Ian Ruxton

Ian (Charles) Ruxton is now (since April 2020) a professor emeritus of Kyushu Institute of Techology, commonly known as Kyutech. His books are in three main categories: 1) research into Sir Ernest Satow's life and letters 2) translations from Japanese to English 3) his family history (maternal and paternal) Ian became interested in Ernest Satow in 1993 when he learned that Satow had been forced by his boss (Sir Harry Parkes) together with A.B. Mitford to witness a judicial harakiri/seppuku (ritual suicide) carried out to settle the Kobe Incident in 1868. At that time, when Ian was living in Kobe and writing a paper on the incident, he read Satow's memoir 'A Diplomat in Japan' for the first time. He was motivated to find out more about his distinguished fellow countryman, a scholar-diplomat who had described the harakiri as a 'most decent and decorous ceremony', in stark contrast to the barbarous public hangings which had only recently been banned in Britain. Since then the life and letters of Sir Ernest Satow have become his main research and most, but not all, of his published books and ebooks are on that subject.