to the growing popularity of cruises, particularly the NYK (Nippon Yuken Kaisha) line sailing between Yokohama and London. Watsuji's well-known Fudo (Climate and Culture, 1935) was also largely based on his travel to Europe in 1927. Its environmental determinism, however oversimplified, articulated and endorsed the mental map of the Japanese interwar tourists to Europe, Korea and the South Sea. Watsuji's Fudo is critiqued as a discursive take on the Japanese mental map of the politicised world during this critical period of the 20th century.