ABSTRACT
MY AIM HERE is to analyse the use made of the crucial and highly exceptional position of the Emperor in the Japanese cultural tradition as a national symbol for the purposes of public debate during the period 1931–45, i.e. from the outbreak of the Manchurian Incident to the Japanese surrender, and to determine in what way it reflected the various aspirations, hopes and expectations that prevailed at the time. The material for this, which is part of a more extensive piece of research in terms both of time-scale and sources, has been obtained from two English-language newspapers owned by the Japanese, the Japan Times & Mail (JT & M), known from 1943 onwards as the Nippon Times (NT) and the Osaka Mainichi & Tokyo Nichi Nichi (OM & TNN), or simply the Mainichi after 1943. The points in time to be examined are those when the Emperor, either his person, the office or the dynasty, was particularly prominent in the news, principally the Emperor’s birthday, Tenchō-setsu, 29 April, and Japan’s mythological Foundation Day, Kigen-setsu (kenkokusai), 11 February, dating from 660 BC.
