Japanese literature
Related: Japan - world literature - ero guro nansensu (literary genre) - Edogawa Ranpo - Ryu Murakami - manga (Japanese comics)
Kwaidan: Stories And Studies Of Strange Things (1904) - translated by Lafcadio Hearn
[Amazon.com] [FR] [DE] [UK]Kwaidan: Stories and Studies of Strange Things (often abbreviated to Kwaidan) is a book by Lafcadio Hearn, which features several Japanese ghost stories. It was later used as the basis a movie called Kwaidan by Masaki Kobayashi in 1965. [Aug 2006]
Definition
Japanese literature spans a period of almost two millennia. Early work was heavily influenced by Chinese literature, but Japan quickly developed a style and quality of its own. When Japan reopened its ports to Western trading and diplomacy in the 19th century, western literature had a strong effect on Japanese writers, and this influence is still seen today.
Although Japanese literature and Japanese authors are perhaps not as well known in the west as those in the European and American canons, Japan possesses an ancient and rich literary tradition that draws upon a millennium and a half of written records. --http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_literature [Aug 2006]
Haruki Murakami (1949)
The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle (1994-1995) - Haruki Murakami [Amazon.com] [FR] [DE] [UK]
Murakami Haruki is one of the most popular and controversial of today's Japanese authors. His genre-defying, humorous and fantastic works have sparked fierce debates in Japan over whether they are true "literature" or simple pop-fiction: Oe Kenzaburo has been one of his harshest critics. However, Western critics are nearly unanimous in assessing Murakami's works as having serious literary value. Some of his most well-known works include Norwegian Wood (1987) and The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle (1994-1995). --http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_literature [Feb 2005]
Haruki Murakami, born January 12, 1949) is a popular contemporary Japanese writer and translator. --http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haruki_Murakami [Feb 2004]
Murakami's fiction, which is often criticised for being "pop" literature by Japan's literary establishment, is humorous and surreal, and at the same time reflects an essential alienation, loneliness and longing for love in a way that has touched readers in the US and Europe, as well as in East Asia. --http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haruki_Murakami [Feb 2004]
thanks to Mr. Seeldraeyers
Junichiro Tanizaki (1886 - 1965)
Seven Japanese Tales () - Junichiro Tanizaki [Amazon.com] [FR] [DE] [UK]
Junichiro Tanizaki (Tanizaki Jun'ichir?, July 24, 1886 - July 30, 1965) was a Japanese author. Leetes Island Books, which translated In Praise of Shadows, romanizes his name as Jun'ichir? Tanizaki, while Vintage, a company that translated several of his books, romanizes his name as Junichiro Tanizaki.
Tanizaki was one of the major writers of modern Japanese literature, and remains perhaps the most popular Japanese novelist after Natsume Soseki. In his early years he was infatuated with the West and all things modern, living in a Western-style house in Yokohama, the foreign expatriate suburb of Tokyo, and leading a decidedly bohemian lifestyle. He was first published in 1910 but his reputation really began to take off when he moved to Kyoto after the Great Kanto Earthquake of 1923. The move triggered a change in his enthusiasms, as he abandoned his youthful love for the West and modernity, and became absorbed in traditional Japanese culture, particularly the culture of the Kansai region comprising Osaka, Kobe and Kyoto. The change in his attitudes can be seen best in his masterpiece "Sasameyuki" ("A Light Snowfall", published in English as "The Makioka Sisters"), a tale about four daughters of a waning Osaka merchant family. Though his early novels paint a rich atmosphere of 1920s Tokyo and Osaka, during the 1930s Tanizaki turned away from contemporary affairs to write about Japan's feudal past, perhaps as a reaction to the growing mood of militarism in society and politics. After World War II Tanizaki again emerged into literary prominence, winning a host of awards and until his death regarded as Japan's greatest living author. Most of his works are highly sensual in nature, a few particularly centering around eroticism but are laced with wit and ironic sophistication. --http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tanizaki_Junichiro [Apr 2005]
inspired by Midori