Cat Town


Sakutarō Hagiwara - 2014
    Two of its poems were removed on order of the Ministry of the Interior for “disturbing social customs.” Along with the entirety of Howling, this volume includes all of Blue Cat, Hagiwara's second major collection, together with Cat Town, a prose-poem novella, and a substantial selection of verse from the rest of his books, giving readers the full breadth and depth of this pioneering poet's extraordinary work.

No Longer Human


Junji Ito - 2019
    I can't even guess myself what it must be to live the life of a human being.Plagued by a maddening anxiety, the terrible disconnect between his own concept of happiness and the joy of the rest of the world, Yozo Oba plays the clown in his dissolute life, holding up a mask for those around him as he spirals ever downward, locked arm-in-arm with death.Osamu Dazai’s immortal—and supposedly autobiographical—work of Japanese literature, is perfectly adapted here into a manga by Junji Ito. The imagery wrenches open the text of the novel one line at a time to sublimate Yozo’s mental landscape into something even more delicate and grotesque. This is the ultimate in art by Ito, proof that nothing can surpass the terror of the human psyche.

Richard Cory


Edwin Arlington Robinson - 2012
    frequently anthologized poem

The Wild Geese


Ōgai Mori - 1911
    The young heroine, Otama, is forced by poverty to become a moneylender's mistress. Her dawning consciousness of her predicament brings the novel to a touching climax.

Almost Transparent Blue


Ryū Murakami - 1976
    Murakami's image-intensive narrative paints a portrait of a group of friends locked in a destructive cycle of sex, drugs and rock'n'roll. The novel is all but plotless, but the raw and often violent prose takes us on a rollercoaster ride through reality and hallucination, highs and lows, in which the characters and their experiences come vividly to life. Trapped in passivity, they gain neither passion nor pleasure from their adventures. Yet out of the alienation, boredom and underlying rage and grief emerges a strangely quiet and almost equally shocking beauty. Ryu Murakami's first novel, Almost Transparent Blue won the coveted Akutagawa literary prize and became an instant bestseller. Representing a sharp and conscious turning away from the introspective trend of postwar Japanese literature, it polarized critics and public alike and soon attracted international attention as an alternative view of modern Japan.

Coleridge's Ancient Mariner and Select Poems


Samuel Taylor Coleridge
    He is probably best known for his poems The Rime of the Ancient Mariner and Kubla Khan, as well as his major prose work Biographia Literaria."

Rumi, Day by Day


Maryam Mafi - 2014
    These poems have been selected on the basis of the poignancy of their message and their relevance to contemporary life.This is timeless wisdom translated for modern readers. It is a guide for meditation and a light switch that you can turn on to make your daily connection with spirit. Use these words as tools to better your life each day, to draw continued guidance, inspiration and spiritual wealth.

The Izumi Shikibu Diary: A Romance of the Heian Court


Izumi Shikibu
    An outgrowth of a doctoral dissertation submitted to Stanford University in December 1965.

The Commandments


Óskar Guðmundsson - 2021
    Now a killer has taken the law into their own hands and meted out brutal retribution for ancient crimes.Salka is faced with tracking down the murderer of a stalwart of the church and the community, a man whose reputation stretches deep into the past, and even into the police team tasked with solving the case.As the killer prepares to strike again, Salka and her team search for the band of old friends who could be either killers or victims – or both.A bestseller in Iceland, The Commandments asks many challenging questions as it takes on some highly controversial issues.

The Best of Poe


Saddleback Educational Publishing - 2005
    This series features classic tales retold with color illustrations to introduce literature to struggling readers. Each 64-page eBook retains key phrases and quotations from the original classics. You'll be kept in suspense with these four Edgar Allan Poe short stories! The Pit and the Pendulum, The Fall of the House of Usher, The Cask of Amontillado, The Murders in the Rue Morgue.

Showa, 1926-1939: A History of Japan


水木しげる - 2013
    This volume deals with the period leading up to World War II, a time of high unemployment and other economic hardships caused by the Great Depression. Mizuki's photo-realist style effortlessly brings to life the Japan of the 1920s and 1930s, depicting bustling city streets and abandoned graveyards with equal ease. When the Showa era began, Mizuki himself was just a few years old, so his earliest memories coincide with the earliest events of the time. With his trusty narrator Nezumi Otoko (Rat Man), Mizuki brings history into the realm of the personal, making it palatable, and indeed compelling, for young audiences as well as more mature readers. As he describes the militarization that leads up to World War II, Mizuki's stance toward war is thoughtful and often downright critical--his portrayal of the Nanjing Massacre clearly paints the incident (a disputed topic within Japan) as an atrocity. Mizuki's "Showa 1926-1939" is a beautifully told history that tracks how technological developments and the country's shifting economic stability had a role in shaping Japan's foreign policy in the early twentieth century.

Ruskin Bond's Book Of Verse


Ruskin Bond - 2007
    And this tree, so complete in itself, Is only part of the mountain. And the mountain runs down to the sea. And the sea, so complete in itself, Rests like a raindrop On the hand of God. Ruskin Bond's Book of Verse brings together the poetry of one of India's best-loved writers. This charming collector's edition is a treasury of poems on love and nature, travel, humour and childhood, and will be a lasting source of delight to readers.

Inspector Imanishi Investigates


Seichō Matsumoto - 1961
    Only two clues surface: an old man, overheard talking in a distinctive accent to a young man, and the word “kameda.” Inspector Imanishi leaves his beloved bonsai and his haiku and goes off to investigate—and runs up against a blank wall. Months pass in fruitless questioning, in following up leads, until the case is closed, unsolved.But Imanishi is dissatisfied, and a series of coincidences lead him back to the case. Why did a young woman scatter pieces of white paper out of the window of a train? Why did a bar girl leave for home right after Imanishi spoke to her? Why did an actor, on the verge of telling Imanishi something important, drop dead of a heart attack? What can a group of nouveau young artists possibly have to do with the murder of a quiet and “saintly” provincial old ex-policemen? Inspector Imanishi investigates.

1000 Poems from the Manyōshū


Ōtomo no Yakamochi
    The 1,000 poems (out of a total of more than 4,500) in this famous selection were chosen by a distinguished scholarly committee based on their poetic excellence, their role in revealing the Japanese national spirit and character, and their cultural and historical significance. The acclaimed translations artfully preserve the simplicity and direct quality of the originals, and encompass an enormous range of human emotions and experiences. Text is in English only

Spirits Rebellious / The Madman/ The Forerunner


Kahlil Gibran - 2009
    "The Forerunner" and "The Madman" (1932).