Japanese Tales of Fantasy and Folklore: Ninety Stories about Ghosts, Demons and Other Supernatural Beings from the Konjaku Monogatari

by Naoshi Koriyama (translator), Bruce Allen (translator), Karen Thornber (foreword)

Genres: Nonfiction, Japan

288 pages, Hardcover

Published October 8, 2024

About the author

Naoshi Koriyama (郡山 直 Kōriyama Naoshi?, born 1926) is a Japanese poet. Born in Kikaijima, Kagoshima Prefecture, he moved to the United States from Japan in 1950 to study English and social studies, first attending the University of New Mexico. He graduated from the New York State College for Teachers at Albany in 1954 and returned to Japan to teach and write poetry. His interest in poetry came from using it as a tool to combat his feelings of loneliness when he transferred from New Mexico to Albany in 1951. From 1967 until 1997, he was a professor at Toyo University. He has published nine collections in English, three from Japanese to English, and in 2011, he published his first volume entirely in Japanese.

(from Wikipedia)

Reviews

[Mick · Rating 2 out of 5]

I wouldn't call this fantasy and folklore. It's really Japanese Buddhist parables. Very simple and not much entertainment value.

[Distorted Daydream · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some of the stories were really interesting, but I was expecting more stories about yokai.

[Azedenkae · Rating 1 out of 5]

The issue is that the description is very misleading. The book focused almost exclusively on stories surrounding buddism or more mundane stories, with little to nothing that aligns with the emphasis on oni, demons, tengu, etc. that is in the description at the back of the book. Very disappointing. Despite the stories themselves being good, just not what I expected at all from the book's description.

[Marcia · Rating 3 out of 5]

It's a collection of setsuwa from Heian era Japan. These easy to read stories give the reader a sense of what a setsuwa is. For example, the location of the story is always included, as is the name and title of people in the story. Some are totally similar. Some are quite imaginative. Many involve demonic animals and people.
There is a very informative introduction which adds a lot to this book.