Celebrating the life of
James Morley
12th July, 1921 - 27th September, 2020Family and friends
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Japan was the 2nd country for my doctorate in comparative politics. I took Professor Morley's course on Japanese politics in 1963. I enjoyed that course very much and learned a lot. He also helped me prepare for my Ph.D. orals, but, unfortunately he was on sabbatical when I had them. He, and other scholars on Japan, influenced my teaching ...
Carol Gluck Jim, typically smiling, quizzical, and always there for you. Not sure of the date, maybe before the new IAB, so before 1971?
My memories of Jim Morley are as both a wonderful teacher and a kind, delightful person. I learned a great deal from him during my years at Columbia three decades ago and I was always delighted when our paths crossed in subsequent years. In 2004, when I was working on a study of the role of philanthropy in promoting the field of Japanese studie...
Carol Gluck Jim Morley in 2015 at Winnie Olsen's award ceremony in New York City. Winnie was the publications person at the East Asian Institute
Weatherhead East Asian Institute From Bill Heinrich: Jim Morley was one of three reasons I went to Columbia, the other two being Gerry Curtis and Hugh Patrick. I am certain there has never been a better place anywhere to learn about Japan than EAI when those three were in their prime. Even before I met Jim, he had already lent me a helping hand by setting me up with a research institute in Tokyo that provided both contacts and a little extra cash for an impecunious graduate student. What was a revelation was Jim’s approachability and unfailingly upbeat nature. It made my day if I had a chance to talk with him or attend his class. When he asked me to be rapporteur for the Modern Japan seminar, which he somehow believed was an onerous task, I jumped at the opportunity: the more time I spent with him, the better. His classes were a joy to attend because he was genuinely interested in having a discussion, sharing what he knew and learning what his students thought. We connected on many levels. I still have a note he wrote me after he borrowed Henry Roth’s Call It Sleep, which he saw me carrying around. He told me how much he enjoyed reading it and that it had led him to reflect on his own upbringing, which apparently had been difficult. So, we ended up having a long talk about fathers. I won’t say that Jim made me what I am, but he is one of a handful of people who kept me pointed in the right direction. For that, and for his humor, good sense, friendship, and interest in his students as human beings I will always be grateful. The photo below was taken at Gerry Curtis’s retirement: Victor Cha and I are flanking Jim. I was so pleased he could come. Even more amazing was his stamina: he sat through and participated in the day’s panel discussion, was engaging through dinner, and then put the rest of us to shame by delivering the most thoughtful and humorous appreciation of Gerry. Without notes! I will miss that twinkle in his eye!
Weatherhead East Asian Institute A profile of Professor James Morley in WEAI's 70 Years Newsletter Full newsletter available here: https://weai.columbia.edu/sites/default/files/content/docs/WEAI-70-Years-April-Newsletter-FINAL.pdf
From Bilahari Kausikan (Part 2) Anyway he and later Gerry Curtis also evoked an interest in Japan that complemented my interests in the USSR and China and actually that broad way of looking at the region — I will never forget Professor Morley’s seminar on the international relations of East Asia — stood me in good stead when I decided to abandon ac...
From Andrew Nathan (Part 4) At this point my group of colleagues split. One faction believed I was lying, and they urged me to come clean. They were concerned about what might happen to us, alone behind the Bamboo Curtain. Would the regime treat us as spies? Expel us? The other faction was, as I remember it, Jim. Jim stood by me. He believed me. He...
From John Campbell: In Fall, 1964, I was a senior in the College, and one day I was talking to my advisor Prof. Morley about what I might do with my life. He said, gee, my father was just saying the same thing (at age 80 as I remember), I told him that I was deeply into Japan—I had been there in the Army and studied a lot when I got back to schoo...
From Andrew Nathan (Part 1) Joanne and I had great affection for Jim, in different ways. She was his student, and she can recall that experience in her own words. I knew him as a colleague. He was Institute director when I came to Columbia as a very young, wet assistant professor in 1971, and later he was my department chair. Of course I remember h...
From Andrew Nathan (Part 2) The thing I remember most vividly is kind of a long story, but let me try to tell it relatively briefly. He and I were included on a group trip to China in 1973 called the "New York State Educators' Study Tour." How that came about is another long story; let's skip it. Anyway, the tour guides kept us under tight control ...
