What do you think?
Rate this book
Oriental Ghost Stories
'- and the man saw that she had no eyes or nose or mouth - and he screamed.' Lafcadio Hearn's fascinating and unsettling ghost stories are a reinterpretation of oriental legends, and folktales. They are a potent blend of weird beauty and horror. Hearn, who referred to his narratives as 'stories and studies of strange things', believed that the spectral world was part of the oriental landscape. Lakes, mountains, ruined castles and terraced fields were the natural locale of ghostly spirits, and their intervention in human affairs was part of the natural order of things. Hearn's apparitions are not a violent intrusion upon everyday reality; they are already a part of that reality, co-existing with the living. This collection contains the best of the work of this neglected master of the supernatural tale. Prepare to be charmed and chilled in equal measure.
253 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2007
7 people are currently reading
464 people want to read
About the author
Lafcadio Hearn
1,460 books447 followersGreek-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.
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.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 19 of 19 reviews
October 23, 2019
These stories, although seldom frightening, are almost everything else: creepy, poignant, evocative, picturesque, filled with the power of love and art.
Lafcadio Hearn--who was an American newspaperman who moved to Japan, converted to Buddhism, and took a Japanese bride--began to write these stories in Japan at the end of the nineteenth century. His style is a uniquely charming combination of spare newspaperman prose and gorgeous fin-de-siecle gem-like imagery, of a Western enthusiasm for exotic detail and an Asian philosophic distance.
The stories are presented in roughly chronological order, and I believe the later ones are even better than the first. I particularly like the two familiar essays printed here ("Incense," "Silkworms") in which the ghostly tales arise naturally as illustrations of Asian customs. Their apparently casual yet artful structures are worthy of Lamb or Robert Louis Stevenson.
April 30, 2020
Average rating: 3.31 stars
Contains 29 short stories.
Contains 29 short stories.
June 7, 2017
It's funny how cyclical the entire phenomenon of occidental Japanophilia is. With an apparent 10-year frequency, it suddenly becomes popular among the Western world's cultural elite to mine Japanese culture for new things to imitate or at least fascinate on. If the entire phenomenon can be placed on the shoulders of any one person it is probably Lafcadio Hearn, an Irishman of Greek descent who married into the Japanese aristocracy during the Meiji era. (consider how insular and xenophobic Japan is today, and it becomes apparent what that must have meant in the imperial age)
This book compiles several smaller anthologies of several Japanese (and some Chinese later on) folk tales, some of them appearing for the first time in print when Hearn wrote them down. Most are poignant, rather fascinating and some sad or creepy, even humourous... but most have some kind of moral that are recognizeable as a product of their original social context. The few Chinese stories included in the final third stand out as obvious products of thoroughly different aesthetic ideals and social structures than the Japanese ones. Even within each country, the moral codex advocated by the stories depends on the social class of the protagonists and hence presumably the audiences.
Most commendable is that unlike many other Europeans writing on Asian cultures Hearn does not place them at any sort of romanticizing distance, either negatively like Rudyard Kipling or positively like Hermann Hesse, while at the same time providing plenty of footnotes explaining the necessary cultural background knowledge that foreign readers would not possess. It's great as an anthology of supernatural horror stories *and* as a sterling example of the show-don't-tell approach as applied to anthropology.
This book compiles several smaller anthologies of several Japanese (and some Chinese later on) folk tales, some of them appearing for the first time in print when Hearn wrote them down. Most are poignant, rather fascinating and some sad or creepy, even humourous... but most have some kind of moral that are recognizeable as a product of their original social context. The few Chinese stories included in the final third stand out as obvious products of thoroughly different aesthetic ideals and social structures than the Japanese ones. Even within each country, the moral codex advocated by the stories depends on the social class of the protagonists and hence presumably the audiences.
Most commendable is that unlike many other Europeans writing on Asian cultures Hearn does not place them at any sort of romanticizing distance, either negatively like Rudyard Kipling or positively like Hermann Hesse, while at the same time providing plenty of footnotes explaining the necessary cultural background knowledge that foreign readers would not possess. It's great as an anthology of supernatural horror stories *and* as a sterling example of the show-don't-tell approach as applied to anthropology.
