Writings from Japan: An Anthology

by Lafcadio Hearn, Francis King (Introduction)

Perhaps no westerner has been held in greater esteem by the Japanese than Lafcadio Hearn who, in 1890, penniless and half-blind came to Matsue, a remote town on the northwest coast of Honshu. There, in the fading twilight of feudal Japan, he was able to interpret for the Western world - from a Japanese point of view and as no one had done before - the forces that had moulded the soul of this unknown people. In his "Glimpses of Unfamiliar Japan" and in the dozen or so books that followed, he recorded the minutiae of life in the ancient Izumo province. This selection by Francis King gathers together the finest essays on the customs, lore and scenes of Japanese life from the individually uneven, and now largely neglected, published works of Hearn.

Genres: Japan, Travel, Nonfiction

368 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1985

About the author

Greek-born American writer Lafcadio Hearn spent 15 years in Japan; people note his collections of stories and essays, including Kokoro (1896), under pen name Koizumi Yakumo.

Rosa Cassimati (Ρόζα Αντωνίου Κασιμάτη in Greek), a Greek woman, bore Patrick Lafcadio Hearn (Πατρίκιος Λευκάδιος Χερν in Greek or 小泉八雲 in Japanese), a son, to Charles Hearn, an army doctor from Ireland. After making remarkable works in America as a journalist, he went to Japan in 1890 as a journey report writer of a magazine. He arrived in Yokohama, but because of a dissatisfaction with the contract, he quickly quit the job. He afterward moved to Matsué as an English teacher of Shimané prefectural middle school. In Matsué, he got acquainted with Nishida Sentarô, a colleague teacher and his lifelong friend, and married Koizumi Setsu, a daughter of a samurai.
In 1891, he moved to Kumamoto and taught at the fifth high school for three years. Kanô Jigorô, the president of the school of that time, spread judo to the world.

Hearn worked as a journalist in Kôbé and afterward in 1896 got Japanese citizenship and a new name, Koizumi Yakumo. He took this name from "Kojiki," a Japanese ancient myth, which roughly translates as "the place where the clouds are born". On that year, he moved to Tôkyô and began to teach at the Imperial University of Tôkyô. He got respect of students, many of whom made a remarkable literary career. In addition, he wrote much reports of Japan and published in America. So many people read his works as an introduction of Japan. He quit the Imperial University in 1903 and began to teach at Waseda University on the year next. Nevertheless, after only a half year, he died of angina pectoris.

Reviews

[Heman · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have always been fascinated by the Japanese knack for communal eccentricity. Although Japan has been one of the top ten industrial nations of the world since the late 19th century, it has always kept itself...well, weird. The entire culture of this long isolated island, to this day, stands in stark contrast to the rest of the world. Lafcadio Hearn, himself a misfit outsider in his western homelands-Ireland, England, France and the U.S.- found a lasting refuge in Japan and is revered by the Japanese. There is to this day a memorial museum in Matsue, where he lived for a period in late 19th century. He was so enamored of Japan and the Japanese that he is believed by some devout Buddhist Japanese to have been himself a Japanese in a previous life.
This anthology of his writings about Japan, can be read as an effort to shed light on the Japanese culture and its otherness; what he described as the "fairy land" of Japan.
When an isolated feudal Japan, still living in the 16th century, was suddenly opened up by the threat of Admiral Perry's "black ships" to a world that was living three centuries in the future, the humiliation and injury to the Japanese was so sever that in the span of three decades, they not only joined that future, but transformed into the 10th greatest industrial nation in the world. But the weight of the repression of centuries of tradition and class and the sudden whirlwind of change put a bend in their attitudes and culture.
The book is a beautiful and meditative reflection on an old Japan that was dissolving day after day in front of the author. It is a snapshot of an era, a praise and a prophetic warning about the proud island nation never forgiving an injury, and too eager to emulate the west, for better or worse.
Speaking of the modern Japan of the early 20th century he says:
"Setting the whole Japanese nation to study English (language of a people who are being forever preached to about their 'rights,' and never about their 'duties') was almost an imprudence."

[Bill · Rating 4 out of 5]

I loved this compilation of selections from Hearn's writings from the last years of his life in Japan. He was writing from a country which was largely unknown in most aspects of its culture, and also largely unchanged since opening to the west some 50 years previously. It's such an open window on Japan from 1890 until his death in 1904, and as such I would recommend it highly. I had heard of Hearn, yet never read a thing he had written until this volume. I understand his books as originally published are somewhat uneven, which may be the ultimate value of this compilation insofar as his reputation as a commentator on his times, and on Japan of over a hundred years past.

[Patrick · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this years ago, and it was one of my first introductions to Japan and Japanese culture. From this I went on to Kawabata, The Tale of Gengi, and a host of others. I need to find my old copy or get another one and reread these.

[Keith Miller]

Writings from Japan: An Anthology (Penguin Classics) by Lafcadio Hearn (1995)

[Mehul Jangir · Rating 3 out of 5]

Hearn's writing is layered. His narrations of superstitious tales and deep descriptions of stuff like the hike up Fuji and Japan's sunsets were particularly good. On the other hand, his essays about insects and Japan's changing social system tended to drag on.

[Jakob]

https://youtu.be/qiI4N0iaiIw