From Andrew Nathan (Part 5) I've always been so grateful to Jim for his trust in me. Why did he trust me? Was it out of institutional loyalty? Protectiveness for a young person? A more benevolent view of human nature than most people hold? Certainly it let me know that I in turn could trust him, which was a feeling I know shared by numerous people,...
From Andrew Nathan (Part 3) For reasons I still do not understand, some malfunction in the cranking mechanism of my camera (remember cameras?), the roll did not contain the photos I had taken of the wall poster. This sounds incredible, but it's true - I simply did not have the pix I took of that wall poster, whether on this or any other roll of fil...
From Bilahari Kausikan (Part 1) When I came to Columbia in 1977-1978, for reasons I could never understand because I had made clear to what was then called USIS who had given me the scholarship and to GSAS, that my interest was the Soviet Union, the advisor who was assigned to me wanted me to work on a different topic altogether. Fortunately, I vag...
Jim was a great person, a great scholar, and a wonderful friend. He was diligent and hardworking and had a great sense of humor. He was one of the major reasons I decided to move to Columbia from Yale.
It was my great good fortune to have known Professor Morley first as his secretary when he was Director of the East Asian Institute (where my admiration for him deepened by the day—for the respect with which he treated everyone [myself included], his inquiring and interesting mind, his expansive good humor, and his authentic humanity. When, with hi...
Carol Gluck Jim was the mainstay of the East Asian Institute for years. Before and after he was director, he supported, encouraged, and energized faculty, students, and anyone else who came into his ken. Always welcoming, cheerful, and commonsensically ironic, Jim took time and care for all of us. He was a wonderful man. We owe him a lot. [ In the photo here,Jim is in the center, with Gerry Curtis and Herb Passin on his left, a very young me on his right, taken maybe in Japan, maybe in the late 1970s.
Weatherhead East Asian Institute WEAI mourns the loss of James Morley Former East Asian Institute Director James Morley died on Sunday, September 27, 2020. He was 99 years old. Professor Morley was a teacher, role model and friend. He was a mentor to generations of students throughout his long tenure at Columbia, which began in 1954 and lasted until his retirement as Professor of Political Science in 1991. In addition to his research and teaching work, he served for three separate terms as director of the East Asian Institute (renamed in 2003 as the Weatherhead East Asian Institute). In 1967, following his first term heading the Institute, he served as an assistant to the American ambassador to Japan at the US embassy in Tokyo, where he worked to strengthen the countries’ bilateral ties. Professor Morley was a prolific scholar, and published such books as The Japanese Thrust Into Siberia, 1918 (1957), Forecast for Japan: Security in the 1970s (1972), Prologue to the Future: the United States and Japan in the Postindustrial Age (1974), and Japan’s Road to the Pacific War: Selected Translations from Taiheiyo Senso e no michi: Kaisen Gaikoshi (five volumes) (1976-1984). He also served as editor of such works as Dilemmas of Growth in Prewar Japan (1976) and Security Interdependence in the Asia Pacific Region (1986), among others. After breaking Japanese codes for the US during WWII, Professor Morley devoted his career as an academic to understanding Japan and to healing the US-Japan relationship. Recognizing his contributions, he was awarded the prestigious Order of the Sacred Treasure, second class, by the Japanese government. He was also a recipient of the 1987 Japan Foundation Award for significant contributions to "the enhancement of mutual understanding between Japan and other countries." Professor Morley is remembered for his warmth and generosity, and for inspiring and encouraging so many young East Asia scholars. The loss of Professor Morley is the loss of a great leader and a brilliant mind. He will be missed by the Weatherhead East Asian Institute community and by all who knew him. https://weai.columbia.edu/news/weai-mourns-loss-james-morley
Victor Cha A story about Jim Morley's visit to the White House State Dinner.
Jim was my academic adviser, mentor and friend. I owe him a lot. When he invited me and some others to his home after our graduation, he asked me to taste white wine on the rocks. I told him it was very tasty. He later confessed me that it was sake on the rocks! One more thing to learn from him!? Ever since, I love drinking sake on the rocks, which...
Jim Morley was a great scholar of Japan and, indeed, the world, a wonderful human being and a great colleague. His being on the faculty was one of the attractions for me to join the Columbia faculty from my position at Yale. I really valued his friendship.