October 18, 2019
Principal responsable de esta locura nipona que nos ataca a muchos en Occidente, Hearn es en sí mismo un autor atípico, que vivió una vida increíble y que sacó todo el jugo a su país de acogida. Recopilar las historias de miedo de tradición popular (o más bien traducirlas, para su distribución allende los mares) fue una idea genial. Una ideaca, vamos.
De aquí salen muchísimas de las temáticas recurrentes que admiramos en películas y manga de Ito, Maruo o Miike. Como para no inspirarse.
De aquí salen muchísimas de las temáticas recurrentes que admiramos en películas y manga de Ito, Maruo o Miike. Como para no inspirarse.
August 11, 2011
It's quite difficult to find Lafcadio Hearn at used bookshops. This is all I've managed so far.
=======
Very enjoyable, sometimes so strange. I loved the floating heads, one of which becomes fastened to a monk's clothing. I loved the beautiful young men making love to dead women. I loved the incense ceremony. I will keep looking for more Lafcadio.
=======
Very enjoyable, sometimes so strange. I loved the floating heads, one of which becomes fastened to a monk's clothing. I loved the beautiful young men making love to dead women. I loved the incense ceremony. I will keep looking for more Lafcadio.
October 23, 2014
An introduction to the beauty, elegance and folkloric horror of Japanese ghost stories. JS
November 8, 2017
Interesting book of weird/creepy/unusual ghost stories.
Well worth a read, if only for the foreword by noted author David Stuart Davies.
Well worth a read, if only for the foreword by noted author David Stuart Davies.
July 21, 2011
Lafcadio Hearn, a journalist born in Greece by an Irish father and a Greek mother, was truly a man of the world, influenced by numerous cultures throughout his life. Finally, he settled in Japan, where he took a Japanese name Yakumo Koizumi and began writing ghost stories, or rather – translating ghost stories: none of the tales in this collection can be claimed as his, because he only translated them from other texts, or transcribed them as they were told to him by the natives. Hearn is little-known even amongst the circle of horror readers. Perhaps that is rightfully so, because from what I’ve seen, I was less than impressed.
“Oriental Ghost Stories” by Wordsworth Editions collects 17 stories from “Kwaidan”, 6 from “In Ghostly Japan”, and 6 from “Some Chinese Ghosts”, amounting to a total of 29 stories spanning on 253 pages. Lafcadio Hearn’s prose was different from his Western (and superior) counterparts – instead of the “manufactured tension, calculated horror and lengthy descriptions” Hearn adopts a light, simplistic style with thin lots which echo the narratives of traditional folk tales. That is to say, his works read like children’s books, with the addition of some philosophy or a more mature moral.
Truly, the stories are extremely short, in average about 2-3 pages, and they’re without exception told in a rushed manner devoid of any details. The formula goes thus:
“Some XX years ago there lived a man / woman named ______ who was very skilled in YYY. By the time ______ grew up, ______ had already surpassed everyone else in YYY.”
The protagonist in question is always the most beautiful of all of its gender ever to grace the Earth. Then the protagonist falls madly in love, always at first sight, with a young member of the opposite sex that is, of course, also the most handsome ever. The love of these exquisitely handsome men and women, alas, cannot be because of:
a) Bad luck – i.e. an tragic accident
b) Old traditions which MUST be obliged, despite the obvious lack of common sense behind them
The result of either a) or b) is, of course, death – usually of the woman. Then the remaining partner, usually the man, is doomed to be in some ways haunted by the departed’s ghost, which mostly does nothing in particular, but simply lingers there, all scary and spooky.
What pisses me off as the reader is that in almost all of the stories the tragedy could’ve been easily avoided if only the protagonists weren’t so thick-headed. For example, in one story, a young man loses his father who had taken good care of him all the time, in other words – sacrificed himself for the benefit of his offspring. And how does this youth show gratitude for his father’s love? If this were the Western story, the youth would strive to become a great man, thus not letting his father’s sacrifice go in vain. In this tale, however, the youth decides to willingly sell himself into slavery so that he could build his father the most marvelous grave the world has ever seen. Now, if I were the father of such youth, I would weep from shame. I sacrificed myself, for what? So that my son can willingly become a slave?! Well, to hell with him.
