Setsuwa and Medieval Japanese Buddhism

For decades, writing by women was treated as its own separate genre in Japan, joryu bungaku. In today's episode, we’ll start with an explanation of why joryu bungaku became its own separate genre. We’ll move on to the story of women’s writing between the Meiji Era and the Pacific ...  عرض المزيد

In this episode, we examine the history of the Aum Affair and its lasting impact on Japanese fiction.We'll start out with the history of new religions in Japan, including Aum Shinrikyo. We'll take a look at Haruki Murakami's non-fiction book, Underground: The Tokyo Gas Attack and ...  عرض المزيد

Three stories from Japan about love gone wrong. On the first, the fairest youth in all the land is set to marry the daughter of a rich noble. The problem? His father kind of oversold his looks... On the second, we'll see why moths and other nighttime bugs go toward the light, and ...  عرض المزيد

<div>Two stories from Japan about samurai (and wannabe samurai) following their dreams. Too bad it takes fights with giant creatures and a little bit of murder to do so.

The creature this time is ao nyōbō, and she doesn't want you to stop by her beautiful, horribly dilap ...  عرض المزيد

🐸Love means never having to say I'm sorry (I poisoned you)"🐸...or something like that. This Valentine's Day there are three love stories from Japan. On the first, a man moves on after becoming a widower (kind of), on the second, two frogs fall out of love...with a place, and on ...  عرض المزيد

Three connected stories of samurai from medieval Japan. On the first, Kintaro, a buff eight-year-old, discovers his destiny. On the second, Watanabe no Tsuna, a samurai warrior in his prime fights a demon that's been terrorizing a gate in Kyoto, and on the third he's recruited by ...  عرض المزيد