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Keizo Obuchi
Keizo Obuchi , 1937-2000, Japanese politician, prime minister of Japan (1998-2000), b. Nakanojo. The son of a silk manufacturer and politician, Obuchi graduated from Waseda Univ. in 1962 and in 1963 was elected to the parliament seat once held by his late father. A member of the Liberal Democratic ...
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Liberal Democratic party
Liberal Democratic party (LDP), Japanese political party. It began as the conservative Liberal party, which, under Shigeru Yoshida , became the dominant political force in Japan following World War II. In 1955 the Liberals merged with the newly created Japan Democratic party. Retaining control of ...
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silkworm
silkworm name for the larva of various species of moths, indigenous to Asia and Africa but now domesticated and raised for silk production throughout most of the temperate zone. The culture of silkworms is called sericulture. The various species of silkworms raised today are distinguished by th...
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Junichiro Koizumi
Junichiro Koizumi , 1942-, Japanese political leader, b. Yokosuka. From a political family, he studied economics at Keio Univ. (grad. 1967). He entered politics in 1970 as a member of the Liberal Democratic party (LDP), and two years later was elected to the Diet. Koizumi served as minister of hea...
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Federated States of Micronesia
Federated States of Micronesia independent nation (2005 est. pop. 108,000), c.271 sq mi (702 sq km), an island group in the W Pacific Ocean. It comprises four states: Kosrae, Pohnpei (formerly Ponape), Chuuk (formerly Truk), and Yap . The capital, Palikir, is on the island of Pohnpei. The popu...
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Dame Muriel Spark
Dame Muriel Spark 1918-2006, Scottish novelist, b. Muriel Sarah Camberg. She lived in Edinburgh, Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe), London, New York, and Rome, and spent her last years in Tuscany. Spark's typically short, spare, and witty novels expose the pretensions, hypocrisies, and petty foibles of her c...
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Gouverneur Morris
Gouverneur Morris , 1752-1816, American political leader and diplomat, b. Morrisania, N.Y. (now part of the Bronx); a grandson of Lewis Morris (1671-1746), he was born to wealth and influence. He studied law and was admitted (1771) to the bar. At the outbreak of the American Revolution he adopted ...
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silk
silk fine, horny, translucent, yellowish fiber produced by the silkworm in making its cocoon and covered with sericin, a protein. Many varieties of silk-spinning worms and insects are known, but the silkworm of commerce is the larva of the Bombyx mori, or mulberry silkworm, and other closely rela...
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Japanese literature
Japanese literature literary works produced in the language of the islands of Japan .
See also Asian drama .
Earliest Writings
Although Japanese and Chinese are different languages, the Japanese borrowed and adapted Chinese ideographs early in the 8th cent. in order to render the...
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Japan
Japan , Jap. Nihon or Nippon, country (2005 est. pop. 127,417,000), 145,833 sq mi (377,835 sq km), occupying an archipelago off the coast of E Asia. The capital is Tokyo , which, along with neighboring Yokohama , forms the world's most populous metropolitan region.
Land
Japan proper ...
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