Japanese Fairy Tales
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Product Description
This is a collection of 22 charming Japanese fairy tales, originally published in 1905, selected and translated by Yei Theodora Ozaki. Included are legends and fairy tales about peasants and kings, god and terrible forces, princesses, animals, the sea, and the sky.
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Since it was free I didn’t really know what to expect but the tales are reasonably nice. Not all of them are light-hearted though and even with the ones with “pleased endings” you still might not want to read them to kids.
Reader’s Rating: 5 / 5
the tales are wonderful. a few of them match some of the stoies we heard while living in Okinawa with the military.
HOWEVER, I cannot give the Kindle version a 5 star like I want to, because the formatting is absolutely horrendous.
Reader’s Rating: 4 / 5
Originally published in 1903, Yei Theodora Ozaki’s translation of Sadanami Sanjin’s collection of Japanese fairy tales has been the introduction of many a young child into the legends and fables of ancient Japan across the years. Certainly not a scholarly reference or valuable research tool for folktale researchers, Ozaki unabashedly re-crafted some of the tales, translating loosely and adding in fundamentals of unrelated tales, in order to make them more enjoyable and understandable for Western children. She even gave Urashimataro a pleased ending!
There is something delightfully romantic about translations from this era, due to the unfamiliarity with Japanese culture at the time. Terms that would not be translated today, like “oni” and “samurai”, are rendered as “ogre” and “knight” and additional English equivalents. While unauthentic, this makes the tales more approachable by young children who have a mind for fantasy but haven’t yet graduated to Japanese Studies.
While far from a picture book, artist Kakuzo Fujiyama contributed 66 gorgeous drawings to illustrate the 22 tales. Sorry to say, all the illustrations are reproduced in black-and-white, as a replacement for of the original color plates included in the original pressings.
Many of the tales here are familiar with anyone even slightly interested in Japanese folklore. “Momotaro, or the Tale of the Son of a Peach, “The Tale of Urashima Taro, the Fisher Lad”, “Kintaro the Golden Boy” and “The Ogre of Rashomon”. Along with these, there are rarer tales that I haven’t seen in any additional Japanese fairy tale collection. “The Stones of Five Colors and the Empress Jokwa”, “The Astute Monkey and the Boar” and “How and Ancient Man Lost his Wren” were all new to me.
Reader’s Rating: 4 / 5