Larry King's Show (CNN) has ended. It is sad.

With it one era has ended: the era with the charm of the "American way of life (and thinking)". It was a charm of the middle class' life, the fruit of the economic growth after the World War Ⅱ.

Strangely enough, in today's Japan the "Beatnik" culture is acquiring a belated popularity. Kerouac's books (in Japanese translation) are selling well, although I do not know who is getting the royalty.

In spite of the economic difficulty or even out of despair the Japanese youth is aspiring for individual freedom. Then are we Japanese the successor of the post-war American culture? We do have our own version of Larry King.