Tag Archives: literature

Japanese expression “〜するも” (~suru mo) and vagueness of the が (ga) particle

Recently I read the very enjoyable short story “麦本三歩は今日が好き” by 住野よる in the literary magazine 小説幻冬 (Dec 2016 edition). I even translated a short excerpt of it into English here. There was one line of the story whose grammar I just couldn’t figure out, and I thought that it was either some strange pattern I had never… Read More »

Japanese literature translation: 風の又三郎 (Matasaburo of the Wind) by 宮沢賢治 (Kenji Miyazawa) [part 1/6]

It is the first day of elementary school after summer break, and the children are surprised to find a strange redheaded boy has joined their class. Soon after, some of the children begin to suspect there is something special about the newcomer. Could he be the legendary “Matasaburo of the wind”, or just another boy?  Recently… Read More »

Japanese literature review: Kenji Miyazawa’s “Matasaburo of the Wind”

I’ll have to just come out and admit it: of all of the books I have read there is a small group I never made it to the end of, including both Japanese and English works. One of these is Kenji Miyazawa’s (宮沢賢治) “Night on the Galactic Railroad” (銀河鉄道の夜) which was a deeply moving story when… Read More »

Japanese novel short excerpt translation: “Passaggio” (パッサジオ) by Hitonari Tsuji (辻仁成)

I recently reviewed Hitonari Tsuji’s Passaggio, and in this post I will be translating a small portion of it. I usually like to translate the first chapter (or at least the first few pages) of novels that I enjoy, but in this case I found a certain passage that was written so beautifully I decided to… Read More »

Japanese novel review: “Passaggio” (パッサジオ) by Hitonari Tsuji (辻仁成)

Of the last five books I’ve read, two were in English and three in Japanese. The English ones were both pretty good (one biography, one fantasy), but since they had little to do with Japanese I haven’t posted reviews for them here. The first two Japanese books were pretty mediocre, so I decided against writing reviews of them as well.… Read More »

Japanese short novel translation: ”Sluggish Symbol, Inane Illusion” (緩慢な表象と虚ろな幻想): Chapter 10: “Graduation”

”Sluggish Symbol, Inane Illusion” is a short novel written by Yuki Fujimura that is published on syosetsu.com, which I enjoyed so much I decided to translate into English. This story takes place in a society where each citizen is legally obligated to write a single book during their lifetime. You can see more information about this novel including a brief synopsis, my… Read More »

Japanese short novel translation: ”Sluggish Symbol, Inane Illusion” (緩慢な表象と虚ろな幻想): Chapter 9: “Defeat”

”Sluggish Symbol, Inane Illusion” is a short novel written by Yuki Fujimira that is published on syosetsu.com, which I enjoyed so much I decided to translate into English. This story takes place in a unique society, where each citizen is legally obligated to write a single book during their lifetime. You can see more information about this novel including a… Read More »

Japanese short novel translation: ”Sluggish Symbol, Inane Illusion” (緩慢な表象と虚ろな幻想): Chapter 4: “City”

”Sluggish Symbol, Inane Illusion” is a story written by Yuki Fujimura that is published on syosetsu.com. I enjoyed it so much I decided to translate it into English. This story takes place in a unique society, where all citizens are legally obligated to write a single book during their lifetime. You can see more information about this novel including a brief… Read More »

Japanese short novel translation: ”Sluggish Symbol, Inane Illusion” (緩慢な表象と虚ろな幻想): Chapter 1: “Saki Mitsumura”

Recently I reviewed the short story ”Sluggish Symbol, Inane Illusion”  (緩慢な表象と虚ろな幻想) which I discovered on the site syosetsu.com. After reading through several stories on there, this is one of the few that I really liked (this is one of the others), and I felt it would be a perfect candidate for an English translation. I wrote a message to the story’s author… Read More »

Japanese short novel translation “Memoirs of a Traveller” (ある旅人の手記): Ch.1 “Coffee and Camera”

This is the first chapter of the story “Memoirs of a Traveller” which I am translating from Japanese to English. As you might guess from the name, this is a fictional story about someone’s travels throughout various cities and places. You can see my review of this story here, and the translation of the prologue (which should… Read More »