Or, when a young man accompanies an older doctor to the house of a family friend who is also, yes, the most beautiful woman in the world. The two youngsters fall in love instantly. But, tradition deems it not appropriate for a young man to visit the house of a lady alone, so the poor bloke, although burning with desire, stops coming; the lady thinks he had abandoned her and dies from sorrow, and her ghost comes to haunt him.
Usually, a plot arises from a conflict or predicament of sorts, where grief is shoved onto the hero, and he must react accordingly in order to overcome the problem. The thing with these tales is that all conflict and the consequences which result from it could’ve been easily avoided. The man above, for example, could’ve done something as simple as send a letter, a secret sign, or even pay a stealthy visit to his beloved.
So forgive me if the characters’ don’t exactly tug at my heart strings, because plainly speaking, most characters in this collection are fools, and I do not pity the fools. I despise them, and by consequence, I despise most of these stories.
The only two exceptions that spring to mind are “Diplomacy”, whose protagonist is smart and witty, and “Silkworms”, which is not even a proper story – but rather an essay, in which Hearn, using a domesticated silkworm as an example, philosophically muses on the meaning and purpose of life.
Only the stories in “Kwaidan” (also the best this volume has to offer) are actual fictional tales, where the titles from the other two collections are a combination of fiction and said non-fictional writings on subjects such as incense, porcelain and tea leaves. These subjects may appear fascinating to some, but I presume most of don’t really give a damn. Maybe it’s the difference in mentality, but the “honorable” and “just” in these old folklore comes across as incredibly dumb from today’s perspective.
As a whole, this collection mostly bored me, and amused me very rarely. I blame it not on Hearn, because it is evident that the man was eloquent and definitely knew how to write; no, I blame it on the folk tales, which Hearn, as said before, only translated. If he actually wrote his original fiction, I believe we would have another great horror writer instead of a great translator of boring and dull Oriental folk-tales.
Rating: 3/10
“Oriental Ghost Stories” by Wordsworth Editions collects 17 stories from “Kwaidan”, 6 from “In Ghostly Japan”, and 6 from “Some Chinese Ghosts”, amounting to a total of 29 stories spanning on 253 pages. Lafcadio Hearn’s prose was different from his Western (and superior) counterparts – instead of the “manufactured tension, calculated horror and lengthy descriptions” Hearn adopts a light, simplistic style with thin lots which echo the narratives of traditional folk tales. That is to say, his works read like children’s books, with the addition of some philosophy or a more mature moral.
Truly, the stories are extremely short, in average about 2-3 pages, and they’re without exception told in a rushed manner devoid of any details. The formula goes thus:
“Some XX years ago there lived a man / woman named ______ who was very skilled in YYY. By the time ______ grew up, ______ had already surpassed everyone else in YYY.”
The protagonist in question is always the most beautiful of all of its gender ever to grace the Earth. Then the protagonist falls madly in love, always at first sight, with a young member of the opposite sex that is, of course, also the most handsome ever. The love of these exquisitely handsome men and women, alas, cannot be because of:
a) Bad luck – i.e. an tragic accident
b) Old traditions which MUST be obliged, despite the obvious lack of common sense behind them
The result of either a) or b) is, of course, death – usually of the woman. Then the remaining partner, usually the man, is doomed to be in some ways haunted by the departed’s ghost, which mostly does nothing in particular, but simply lingers there, all scary and spooky.
What pisses me off as the reader is that in almost all of the stories the tragedy could’ve been easily avoided if only the protagonists weren’t so thick-headed. For example, in one story, a young man loses his father who had taken good care of him all the time, in other words – sacrificed himself for the benefit of his offspring. And how does this youth show gratitude for his father’s love? If this were the Western story, the youth would strive to become a great man, thus not letting his father’s sacrifice go in vain. In this tale, however, the youth decides to willingly sell himself into slavery so that he could build his father the most marvelous grave the world has ever seen. Now, if I were the father of such youth, I would weep from shame. I sacrificed myself, for what? So that my son can willingly become a slave?! Well, to hell with him.
