This chapter examines Messiaen’s engagement with Japan. French artists’ fascination with Japan has a long history, dating back at least to the Paris World Exposition of 1867, and in return many Japanese artists – including composers – have discovered a reciprocal affinity with aspects of French aesthetic sensibility. It was therefore entirely to be expected that Messiaen, as a French composer with a long-standing interest in Eastern cultures, would succumb to this same fascination after his visit to Japan in 1962, which resulted in the composition of his Sept Haïkaï – and that his work would also exert a profound influence on several Japanese composers of the postwar generation, above all Toru Takemitsu.