SAMURAI WILLIAM: The Englishman Who Opened Japan

William Adams was an English seafarer who became the first Englishman to reach Japan. After living there or many years, Adams had taken a Japanese name, risen to the highest level in the ruling Shogun's court, an advisor to Tokugawa Ieyasu as portrayed in Richard Clavell's Shogun, and his life was just as exciting. In 1611, he wrote a letter to the merchants of London's East India Company offering his services as an adviser and interpreter. Seven adventurers were sent to Japan with orders to find and befriend Adams in the belief that he would help them gain access to a country that had sealed itself off from the rest of the world under the Edo Shogunate. Their arrival was to prove a momentous event in the history of Japan, and the Shogun suddenly found himself facing a stark choice - expel the foreigners and continue with his policy of isolation, or open his country to the world. Two thirds of the book concentrates on this English trade mission to Japan and what followed over the next decade as Adams helped the English attempt trade with the Shogun, but was confounded by cultural misunderstanding, scheming Jesuit priests, and fearsome Dutch rivals. Beautifully written and easy to read, this is a fascinating tale of an encounter between two civilisations, centred on an individual as extraordinary as the world in which he lived. Superbly researched and told with great gusto. 352pp in well illustrated softback.