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A review by joeytitmouse
Kwaidan: Stories and Studies of Strange Things by Lafcadio Hearn
5.0
Beautiful. You can tell how much Hearn loves the subject matter that he translates, most especially in Hourai .
Tidbit: Hearn was a Greek-Irishman whom poverty forced him to become an American and then providence brought him to newly-opened Japan where he married and became Koizumi Yakumo, taking his wife's name. In pictures, you'll never see his left eye. His right side was his "good side," apparently. Maybe I'm romanticizing him a bit but seriously his love of the culture comes though in his translations.
So these aren't your classic western horror stories, all the sudden some ghost pops out or something (though Hi-Mawari ended on a shocker), sometimes even funny (Oshidori, though that may be unintentional), sometimes very sweet. Great stories to read by dim light on some rainy evening. More like "tales of the strange" than ghost stories. The Dream of Akinosuke was absolutely beautiful.
**Note, I read a totally different version, which is part of a Hearn omnibus, but since I only really bought the book for Kwaidan, it may take me some time to read the other stories (Some Chinese Ghosts sounds great already) and maybe the letters. It has a totally sweet dragon on the cover however. You can find copies of Kwaidan (in public-domain) pretty much anywhere on the internet.
Tidbit: Hearn was a Greek-Irishman whom poverty forced him to become an American and then providence brought him to newly-opened Japan where he married and became Koizumi Yakumo, taking his wife's name. In pictures, you'll never see his left eye. His right side was his "good side," apparently. Maybe I'm romanticizing him a bit but seriously his love of the culture comes though in his translations.
So these aren't your classic western horror stories, all the sudden some ghost pops out or something (though Hi-Mawari ended on a shocker), sometimes even funny (Oshidori, though that may be unintentional), sometimes very sweet. Great stories to read by dim light on some rainy evening. More like "tales of the strange" than ghost stories. The Dream of Akinosuke was absolutely beautiful.
**Note, I read a totally different version, which is part of a Hearn omnibus, but since I only really bought the book for Kwaidan, it may take me some time to read the other stories (Some Chinese Ghosts sounds great already) and maybe the letters. It has a totally sweet dragon on the cover however. You can find copies of Kwaidan (in public-domain) pretty much anywhere on the internet.