From: "Frank Conlon" <conlon@U.WASHINGTON.EDU>
To: <H-ASIA@H-NET.MSU.EDU>
Sent: Wednesday, July 27, 2011 3:09 PM
Subject: H-ASIA: Professor David G. Goodman
> H-ASIA
> July 27, 2011
>
> David G. Goodman
>
> (x-post H-Japan)
> ************************************************************************
> From: Robert Tierney <rtierney@illinois.edu>
> Subject: Death of David G. Goodman
>
> Please circulate this sad announcement sent by Brian Ruppert, Chair of the
> East Asian Languages and Cultures Department, University of Illinois,
> Urbana Champaign
>
> Dear Colleagues,
>
> David G. Goodman, our good friend and colleague and a leader in the field
> of Japanese theatre and cultural criticism, died on Monday, July 25, 2011,
> in Urbana, Illinois. Professor Goodman was born and raised in Racine,
> Wisconsin, going on to receive a B.A. from Yale University (cum laude,
> 1969) and an M.A. and Ph.D. (1982) from Cornell University. He leaves
> behind his wife Kazuko, his daughter Yael, and his son Kai. He was 65
> years of age. The funeral will be held Wednesday, July 27, 2011, at 2PM
> at Sinai Temple, Champaign, Illinois, to be followed by a meal of
> condolence at the family home, 1809 Moraine Drive, Champaign.
>
> David Goodman was a pioneering scholar in the study of modern Japanese
> theatre, especially of avant-garde theater in post-war Japan, and lived in
> Japan for more than ten years (1960s-70s). David was a towering figure in
> his field, not only translating major works of modern Japanese literature,
> drama, and poetry and authoring several scholarly monographs in English,
> but also writing multiple original works in Japanese. His first book was
> a translation of plays about experiences of the atomic bombs in Japan,
> After Apocalypse: Four Japanese Plays of Hiroshima and Nagasaki (1986),
> which was followed soon after by Japanese Drama and Culture in the 1960s:
> The Return of the Gods (1988), in which he explored a series of
> avant-garde plays to outline the re-appropriation of traditional cultural
> symbols in Japanese theatre. The latter work has had a lasting
> contribution on our understanding of the recovery of tradition and ongoing
> explorations of possibilities for renewal in performance modes and other
> dynamic aspects of Japanese culture today. In all, David Goodman published
> seven books in English.
>
> Anyone who knew Professor Goodman understood that he had an extremely
> vibrant mind and attempted, in both his research and the classroom, to
> bridge between the theatre, audience, and the larger population, on the
> one hand, and to bring multiple cultures into mutual conversation on the
> other. Thus he not only wrote seminal cultural critiques such as Jews in
> the Japanese Mind: The History and Uses of a Cultural Stereotype (1995,
> 2000), but also taught courses in which he and his students examined the
> inter-cultural relationship between Japanese, Jewish, and American
> culture. Indeed, his colleagues recognized that David Goodman was a
> master pedagogue, and graduate students and undergraduates regularly spoke
> of their remarkable impressions of his courses. David also established,
> together with his brother, the Rita & Arnold Goodman Fellowship for
> Improvement of Women's Lives & Gender Equality in the Developing World,
> which has annually helped graduate students at the University of Illinois
> studying issues related to women, gender, and development.
>
> His four major books written in Japanese flowed out of his great
> fascination with theses developing cultures. These included works such as
> including Israel: Voices and Faces (1979) and Hashiru (Running, 1989.
> Among many honors, he received the Translation Center Award (from Columbia
> University), for his Long, Long Autumn Nights: Selected Poems of Oguma
> Hideo, 1901-1940. He has also received NEH and Fulbright research grants.
> He is known to the Japanese public, being listed in the two major Japanese
> dictionaries of prominent public figures (Asahi jinbutsu jiten, Gendai
> jinbutsu jiten). At the time of his death, David was also working on a
> book entitled Death-Defying Acts: Essays Toward a History of Modern
> Japanese Drama.
>
> David's broad vision led him recently to establish IJPAN (the Illinois
> Japan Performing Arts Network), which brings together leading technologies
> and the Japanese arts to provide for live-streaming performances. He
> received a major grant from the Japan Foundation's Center for Global
> Partnership for this project, which has just completed its first year.
> David had great success bringing together audiences in Japan, NY (Japan
> Society), and the University of Illinois (in both classrooms and the
> Krannert Center for the Performing Arts), to watch and interact with
> actors and playwrights in genres ranging from the noh theatre to
> contemporary Japanese drama. His energy and creativity will be sorely
> missed by all of us in his Department (EALC) and in the College of Liberal
> Arts and Sciences at the University of Illinois, as well as all of those
> blessed by his knowledge, friendship and scholarly collaboration.
>
> David's legacy in his field and at the University of Illinois will live
> on, and those who knew him personally will always feel the impact of his
> friendship and intellect. David Goodman was a gentleman. All of us who
> knew him will recall his warmth, sense of humor, breadth of knowledge,
> intensity when he felt strongly about something, and his wise counsel. A
> memorial event commemorating David's life and work will be organized in
> the coming Fall.
>
>
> Brian Ruppert
> Head, Department of East Asian Languages & Cultures
> Department of Religion
> University of Illinois
>
> (217) 244-1432
>
> ******************************************************************
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