The Japanese language has set phrases for hundreds of situations. It is exactly prescribed what you should say when giving a gift ("This is a boring thing, but..."), when welcoming someone back from a trip, when asking someone to do you a favor, and even when asking for a loan to be repaid. Brought up relying on this never-fail stock of set phrases, Japanese find themselves at sea when they learn that there are few equivalent set phrases in other languages and that, in fact, they are expected to display their inner feelings by expressing themselves in a way that is utterly personal. This is why Japanese are so confounded by the western cocktail party, where conversation is a matter of witty, off-the-cuff repartee with people you've probably never met before - a Japanese nightmare. The ideal Japanese conversational exchange, by contrast, is with a next-door neighbor, with whom there has been exactly the same exchange of pleasantries, word for word, every day for the past twenty years.

This little book, originally compiled by Sanseido for Japanese readers as kind of a guide to verbal etiquette, has been put into English with helpful commentary on the wider implications of the social situations which call for these phrases. When presenting one's condolences, for example, you are advised to speak in the "hushed, practically inaudible tones deemed appropriate to the unspeakably painful event being observed." You are also guided through the timing of bowing.

The only problem with a book like this is that if you give out with one of these deeply Japanese set phrases, like Goteicho na omimai o itadaki, arigato gozaimasu - which is here translated "You were very kind to come and see me. Thank you." it will be assumed that your ability to keep your end up in a polite Japanese conversation is well-nigh perfect, so there may be a slight disappointment if you thereafter lapse into your own informal, amusingly mangled version of this sweet, infinitely subtle language.

Reviewed by Sandor Belfry

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