Japan and Christianity

The Christian history of Japan began long before the famous Christian century of the 16th century. Nestorian Christians from Persia are said to have built churches as early as the 7th century in Nara, and even converted…

Oku no Hosomichi

The Narrow Road to the Deep North (奥の細道) is a major work by the Japanese poet, Matsuo Bashō (1644–1694). The text is written in the form of a travel diary, and it was penned as he made…

Ancient Japanese Ghost Stories

The stories in this volume were first recorded in 1918 by Richard Gordon Smith, who spent twenty years traveling in Japan and collecting vintage folklore related to supernatural events. This edited and updated version of the century-old…

A Walk Across Dalian

In the tradition of his “Everyday Dalian” photobook, the Municipal Government of Dalian originally commissioned SongLi to produce his second photography book about the city. The intended purpose was as…

Under The Dragon Flag

James Allan recounts his misadventures in Northeast Asia during the 1894-95. After gambling away his fortune in Monte Carlo Allan signs up as a sailor and sets out for the seas. He eventually finds himself aboard the…

Under the Ensign of the Rising Sun

The Russo-Japanese War grew out of the rival imperial ambitions of the Russian Empire and Japanese Empire over Manchuria and Korea. Harry Collingwood provides a personal narrative of this conflict, that served as a prelude for the…

1904: An Officer’s Journal During the Russo-Japanese War

In 1904-1905, Ian Standish Monteith Hamilton was the military representative of the Indian Army serving with the Japanese Army in Manchuria. Among the several military advisors from Western countries, he was the first to arrive in Japan…

Celebrated Geysha of Tokyo

A photographic book that commemorates the Geisha (spelled Geysha in the 1890s) community of Tokyo. These iconic images capture an insight into an ancient Japanese cultural tradition.

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Dalian Ghost Stories

The city of Dalian has always held secrets. Its foreign colonization and occupation brought external cultures and languages to Northeast China. Great Britain, Russia, and Japan took turns dominating the region for nearly a century, influencing local…

Of Goblins and Samurai: The Kojiki

OF GOBLINS AND SAMURAI: THE KOJIKI is the oldest chronicle in Japan, dating from the 8th century. Composed by Ōno Yasumaro at the request of Empress Gemmei, the collection contains myths about the origin of the four…

Droplings

When Allied forces parachute wooden decoy soldiers over wartime Germany, a pagan terror is stirred after centuries of sleep.

Even the Romans ignored the legends and put little faith in the oral superstitions. It was a mistake…

Haunted Tales of the Tokugawa

In 1590 AD the Hōjō clan was overthrown at the Battle of Odawara by the forces of Taikō Hidéyoshi. His second in command, and future Shogun of all Japan, Tokugawa Iyeyasu, was given authority over the captured…

The Awakening of China

China’s period of isolation is over. To understand its future, look to its recent past. A century ago, China was considered a theatre of the greatest movement taking place on the face of the globe. Efforts of…

On the Great Highway

James Creelman became the first American journalist to interview the Pope, accompanied the Japanese in their war with China in Manchuria, visited Tolstoy at his home in Russia, got wounded in the Philippines as a correspondent in…

New Forces In Old China

This book from 1909 describes the development of change within old, conservative, exclusive China by the three great transforming forces of the modern world – Western trade, Western politics and Western religion. These forces are producing stupendous…

Notable Women of Modern China

During a stay of some months in China during 1909, Margaret E. Burton had an opportunity to see the educational system of the country for women. She was greatly impressed, and compiled profiles of some of the…

The Tale Of Genji

Murasaki Shikibu’s epic-length novel, The Tale of Genji, probes the psychological, romantic and political workings of mid-Heian Japan. The novel earned Murasaki Shikibu notoriety even in the early 11th century, some six hundred years before the printing…

The Civilization of China

Herbert Allen Giles (1845-1935) was a British linguist who modified a Mandarin Chinese Romanization system established by Thomas Wade earlier, resulting in the Wade-Giles Chinese transliteration system. Giles was a diplomat to China (1867-1892) who later became…

More Glimpses of Unfamilar Japan

Hearn offers another look into a side of Japan that no longer exists, lost in modern history. Yet his observations gave the Western world its first look at this mysterious and misunderstood culture. This second series also…

Memoir of a Chinese Princess

In 1903, Princess Der Ling became First Lady-in-Waiting to Tzu-Hsi, the Empress Dowager, who was fascinated by the young woman’s travels and experiences in places the Empress would never see. Der Ling served her Empress for two…

Kwaidan: Stories and Studies of Strange Things

This collection of 17 old stories from Japan was collected and translated by the well-known ethnographer, Lafcadio Hearn, and first published in English in 1904. The tales are old folk stories that deal with ghosts and the…

Kokoro: Japanese Inner Life Hints

These stories follow Hearn’s particular interests of Japanese folklore and the vanishing culture of which he found himself a part in post-Meji Japan. Each story is a slice of life focusing on Japanese character, morals and feelings.…

Japanese Fairy Tales

Yei Theodora Ozaki’s classic Japanese fairy tales are showcased in this new compilation. Featured are twenty-two favorite tales that introduce the vivid world of Japanese fantasy. It is a landscape of ghouls, goblins, and ogres. Of sea…

JAPAN: An Attempt at Interpretation

Hearn’s book is incredibly insightful and thorough, offering a history of the various forms of Shinto, Buddhism, Confucianism and other folk-practices that shaped the national character of Japan. It also details Japanese interactions and culture, and most…

Glimpses of Unfamiliar Japan

Hearn offers a look into a side of Japan that no longer exists, lost in modern history. Yet his observations gave the Western world its first look at this mysterious and misunderstood culture. This first series contains…

Folklore of Old Japan

Algernon Bertram Freeman-Mitford (1837-1916), Lord Redesdale, was in the British Foreign Service as a young man. He was assigned to the legation in Japan for several years and acquired a life-long fascination with Japanese culture. This book…

Diaries of Court Ladies From Old Japan

Written nearly one thousand years ago, these diaries continue to intrigue modern readers. Authored by three Ladies of the Royal Court in Japan, they show not only Imperial life, but also life in Japan before its traditional…

Court Life in China

One woman ruled China for nearly half a century, The Empress Dowager. An unequaled historical figure, the Empress has often been misunderstood and misrepresented. From her participation in the Boxer movement to failing to modernize China in…

Christianity In Japan

This book attempts to interpret the characteristics of Japan at a time when it became a modern power. It focuses on many social attitudes, and the role of religion and influences of Christianity on the society. Written…

China and the Manchus

Herbert Allen Giles (1845-1935) was a British linguist who modified a Mandarin Chinese Romanization system established by Thomas Wade earlier, resulting in the Wade-Giles Chinese transliteration system. Giles was a diplomat to China (1867-1892) who later became…

China and the Foreign Powers

The relationship between China and the world is a complex one of economic cooperation and political mistrust. This book give a detailed account of the turbulent times in Asia at the turn of the century. Plus, its…

Bushido: The Soul of Japan

Originally written during the Russo-Japanese War of 1904, this revised edition explains the Japanese soul from a unique historical perspective. Written by a Japanese professor, it contrasts the Spirit of Japanese culture at a time of its…

Dairen: 1936

The original text from the 1936 SMR tourist handbook for the city of Dairen, now known as Dalian. This historic document details the colonial situation of the famous Chinese port while it was a Japanese territory. The…

Blue Sky Red Tears: Book One

Dairen was Japan’s first colonial city in Manchuria. It was a foothold for the Empire’s plans of expansion in and conquest of China. But the prosperity of the 1930s was not shared by all of the colony’s…