Lafcadio Hearn
Lafcadio Hearn (Patrick Lafcadio Hearn, Yakumo Koizumi/小泉八雲) is a Japanese researcher and writer. Born in Greece, he was brought up in Ireland, worked in the United States, and had citizenship in Japan. He is famous as the author of “Kwaidan,” a collection of literary works focused on monsters. These ghost stories are widely known even now, such as “ROKURO-KUBI,” “YUKI-ONNA,” and “MIMINASHI-HOICHI,” which are based on his work. These strange works are Yakumo’s summaries of stories which he heard from his wife, Setsu. Koizumi married Koizumi Setsu, a samurai’s daughter, and after a few years they moved to Kumamoto Prefecture in Kumamoto City, Hyogo Prefecture Kobe City. At the age of 45, he began his career at the the Tokyo Imperial University (later the University of Tokyo) as an English teacher. After his retirement, Natsume Soseki took his place.
Natsume Soseki, Japanese writer
1867-1916 Novelist and Professor of English literature
He had been studying in the UK as an international student. Meiji 33. In
Both Natsume Soseki and Lafcadio Hearn taught at Tokyo University, and their works are very popular in Japan. We would like to highlight the similarities within their writings as a comparison between ghost stories within the English and Japanese traditions.
“The Broken Promise” by Hearn and “Ten Dream nights” by Soseki Natsume
Story plots
The broken promise by Hearn
Ghost Terrorizing Her Murderer
At death’s door, a wife begs her husband, a samurai, “Please do not marry again.” The samurai promises this. The wife requested that the samurai build her grave in one corner of the garden and put bells in the grave. However, the samurai’s family members required him to remarry. The samurai stated, “When I started to feel a reasonable affection for my new wife …. It is about seven days after marriage.” The samurai was required serve a night shift. That night, the ghost of his previous wife stood on the new wife’s bed. She heard the sound of a bell, and the old wife said, “Leave this house, but do not say anything about me, or I will surely kill you.” The wife was scared, and threatened to tell her husband, but the old wife said that it was not possible to get divorced. The ghost of the previous wife appeared the next day as well. At last the new wife told her husband everything. Her husband set another samurai to guard his new wife at night. However, the samurai guard went to play a Japanese board game, “Go,” in the next room. The samurai guard heard the sound of a bell, but could not move his body. Then the samurai and the other guards fell asleep against their will. The next morning, the samurai husband came back to the new wife’s room, and saw her dead body, decapitated. The head was not slashed as if with a sword, but torn off. The husband tried to wake up the samurai guards, but could not. When they followed the trail of blood, they came to the old wife’s grave. The ghost of the old wife was standing by her grave, holding the severed head of the new wife. The bells buried in the old wife’s grave were found around the new wife’s neck. The husband angrily slashed at the ghost with his sword, and she disappeared.
The first night of “Ten nights of
A man dreams that just before death, a woman says “I will come to see you in one hundred years.” After her death, the man buries the woman, and attempts to wait. Several days pass, and when the man loses count of the days, a hundred lilies bloom from the grave of the woman. The man knows that one hundred years have passed. Though the man waited one hundred years, it had only felt like a moment.
When the woman was living she had long black hair, and rosy cheeks, showing the life within her. When she died, however, these attributes that brought life to the woman’s appearance went away, and were replaced by the blooming lilies to represent that life. The man’s joy at seeing the lilies represents the beauty of eternal love.
The plots within these stories are
In this website, we have explored the Japanese
Bibliography
Hearn, Lafcadio.
Natsume Soseki. Ten Nights of
King, F. “The Tower of London, by Natsume Soseki.” Spectator -London- Weekly- 9207, no. 9207 (2005): 35
Natsume, Sōseki, and Marvin Marcus. Reflections in a Glass
Image Bibliography
Natsume, Soseki. n.d. Portrait of Natsume Soseki. Soseki No Omoide. National Diet Library. http://www.ndl.go.jp/portrait/e/datas/307_1.html.
Paul Delaroche, 1797 – 1856. 1833. The Execution of Lady Jane Grey. Place: The National Gallery, London, Bequeathed by the Second Lord Cheylesmore, 1902. https://library-artstor-org.ezproxy.guilford.edu/asset/ANGLIG_10313766349.
Suzuki Tokoku, Japan, Tokyo, 1846-1913. late 19th-early 20th century. Ghost Terrorizing Her Murderer. Sculpture, Netsuke. Place: Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, California, USA, Raymond and Frances Bushell Collection, M.91.250.239, http://www.lacma.org/. https://library-artstor-org.ezproxy.guilford.edu/asset/AMICO_LACMA_103887217.
The Miriam and Ira D. Wallach Division of Art, Prints and Photographs: Print Collection, The New York Public Library. “Lafcadio Hearn.” New York Public Library Digital Collections. Accessed November 30, 2018. http://digitalcollections.nypl.org/items/510d47df-de8d-a3d9-e040-e00a18064a99
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