Niwa

JAPANESE - ENGLISH EDITION

Two tales from the master storyteller Kenji Miyazawa

"Matsuri no Ban" - Ryoji goes to the autumn festival that takes place in the village near his home. There he encounters a giant man with eyes the colour of "grubby gold." Is he, as the villagers claim, the Mountain Man of legend and is Ryoji wise to try to help him?

Kenji Miyazawa is well known for his tales of fantasy, but this story, although it contains an element of the supernatural, is firmly based in reality.

"Futari no Yakunin" - Very early one Sunday morning, two young boys set out to visit the fields outside the town where they live. When they are nearly at their destination they find that a notice board has been erected telling the public to "Keep Out." Despite the warning they decide to continue with their outing...

Told in the first person, this is a superb example of Miyazawa's "un-magical" writing. The characters and locations are acutely observed and lovingly described in a way which powerfully evokes the lost days of childhood.

In both these stories the characters very often speak colloquially, using language that is outside the province of most language learning text-books. Because of this extra pains have been taken to highlight and explain idiomatic expressions and contractions in speech and, although it is never possible to make a word for word translation from one language to another, all the speech has been translated, as literally as possible, into English.

This Japanese-English edition features:

- Modern Japanese text

- Kanji with furigana readings

- Detailed notes in English

*Recommended for advanced beginner and intermediate students.

About the authors -

Kenji Miyazawa (1896-1933) is often referred to as a writer of children's literature, but although his stories may appear simple they are far from child-like in conception or execution. Among his best known tales are "Gingatetsudo no Yoru" and "Cello Hiki no Goshu" both of which been made into animated films.

The English text was prepared by Elizabeth Plain, whose other works include the popular Kanji-Kan series of puzzle books.