Japanese Supernatural Tales

A haunting gathering of classic Japanese tales of monsters and demons, yokai and oni and yurei, that live on in popular manga, anime, J-horror films, and video games A Penguin Classic Flesh-eating oni demons, kappa water sprites, shapeshifting kitsune foxes, vengeful yurei ghosts, and other monsters and magical creatures have long lurked in the shadows of Japanese culture, appearing as divine beings in eighth-century myths, dangerous demons in medieval literature, troublesome tricksters in local legends, and sinister predators in modern fiction. With dozens of stories, including twenty-four that have never been published in English, this volume showcases an incomparable range of the supernatural-from the beautiful ghost that seduces a widowed samurai, to the jorogumo spiders that transform into women to ensnare their human prey, to the sentient reflection that unnerves a night watchman in Haruki Murakami's "The Mirror"-inviting you into a realm of frightening otherness from a rich, thousand-year tradition.

Michael Dylan Foster (editor) is the author of The Book of Yokai: Mysterious Creatures of Japanese Folklore and Pandemonium and Parade: Japanese Monsters and the Culture of Yokai. A professor in the Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures at the University of California, Davis, he has been the "Yokai Navigator" since 2022 for the NHK World documentary television series YOKAI: Exploring Hidden Japanese Folklore.

Introduction by Michael Dylan Foster Suggestions for Further Reading Acknowledgments A Note About Japanese Names and Words JAPANESE SUPERNATURAL TALES I. THE AGE OF THE GODS Kojiki (Record of Ancient Matters) II. COURT AND COUNTRYSIDE The Tale of Genji by Murasaki Shikibu Tales of Times Now Past Two Tales of Tengu III. EDO PERIOD AND THE KAIDAN BOOM Selections from Hand Puppets (Otogiboko) by Asai Ryoi Selections from One Hundred Tales from the Various Provinces(Shokoku hyaku-monogatari) "A Ghost Asks Jusaku a Favor" from Taihei hyaku-monogatari "The Smallpox Demon" from Nanreishi by Tada Yoshitoshi "Will-o'- the- Wisps" from Isetsu-machimachi by Wada Uko "Death and the Mermaid" from Exemplary Tales of the Way of the Warrior by Ihara Saikaku Two Spider Tales "Shuten Doji" "The House Amid the Thickets" from Tales of Moonlight and Rain (Ugetsu monogatari) by Ueda Akinari Selections from Mimi-bukuro by Negishi Yasumori Selections from Toen shosetsu by Kyokutei Bakin IV. THE MEIJI TRANSITION News of the Times Two Tales by Lafcadio Hearn (Koizumi Yakumo) "Sea Dæmons" by Izumi Kyoka V. STORIES OF A MODERN NATION A Selection of Legends Two Stories by Okamoto Kido "The Man Traveling with the Brocade Portrait" by Edogawa Ranpo "The Sea Monk" by Tanaka Kotaro "Happiness" by Nakajima Atsushi "The Mermaid and the Samurai" by Dazai Osamu "Love in Two Lives: The Remnant" by Enchi Fumiko "The Woman with the Flying Head" by Kurahashi Yumiko "The Mirror" by Murakami Haruki Notes and Credits