Kota Kato

L’eleganza, nella sua accezione più nobile che coinvolge ogni atto e pensiero dell’individuo, è in grado di conquistare il favore delle persone assai più della bellezza.
Secondo la giapponese Emiko Katō questa forma di eleganza si può acquisire e coltivare.
Il suo L’eleganza dell’anima è un manuale di formazione che insegna a esprimere garbo e delicatezza nel vestire, nel conversare e nel relazionarsi con gli altri in ogni occasione della vita. Arricchito da deliziosi disegni, è una lettura inusuale per migliorare sé stessi e i propri rapporti col mondo.

The protagonist Chujiro, who possesses many attractive qualities, is a victim of unkind circumstances: his mother abandoned him as a child, so he had no choice but to live outside society. Even so, he grows up determined to reunite with her. Worried that she might be living in misery, he saves his money to help, only to find that she has married into wealth and social position and has no intention of seeing her outcast yakuza son…

Beautifilly filmed in widescreen black & white, Bakumatsu zankoku monogatari is known by sundry English titles. The subtitled 35 mm print I saw called it The Executioners but the current subtitled DVD Brutal Story at the End of the Tokugawa Shogunate comes closer to an accurate translation of the Japanese title. It's also known as Cruel Story of the Shogunate's Downfall or simply as A Cruel Story.
This is a tale of Shinsen-gumi, the anti-royalist samurai organization of Kyoto about whom many films have been made, & many histories & novels written, many manga & anime drawn. They rose in power just before the Meiji Restoration as the Tokugawa period was coming to a close, & their goal was to preserve the Tokugawa government at any cost.