Plans to Translate Princess Bio Canceled

Japan's Crown Princess Masako waves as she arrives at Imperial Palace in Tokyo to see Emperor Akihito and Empress Michiko in this Dec. 9, 2006 file photo. Japanese publisher said Friday, Feb. 16, 2007 it has decided to scrap a translation of a new book on Japan's royal family titled "Princess Masako: Prisoner of the Chrysanthemum Throne," that has sparked protests from Japan's government. (AP Photo/Koji Sasahara, File) (Koji Sasahara - AP)

TOKYO -- A Japanese publisher said Friday it has canceled plans to publish a new book on Crown Princess Masako, a tartly worded biography that claims to lift the veil of secrecy shrouding Japan's royal family and has drawn indignant protests from Japan's government.

"Princess Masako: Prisoner of the Chrysanthemum Throne," written by Australian journalist Ben Hills, was released by Random House in December and is billed on the cover as "the tragic, true story" of the 43-year-old princess, a Harvard graduate who abandoned a diplomatic career to marry royalty. The book describes her as a virtual captive of the imperial palace who has been bullied by bureaucrats into depression.

"Masako has become a prisoner of the institution she tried to reform, her health broken by the demands placed on her _ suicide has been mentioned, divorce is openly discussed, the prince may even renounce his claim to the throne," Hills wrote in the preface.

Hills said in an e-mail to The Associated Press on Saturday that he was "very surprised and disappointed" by publishing house Kodansha Ltd.'s decision. "We regard this as a blatant attack on freedom of speech."

He hoped to publish the book through another publisher with "the courage," Hills said. "The Japanese people have the right to know what is going in their royal family."

Japan's Imperial Household Agency and its Foreign Ministry had demanded an apology from the author for "disrespectful descriptions, distortions of facts and judgmental assertions with audacious conjectures and coarse logic." But government officials declined to cite most of the passages they found problematic. The government also protested to Random House in Sydney.

Criticizing the emperor was regarded as serious crime in the first half of the 20th century. There is still a strong tradition in Japan of respect for the royal family, who are shielded from view by secretive palace officials.

The gentle treatment of Japan's cloistered monarchy in the media is in sharp contrast with the full-bore coverage that afflicts Britain's royalty, where the press corps seems to delight in chronicling regal misbehavior and may scold or mock the crown.

Hills' book details Masako's life in the palace, during which she has come under grinding pressure to produce a male heir to the throne. She and Crown Prince Naruhito were married in 1993. After suffering a miscarriage in 1999, she had a daughter, Aiko, in 2001.

Hills said earlier this week that he and Random House stand by the accuracy of the book, had no intention of apologizing and that the government was trying to pressure Kodansha to shelve the Japanese version of the book.

Kazunobu Kakishima, editor at Kodansha, denied the company was scrapping the Japanese translation because of the government's protest. The decision, he said, came after Hills refused to acknowledge making factual errors during an interview with Japanese television earlier Friday.

"We have come to the conclusion that it is impossible to maintain trustworthy relations with the author and thus we were forced to cancel the book," he said.

Kakishima said a "substantial number of factual errors" have been corrected through fact-checking and meetings with interviewees quoted in the book. Kakishima declined to describe any specific errors, citing privacy.

Hills, Kakishima said, had acknowledged the errors in discussions with Kodansha, approved corrections in a translated draft and even thanked the publisher for the changes.

A Foreign Ministry official, speaking on condition of anonymity as required by protocol, denied contacting the Kodansha publishing house over the book but refused to comment on the cancellation.

Palace officials were not immediately available for comment late Friday.

Emperor Akihito's chamberlain, Makoto Watanabe, wrote to Hills earlier this month that a veteran palace reporter told him "almost every page seems to contain an error." In one example, Watanabe said, the book erroneously called the Emperor's duties "all undemanding formal appearances at uncontroversial events." Another passage, Watanabe said, incorrectly said Japanese royals would be unlikely to take up a cause as Princess Diana did with the Leprosy Mission.