Name: Kwaidan: Stories and Studies of Strange Things
Price: 36.56 NZD
Availability: InStock
Author: Hearn, Lafcadio
ISBN: 9781434104991

portada Kwaidan: Stories and Studies of Strange Things

Kwaidan: Stories and Studies of Strange Things

Type

Physical Book

Author

Lafcadio Hearn

Publisher

Waking Lion Press

Language

English

Pages

158

Format

Paperback

Dimensions

22.9 x 15.2 x 0.9 cm

Weight

0.22 kg.

ISBN13

9781434104991

Synopsis "Kwaidan: Stories and Studies of Strange Things"

Deriving its title from the word for "ghost story" in Japanese Kwaidan is a compilation of supernatural tales from Japan. Hearn writes in his introduction, written only months before his death, that the majority of the stories were translated from old Japanese texts (some of which themselves were based on earlier Chinese tales), although one of the stories, "Riki-Baka," he declares to be of his own making, based on a personal experience. Unmentioned in the introduction, another of the stories - "Hi-Mawari", written in the first person - appears almost certainly to be born from his own experience also, a recollection of a childhood experience in Wales.Among the many curious happenings related in the other stories, we read of man-eating goblins, a musician who performs for the dead, a mysterious face appearing in a cup of tea, and, rather terrifyingly, a featureless girl with a face as smooth as an egg.The final section of the book, "Insect-Studies," presents Chinese and Japanese superstitions relating to the insect world: butterflies (personifications of the human soul), mosquitoes (karmic reincarnations of jealous or greedy people), and ants (humanity's superior in chastity, ethics, social structure, longevity, and evolution).Vastly different from ghost stories in the West, this collection will haunt your dreams and leave you shivering in the dark.

Lafcadio Hearn

(Author)

View Author's Page

(Greece 1850 - Japan 1904), born in Greece to an Irish father and Greek mother, he was raised between Greece and Ireland. At the age of nineteen, he moved to the United States to start his journalism career and later to Japan in 1890, where he would spend the rest of his life as a teacher and writer. He is noted for his narrative and descriptive talent both in his journalistic and literary work. He was one of the first Europeans to introduce Japanese culture to Western readers. His long stay in Japan, combined with his deep knowledge of Japanese culture and traditions and his poetic imagination and narrative style, have secured him a privileged place in the reading community and an even more privileged place in the hearts of the Japanese.

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