If you were to choose anyone to compile a collection of Japanese short stories, then it would be veteran translator Jay Rubin. Further, this edition is enhanced by an introduction from Haruki Murakami, two of whose stories feature. As one might expect in such an extensive volume (it runs to 500 pages), not all of the stories are successes, but there were certainly far more hits than misses. Reading this, one can see how much of how the Japanese think about themselves (and project themselves through literature) is inevitably shaped by history and convention, whether it is the honour in suicide or the sheer number of disasters (natural and man-made, spanning the atom bomb through to Fukushima, as well as a number of earthquakes). The collection is neatly divided into thematic sections as opposed to showing the authors chronologically. Stories I rated included those by Tanizaki, Mishima, Abe, Ogawa, Kunikida, Murakami, Shibata, Betsuyaku, Akatagawa, Seirai, Kawabata and Sató. Not rated.
By Jay Rubin