Enjoy a purely natural Massachusetts swamp with me.

Finally got my hands on an article about Yukitaca Osaki published in the Providence Sunday Journal in 1955. Whew! No wonder there is so much confusion about the guy. The author says he has a Ph.D. from Oberlin and was a former cabinet minister before becoming Gillette’s valet. :) Love research.

I haven’t posted anything for a long time, but if I still had students working on Meiji Taisho women’s history/literature I would absolutely send them to the Internet Archive. This amount of well curated material is amazing. Kudos to the folks uploading.

I haven’t posted anything for a long time, but if I still had students working on Meiji Taisho women’s history/literature I would absolutely send them to the Internet Archive. This amount of well curated material is amazing. Kudos to the folks uploading.

I woke up thinking about the remarkable Léonie Gilmour (mother of Isamu Noguchi) and that led me to this article by a scholar who points out the differences between the Japanese biography of Isamu by Masayo Duus with its translation by Peter Duus. inagashigemi.jpn.org/uploads/pdf/...

Woohoo! This wonderful English translation by Avery Udagawa is the Libby Reads! At Boston Public Library. I loved this book in both languages.

Friends, does anyone recognize what this was before it was broken? Tucked inside a jewelry box belonging to Yukitaka Osaki. The black pieces kind of felt like ink stone to me but I couldn’t make sense of the inscriptions.

I'm pretty sure everyone, at least once, wonders about where the poop goes when they flush the toilet on an airplane. JAL is happy to show you. www.youtube.com/watch?v=TomV...

Ceramic tea cup by Ikuko Iwamoto. Gift from a former student. Much appreciated.

I would love to see research on the popularity of Japanese valets/manservants in the USA between 1868 and 1945.

Anyone working on Japanese actors performing in New York City during the 1890s? I am looking for anecdotes, playbills, newspaper articles on Yukitaka Osaki （尾崎行隆）Yukio Ozaki's little brother who was interested in theatre and later became the dresser/steward/manservant to William Gillette.

Friends, could somebody remind me how to check if someone graduated from Keio in the 1880s and if it is possible to access the files from overseas?

In the midst of going down a rabbit hole. Ozaki Yukimasa 尾崎行正 had 4 sons - Ozaki Yukio 尾崎行雄, Osaki Yukitaca 尾崎行隆, Ozaki Yukitake 尾崎行武, and Ozaki Yukimasa 尾崎行昌.

Good morning. Avoid the news and let’s do a woods walk instead.

Someone is in a hurry for good things to happen in 2025.

Who needs Santa to decide if you have been naughty or nice when you have these judgmental buggers at home.

Damn it. It shouldn't be so hard to track down biographical information about fascinating American women from the early 20th century. These stories need to be told.

You know that sense of sadness when you see typos in books because even if there had been a human proofreader, the person didn't know the original Japanese to be able to spot the error.

Doing a bit of research on Japanese toilets. A Japanese scholar pointed out that given the premodern diet, Japanese excrement would have resembled that of a goat so using bamboo strips would have kept them plenty clean. No need for soft paper:) Just FYI.

Excavated from this morning’s cleaning. “for all sensuous people”

What is a reasonable number of book bags to keep for a retired librarian? I swear I have donated dozens and dozens to my local library, but still I find more every time I turn around.

Currently reading (and enjoying) Taiwan Travelogue, but I really want to see pictures of all the dishes being mentioned. I wonder if it could be adapted as a graphic novel. Or maybe a cookbook.

Audible has a nice selection of Japanese lit. Search engine is not the easiest to figure out, so try typing in your author 上橋菜穂子　村上春樹　川上美惠子. You can also search by genre (light novel) and filter by language.

Speaking of Japan Foundation, please sign up for their digital library card and borrow ebooks, audiobooks, digital magazines for free using the Libby app. Love the fact that it isn’t just English but also Japanese. www.jflalc.org/libby

Thanks to the Japan Foundation newsletter, I was reminded about the Japan Film Festival and able to sign up to watch some really great films being streamed. en.jff.jpf.go.jp

Reading a dissertation turned book and temporarily flummoxed by the writers' constant use of East-Asian ... when the book is about Vietnam. Then it occurred to me that I have never considered how Vietnamese tend to align themselves in terms of regional cultures. New rabbit hole!

Just a periodic reminder that Japan Foundation's Libby collection gets better each month. I just discovered Esperanza Ramirez-Christensen's bilingual My First Book of Haiku Poems. Perfect companion to the first cup of coffee.

Probably an odd question coming from a Japanese librarian, but can anyone suggest authors/titles of Japanese love stories that have been translated into English? Nothing comes to mind at the moment.

youtube.com/watch?v=ytMY... If only we could start each morning with a wonderful read aloud, oh wait, I think we can. Here is one to enjoy with your morning coffee.

I am enjoying Hit Parade of Tears by Izumi Suzuki, translated by Sam Bett, David Boyd, Daniel Joseph and Helen O'Horan, way more than I thought I would. On audiobook I can’t tell that the stories were done by different translators. Really smooth, lovely translations.

@alisonfincher.bsky.social Alison, have you done a podcast on Kaneko Misuzu yet? Not a prolific output because she had such a short life, but it would make a great sequel to your Miyazawa Kenji podcast. misuzukaneko.com

Just a note to say that I have 2 accounts until I can untangle myself. Thanks to both Alison and Laura for giving me codes. I have saved my info for this one and look forward to finding old friends and talking books, libraries, and toilets again.