The Columbia Anthology of Japanese Essays, ed. Steven D. Carter (chapter 1)

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CO LU M B I A A N T H O LO G Y O F J A PA N E S E E S S AY S Zuihitsu from the Tenth to the Twenty-First Century

E D I T E D A N D T R A N S L AT E D B Y

Steven D. Carter

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“The focused ramble of the traditional Japanese essay format called zuihitsu (literally, ‘following the brush’) has appealed to writers of both genders, all ages, and every class in Japanese society. Highly personal, these essays contain dollops of philosophy, odd anecdotes, quiet reflections, and pronouncements on taste. In running alongside the main tracks of Japanese literature, this broad collection of zuihitsu brims with idiosyncratic interest.”

— L I Z A D A L B Y, AU T H O R O F T H E TA L E O F M U R A S A K I A N D E A S T W I N D M E LT S T H E I C E : A M E M O I R T H R O U G H T H E S E A S O N S

A court lady of the Heian era, an early modern philologist, a novelist of the Meiji period, and a physicist at Tokyo University. What do they have in common, besides being Japanese? They all wrote zuihitsu—a uniquely Japanese literary genre encompassing features of the nonfiction or personal essay and miscellaneous musings. For sheer range of subject matter and breadth of perspective, the zuihitsu is unrivaled in the Japanese literary tradition, which may explain why few examples have been translated into English.

The Columbia Anthology of Japanese Essays presents a representative selection of more than one hundred zuihitsu from a range of historical periods written by close to fifty authors—from well-known figures, such as Matsuo Bashō, Natsume Sōseki, and Kōda Aya, to such writers as Tachibana Nankei and Dekune Tatsurō, whose works appear here for the first time in English. Writers speak on the experience of coming down with a cold, the aesthetics of tea, the physiology and psychology of laughter, the demands of old age, standards of morality, the way to raise children, the Great Kantō Earthquake of 1923, the thoughts that accompany sleeplessness, the anxiety of undergoing surgery, and the unexpected benefits of training a myna bird to say “Thank you.” These essays also provide moving descriptions of snowy landscapes, foggy London, the famous cherry blossoms of Ueno Park, and the appeal of rainy vistas, and relate the joys and troubles of everyone from desperate samurai to filial children to ailing cats.

STEVEN D. CARTER is Yamato Ichihashi Chair in Japanese History and Civilization at Stanford University. His numerous books include Haiku Before Haiku: From the Renga Masters to Bashō, Unforgotten Dreams: Poems by the Zen Monk Shōtetsu, and Waiting for the Wind: Thirty-Six Poets of Japan’s Late Medieval Age. CO V E R I M A G E : Ogata Gekko, title page of Zuihitsu (ca. 1886). (Bao Ming Collection) CO V E R D E S I G N : Milenda Nan Ok Lee

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