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podcasts. Hello and welcome to the History of Japan podcast, episode 256, The Wrestler.

This week, I want to talk about something that, well, I never in a million years expect to do an episode on.

It's the kind of thing that, on its face, perhaps might seem a bit silly to spend time on,

but which in reality says quite a bit about

Japan, specifically Japan just after World War II.

So meet me in the ring because it's time for the history of professional wrestling in Japan.

Now yes, to start with, I do mean that kind of professional wrestling, the one where everyone

has a character they perform as in the

ring, and where the matches are all scripted. And the fact that they are scripted, by the way,

...