Kwaidan: Stories and Studies of Strange Things

by Lafcadio Hearn

Overview

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Product Details

ISBN-13:	9783742911551
Publisher:	libreka classics
Publication date:	03/01/2019
Sold by:	Libreka GmbH
Format:	eBook
Pages:	142
File size:	259 KB

About the Author

Lafcadio Hearn (1850-1904) was born on the Greek island of Lefkas, the son of an Anglo-Irish surgeon in the British army and a Greek mother. After his parent's divorce when he was six, he was brought up in Dublin by a great aunt. At the age of nineteen, he went to America, eventually ending up in New Orleans as a newspaper reporter. His flight from Western materialism brought him to Japan in 1890, where he worked for an English newspaper, the Kobe Chronicle, and taught in various schools. In 1896, he began teaching English literature at Tokyo Imperial University, a position he held until 1903, and at Waseda University. Hearn married a samurai's daughter, Koizumi Setsu, became a Japanese citizen and a Buddhist and changed his name to Koizumi Yakumo. At the young age of 54, he died of a heart attack. Hearn's search for beauty and tranquility, for pleasing customs and lasting values, made him a confirmed Japanophile. His keen intellect, poetic imagination, and wonderful clear style permitted him to penetrate to the very essence of things Japanese. He became the great interpreter of things Japanese to the West. Hearn's most famous work is a collection of lectures entitled Japan: An Attempt at Interpretation (published posthumously in 1905). His other books on Japan include Glimpses of Unfamiliar Japan (1894), Out of the East (1895), Kokoro (1896), Gleanings in Buddha Fields (1897), Exotics and Retrospectives (1898), In Ghostly Japan (1899), Shadowings (1900), and A Japanese Miscellany (1901).

Table of Contents

The story of Mimi-Nashi-Hoichi -- Oshidori -- The story of O-Tei -- Ubazakura -- Diplomacy -- Of a mirror and a bell -- Jikininki -- Mujina -- Rokuro-Kubi -- A dead secret -- Yuki-Onna -- The story of Aoyagi -- Jiu-Roku-Zakura -- The dream of Akinosuke -- Riki-Baka -- Hi-Mawari -- Horai -- Butterflies -- Mosquitoes -- Ants.

Editorial Reviews

"Wonderful photographs. . . . [Watanabe's] black and white photographs add a layer of understanding and environmental context for the accompanying stories. His photographs are at times as dark as Hearn’s stories. The Kwaidan are a collection of mysterious stories that are well suited for a vivid imagination."

PhotoBook Journal

"The photo book is a new edition of the critically acclaimed book of the same name . . . [featuring] a collection of horror stories, Japanese legends, and ghost stories presented in English for Western audiences. The tales are some of the first examples of modern fantasy literature: including man-eating goblins, insects who parrot human behavior, and a musician who performs to a dead audience. Hearn died soon after the book’s publication, only finding posthumous success. Over a century later, Watanabe has used the eerie stories as the conceptual basis for his imagery in Kwaidan: Stories and Studies of Strange Things, presenting this new edition of the classic text in print."

IGNANT magazine

"Out of this year’s vast ocean of photography books, Kwaidan: Stories and Studies of Strange Things, stands out for me. Written by Lafcadio Hearn over a century ago, and now brilliantly illustrated with accompanying photographs by award-winning photographer Hiroshi Watanabe, these folk stories are revitalized in this new edition."

Photo-eye, 2019 Favorite Photobooks - Elizabeth Avedon

"Written by Lafcadio Hearn over a century ago, and now brilliantly illustrated with accompanying photographs by award-winning photographer Hiroshi Watanabe, these folk stories are revitalized in this new edition."

2019 Favorite Photobooks Photo-eye