Or, when a young man accompanies an older doctor to the house of a family friend who is also, yes, the most beautiful woman in the world. The two youngsters fall in love instantly. But, tradition deems it not appropriate for a young man to visit the house of a lady alone, so the poor bloke, although burning with desire, stops coming; the lady thinks he had abandoned her and dies from sorrow, and her ghost comes to haunt him.
Usually, a plot arises from a conflict or predicament of sorts, where grief is shoved onto the hero, and he must react accordingly in order to overcome the problem. The thing with these tales is that all conflict and the consequences which result from it could’ve been easily avoided. The man above, for example, could’ve done something as simple as send a letter, a secret sign, or even pay a stealthy visit to his beloved.
So forgive me if the characters’ don’t exactly tug at my heart strings, because plainly speaking, most characters in this collection are fools, and I do not pity the fools. I despise them, and by consequence, I despise most of these stories.
The only two exceptions that spring to mind are “Diplomacy”, whose protagonist is smart and witty, and “Silkworms”, which is not even a proper story – but rather an essay, in which Hearn, using a domesticated silkworm as an example, philosophically muses on the meaning and purpose of life.
Only the stories in “Kwaidan” (also the best this volume has to offer) are actual fictional tales, where the titles from the other two collections are a combination of fiction and said non-fictional writings on subjects such as incense, porcelain and tea leaves. These subjects may appear fascinating to some, but I presume most of don’t really give a damn. Maybe it’s the difference in mentality, but the “honorable” and “just” in these old folklore comes across as incredibly dumb from today’s perspective.
As a whole, this collection mostly bored me, and amused me very rarely. I blame it not on Hearn, because it is evident that the man was eloquent and definitely knew how to write; no, I blame it on the folk tales, which Hearn, as said before, only translated. If he actually wrote his original fiction, I believe we would have another great horror writer instead of a great translator of boring and dull Oriental folk-tales.
Rating: 3/10
April 15, 2022
Out of the 29-30 stories I only liked two stories, the First and the last kwaidan
November 23, 2020
Rather unfortunately titled, in my opinion, this anthology collects a variety of the writing of the very interesting character, Lafcadio Hearn. Hearn was a bit of a world traveler, but his most well-known work came out of his decade living in Japan, and indeed, he remains a more well-known author there than anywhere else. This Wordsworth "Tales of Mystery and the Supernatural" edition contains the majority of Hearn’s tales from his book Kwaidan (minus his descriptions of various insects in Japanese folklore), a handful of essays from In Ghostly Japan, and the entirety of Some Chinese Ghosts.
My favorites were the spooky, languid ghost stories published originally in Kwaidan: Stories and Studies of Strange Things, which were even adapted into a horror anthology film in 1964 by Masaki Koyabashi. These tales were based on originally oral folklore collected from old Japanese sources and local people by Hearn and crafted into rather spare, elegant stories. In his writing, Hearn has, I feel, an almost modern voice and manages to avoid many pitfalls for an outsider writing of another culture. This is also true of the more philosophical and thoughtful essays from In Ghostly Japan included here.
On the other hand, Some Chinese Ghosts, written before Hearn had even traveled to Japan, takes a more ornate, fetishized take on Asian ghost literature, as he merely retells old Chinese stories available in Western literature in a picturesque and ironical style. Still interesting, but a little less deep than his later Japanese work delving into actual folklore
My favorites were the spooky, languid ghost stories published originally in Kwaidan: Stories and Studies of Strange Things, which were even adapted into a horror anthology film in 1964 by Masaki Koyabashi. These tales were based on originally oral folklore collected from old Japanese sources and local people by Hearn and crafted into rather spare, elegant stories. In his writing, Hearn has, I feel, an almost modern voice and manages to avoid many pitfalls for an outsider writing of another culture. This is also true of the more philosophical and thoughtful essays from In Ghostly Japan included here.
