The Only Woman in the Room : A Memoir of Japan, Human Rights, and the Arts

In 1946, at age twenty-two, Beate Sirota Gordon helped to draft the new postwar Japanese Constitution. __The Only Woman in the Room__ chronicles how a daughter of Russian Jews became the youngest woman to aid in the rushed, secret drafting of a constitution; how she almost single-handedly ensured that it would establish the rights of Japanese women; and how, as a fluent speaker of Japanese and the only woman in the room, she assisted the American negotiators as they worked to persuade the Japanese to accept the new charter. Sirota was born in Vienna, but in 1929 her family moved to Japan so that her father, a noted pianist, could teach, and she grew up speaking German, English, and Japanese. Russian, French, Italian, Latin, and Hebrew followed, and at fifteen Sirota was sent to complete her education at Mills College in California. The formal declaration of World War II cut Gordon off from her parents, and she supported herself by working for a CBS listening post in San Francisco that would eventually become part of the FCC. Translating was one of Sirota’s many talents, and when the war ended, she was sent to Japan as a language expert to help the American occupation forces. When General MacArthur suddenly created a team that included Sirota to draft the new Japanese Constitution, he gave them just eight days to accomplish the task. Colonel Roest said to Beate Sirota, “You’re a woman, why don’t you write the women’s rights section?”; and she seized the opportunity to write into law guarantees of equality unparalleled in the US Constitution to this day. But this was only one episode in an extraordinary life, and when Gordon died in December 2012, words of grief and praise poured from artists, humanitarians, and thinkers the world over. Illustrated with forty-seven photographs, __The Only Woman in the Room__ captures two cultures at a critical moment in history and recounts, after a fifty-year silence, a life lived with purpose and courage. This edition contains a new afterword by Nicole A. Gordon and an elegy by Geoffrey Paul Gordon. "This engaging, modest account recalls the life and times of a woman who made significant contributions to both Japanese and American cultures." — Publishers Weekly In 1946, at age twenty-two, Beate Sirota Gordon helped to draft the new postwar Japanese Constitution. The Only Woman in the Room chronicles how a daughter of Russian Jews became the youngest woman to aid in the rushed, secret drafting of a constitution; how she almost single-handedly ensured that it would establish the rights of Japanese women; and how, as a fluent speaker of Japanese and the only woman in the room, she assisted the American negotiators as they worked to persuade the Japanese to accept the new charter. Sirota was born in Vienna, but in 1929 her family moved to Japan so that her father, a noted pianist, could teach, and she grew up speaking German, English, and Japanese. Russian, French, Italian, Latin, and Hebrew followed, and at fifteen Sirota was sent to complete her education at Mills College in California. Translating was one of Sirota's many talents, and when World War II ended, she was sent to Japan as a language expert to help the American occupation forces. When General MacArthur suddenly created a team that included Sirota to draft the new Japanese Constitution, he gave them just eight days to accomplish the task, and she seized the opportunity to write into law guarantees of equality unparalleled in the US Constitution to this day. But this was only one episode in an extraordinary life, and The Only Woman in the Room recounts, after a fifty-year silence, a life lived with purpose and courage. A vivid and very personal account of one woman's life in Europe, prewar Japan, and the United States. As the daughter of renowned Russian pianist Leo Sirota, Beate Gordon grew up in the cosmopolitan world of the concert tour, then settled in Japan in the 1930s. During World War II, while her parents remained in Japan under secret service surveillance, Gordon lived alone in the United States, monitoring Tokyo Radio in five languages for the government and later writing radio propaganda. She recounts her dramatic reunion with her parents in Tokyo, where she worked in General MacArthur's headquarters, and evokes the postwar suffering in defeated Japan. Her intimate description of helping draft the women's rights section of Japan's new constitution is an astonishing record of history in the making. On returning to the States in 1947, Mrs. Gordon became a cultural impresario, bringing artists, dancers, writers, and musicians from all over to the United States. Her adventures in search of performing artists in such remote and exotic places as Mongolia, Tibet, India, and Indonesia make for hilarious and sometimes hair-raising anecdotes Beate Sirota Gordon was born in Vienna, but in 1929 her family moved to Japan so that her father, a noted pianist, could teach, and she grew up speaking German, English, and Japanese. In 1946, at age twenty-two, she helped to draft the new postwar Japanese constitution. This title chronicles the unlikely string of events that led her to that role.