The Game of 100 Ghosts

by Terry Watada

Inspired by an old Japanese parlour game of the Edo period (1603-1868), The Game of 100 Ghosts is a lyrical tribute to the poet’s friends and relations who recently departed their lives. In the game, participants gather in the dark at night and sit around 100 lit candles. Each player tells a ghost story, after which a candle is snuffed out. The last candle ends the spiritual evocation, which the participants hope will summon a supernatural being. This wonderful collection then evokes the spirits of lost friends and relations while paying tribute to a tradition.

“For Terry, applause and gratitude, because he has held the people in his mind and his heart, and because he gave them back to us.”
—Joy Kogawa, author of Obasan

"A tour de force literary and conceptual achievement, The Game of 100 Ghosts reveals and further illuminates the Japanese Canadian sensibility. Terry Watada's passion, indeed his life's work, is to discover, recreate, and uncover the past lost through the silence of his parents and community. His literary and musical career has helped define what is best in Canadian contemporary culture."
—Anthony B Chan, author of Gold The Chinese in the New World

Genres: Poetry, Canada, Japanese Literature

119 pages, Kindle Edition

First published September 1, 2014

About the author

Terry Watada is a Toronto poet, novelist, playwright and essayist, and historian, musician and composer, with numerous publications to his credit. Five of his plays have received mainstage production. He contributes a monthly column to The Bulletin, a national Japanese Canadian community paper. For his writing, music and community volunteerism, he was recently awarded the Queen Elizabeth II Diamond Jubilee Medal. His published works include The Sword, the Medal and the Rosary (manga, 2013); Kuroshio: The Blood of Foxes (novel, 2007), Obon: the Festival of the Dead (poetry, 2006); Ten Thousand Views of Rain (poetry, 2001); A Thousand Homes (poetry, 1995); and The TBC: the Toronto Buddhist Church, 1995 – 2010 (2010).

Reviews

[Jola · Rating 3 out of 5]

The concept behind Terry Watada’s collection of poems is brilliant: a literary transposition of an old Japanese parlour game. Its rules are described in the blurb: 'In this game, popular during the Edo period (1603-1868), participants gathered at night to sit around 100 lit candles. Each player then told a ghost story in turn. After each story, a candle was snuffed out. The last candle to burn out represented the end of a spiritual evocation, which the participants hoped would summon a supernatural being from another world.'


Utagawa Kuniyoshi (1797 - 1861), 'The Spirit of Oiwa Tōkyō', 1847 - 1848. [Image source]

Sounds fascinting, doesn’t it? With such a premise, the author was ahead of the game as far as my interest and motivation were concerned. The blurb and the cover enticed and intrigued me right from the start. Unfortunately, everything ended up with a mild disappointment. I wouldn’t say that game was not worth the candle though.

The lesson Terry Watada taught me: the less concrete expectations you have when you approach a book, the better. Most probably I am at fault, not his poems. It’s up to you to decide who is to blame.

What did I wish for when I started reading 'The Game of 100 Ghosts'?
A collection of narrative poems with a coherent and robust framework, full of glimpses of Japanese culture, a kind of lyric family saga.

What did I receive?
Loosely connected, heart-rending, modern elegies devoted to Terry Watada's family members and friends, who had passed away. Mostly Japanese immigrants living in Canada but there was a man with a Polish surname too.


Shotei Takahashi (1871-1945), 'Night scene of Mabashi, near Tokyo' [Image source]

I believe creating these poems must have had a deep therapeutic effect on the author, who tries to come to terms with his loss. It turns out to be really tough: 'I hate the silence of missing you'. He attempts to clarify and overcome some misunderstandings between him and the loved ones who died. Frankly speaking, it felt as if I was eavesdropping strictly confidental confessions of a complete stranger. It made me feel quite uneasy, although I was filled with compassion for the author's grief.

Terry Watada’s poems are full of harrowing anguish. Death is omnipresent in them, often depicted as lack of light. According to the poet there is only one comfort. Like a tiny gold lump in the swamp. His dead brother asks him:
'don’t cry te-bozu
my
love is still with you that is
what
remains of me'

What's the point of all these visitations the author describes? What do the ghosts want to convey? Their message is simple:
'listen to the words of our past
& realize the gift you have been given'

The author, who appoints himself the role of a family chronicler, portrays also loneliness which paradoxically 'looks for company in a city of 5 million', Toronto.


Kobayashi Kiyochika (1847–1915), Detail, 'Sumida River by Night', 1881. [Image source]

The author's poetic insight is moving. I found the tone of his poems natural and genuine. He achieves it with truly simple, almost basic language. As it seems, the naked truth doesn't have to hide behind elaborate metaphors. The artistic value of Watada's poems is uneven though, from beautiful and haunting ones to clichés. The passage I especially enjoyed:
'Come
with me
warmheart let me

feel your sea-breath hand
in mine as it flutters and
smoothes
my fears away
come
with
me

as the light disappears
at
the sunset horizon
like all sensation
save your
sadness
persisting as perfume on
a hot
summer’s day'

I like the author's fascination with Edward Hopper's painting. The sprinkles of Japanese culture were interesting too, the glossary at the end of the book included. As Terry Watada is not only a poet, novelist, playwright, essayist and historian but also a musician and composer - no wonder you can feel his fascination with the sounds and the rhythm of words when you indulge in his poetry.

The author tinged his poems with such overwhelming sadness that it really persists 'as perfume on a hot summer’s day'. After a few days I still can smell its intense scent.


Eiho Hirezaki (1881-1968), 'Ghost in front of the mosquito net' [Image source]

[Nafiza · Rating 4 out of 5]

The poems were sort of dirges; remembering, honouring, and then letting go.

[World Literature Today]

This book was featured in the Nota Benes section of the May 2015 issue of World Literature Today Magazine.

http://www.worldliteraturetoday.org/2...