Lafcadio Hearn (1850-1904) offered a view into Japan during the Meiji Restoration with his books: Glimpses of Unfamiliar Japan, Out of the East, Kokoro, The Boy Who Drew Cats, In Ghostly Japan, Kwaidan, and other books. He lived in Japan for 14 years before his death; his writings provide a snapshot of the land and…
Category: Book Reviews
Stranger in the Shogun’s City by Amy Stanley
History tends to represent the voices of men and those in power. Typically, governmental officials, who are most often men, know how to read and write. And those documents are what survive. The majority of people in the past were illiterate and unable to write. Because of this, their voices disappeared outside of a few…
Geishas and the Floating World: Inside Tokyo’s Yoshiwara Pleasure District
Geishas and the Floating World by Stephen and Ethel Longstreet examines the history and development of Tokyo’s red-light district of Yoshiwara. The name of the book misleads a little. Most of the book focuses upon the prostitutes that worked Yoshiwara. The authors note that geisha weren’t sex workers, but geisha did blur the line as…
The Delicate Happiness of “The Guest Cat”
The Guest Cat by Takashi Hiraide focuses on a childless couple who is adopted by the neighbor’s cat. The novella offers a detailed slice of life set in the late 1980s. It’s hard to believe that is over 30 years ago! The author isn’t familiar with cats, so Chibi’s antics surprise and delight him. Chibi doesn’t…
The Rape of Nanking by Iris Chang
The Rape of Nanking covers the destruction of present-day Nanjing City by the Japanese during World War II. The book doesn’t hold back. In several chapters, I had to take a break from the relentless atrocities the author accounted. Nanking was the first area the Japanese went after taking Shanghai. The goal was to conquer…
Senbazuru: One Thousand Steps to Happiness, Fold by Fold by Michael James Wong
Let’s take a break from folklore this week: Senbazuru: One Thousand Steps to Happiness takes a different perspective than most books I’ve read about mindfulness. It uses the practice of folding 1,000 paper cranes to explain how to slow down and find joy in everyday life. Wong breaks the crane into 12 steps, using each…