On the other hand, Some Chinese Ghosts, written before Hearn had even traveled to Japan, takes a more ornate, fetishized take on Asian ghost literature, as he merely retells old Chinese stories available in Western literature in a picturesque and ironical style. Still interesting, but a little less deep than his later Japanese work delving into actual folklore
December 22, 2014
I got his book after reading Hearn’s Kwaidan: Stories and Studies of Strange Things, which I enjoyed much. I wanted more of that Japanese ‘strange beauty’ he portrays.
The stories aren’t necessary scary in a contemporary way, especially since ghostly apparitions and supernatural encounters are not always considered being of evil nature and certainly not something out of the ordinary to the characters on the stories. The scenes presented by the author are beautifully crafted but still simple, and the subjects of the tales are diverse and thought inducing.
The one thing I would have to point out as not being my favorite was the section dedicated to Chinese stories. In my perception, the prose became a bit too allegoric and leaned a bit more toward religious themes than eerie ghostly events.
A delightful book for those interested in Japanese folktales.
The stories aren’t necessary scary in a contemporary way, especially since ghostly apparitions and supernatural encounters are not always considered being of evil nature and certainly not something out of the ordinary to the characters on the stories. The scenes presented by the author are beautifully crafted but still simple, and the subjects of the tales are diverse and thought inducing.
The one thing I would have to point out as not being my favorite was the section dedicated to Chinese stories. In my perception, the prose became a bit too allegoric and leaned a bit more toward religious themes than eerie ghostly events.
A delightful book for those interested in Japanese folktales.
October 18, 2016
I recommend skipping the introduction, which might politely be termed "a product of its time." I can't speak to the quality of the translations since I'm unable to read the tales in their original language, but from a ghost story standpoint, several of these are very good and creepy. I enjoyed many of the other tales, though I confess to being baffled by the lengthy piece on incense. It's vaguely related in the sense of having been used in burials and memorials, but it felt like a stretch. The ghostly tales from China that make up the last quarter of the book are also not as effective as ghost stories in comparison to the Japanese ones. That said, the book offers a fascinating glimpse of a Westerner's (albeit one who lived in Japan for much of his life and adopted it as his home) experiences in Japan during the Meiji period.
July 6, 2013
This was an interesting book in places, but frustratingly dull in others. Some of the stories were well told - the fluid prose of some of the Chinese fables, and the Japanese lore that Hearn places in the context of a conversation with a friend. At times, though, Hearn seems too removed from the telling of the story, leaving it too clinical and lacking in empathy. And, although ghosts appear in most of the stories, I felt the book title was misleading. The subtitle "Tales of Mystery & The Supernatural" was more accurate.
May 13, 2016
The collection of short stories has some gems but some that are just flat when compared with the other stories. I would not go into this expecting a western style of Ghost story most are along the lines of playing with perceptions and the mind and there are a lot of aspects about devotion and the consequences of breaking vows.
July 3, 2014
If you're looking for terror, this is not the book you want to read.
We can learnt about some traditional rituals and the culture but we must remember this was written in the turn of the 20th century!
We can learnt about some traditional rituals and the culture but we must remember this was written in the turn of the 20th century!
May 28, 2017
Not nearly as scary as one would hope.
I'm not sure if it is the translation but found a few words missing or sentence structure a little wacky. This caused a number of re-readings which seemed to make this book longer then what it really is.
I'm not sure if it is the translation but found a few words missing or sentence structure a little wacky. This caused a number of re-readings which seemed to make this book longer then what it really is.
August 14, 2014
Stories a bit mixed, some good, a few not so good. Worth reading.
January 11, 2015
overall quite good. The style of writing can seem a bit muddled at times, and a small few of the stories don't seem to contain much of a ghostly element, but altogether entertaining.
May 29, 2021
A collection of Japanese and Chinese stories of ghosts and the supernatural. These dreamlike stories are not scary, but are well written, interesting, and entertaining. Lafcadio Hearn has other works as well about his life in Japan — all worth reading.
Displaying 1 - 19 of 19 reviews