Recommendations based on "A Hundred Years of Japanese Film A Concise History, with a Selective Guide to DVDs and Videos"

Two of Murakami's early novels are brought together. Dark, dry and downright weird, 'A Wild Sheep Chase' is the story of a man, a girl, her ears and a very special sheep. 'Dance Dance Dance' is part murder-mystery, part metaphysical speculation.

Introducing Little Clothbound Classics: irresistible, mini editions of short stories, novellas and essays from the world's greatest writers, designed by the award-winning Coralie Bickford-Smith.Filled with rich description and luxurious beauty, these ten tales of loss and longing from one of Japan's greatest writers show the pull between duty and desire, ecstasy and death: a mother lost in mourning, a moonlit journey to fulfil a wish, a night of infidelity, a young lieutenant who ends his life.

"What a good dog you are. What a fine dog you are. Hachi, you are the best dog in all of Japan."Professor Ueno speaks these words to his faithful dog before boarding the train to work every morning. And every afternoon, just before three o'clock, Hachi is at the train station to greet his beloved master. One day, the train arrives at the station without the professor. Hachi waits.For ten years, Hachi waits for his master to return. Not even Yasuo, the young boy who takes care of Hachi, can persuade him to leave his post.Hachiko Waits, a novel inspired by a true story, brings to life the legendary Akita who became a national symbol for loyalty and devotion. This is a must-read for dog lovers of all ages.Hachiko Waits is a 2005 Bank Street - Best Children's Book of the Year.

Hiroshima-born Sadako is lively and athletic--the star of her school's running team. And then the dizzy spells start. Soon gravely ill with leukemia, the "atom bomb disease," Sadako faces her future with spirit and bravery. Recalling a Japanese legend, Sadako sets to work folding paper cranes. For the legend holds that if a sick person folds one thousand cranes, the gods will grant her wish and make her healthy again. Based on a true story, Sadako and the Thousand Paper Cranes celebrates the extraordinary courage that made one young woman a heroine in Japan.

In April 1926, the Japanese poet Taneda Santoka (1882–1940) set off on the first of many walking trips, journeys in which he tramped thousands of miles through the Japanese countryside. These journeys were part of his religious training as a Buddhist monk as well as literary inspiration for his memorable and often painfully moving poems. The works he wrote during this time comprise a record of his quest for spiritual enlightenment.Although Santoka was master of conventional-style haiku, which he wrote in his youth, the vast majority of his works, and those for which he is most admired, are in free-verse form. He also left a number of diaries in which he frequently recorded the circumstances that had led to the composition of a particular poem or group of poems. In For All My Walking, master translator Burton Watson makes Santoka's life story and literary journeys available to English-speaking readers and students of haiku and Zen Buddhism. He allows us to meet Santoka directly, not by withholding his own opinions but by leaving room for us to form our own. Watson's translations bring across not only the poetry but also the emotional force at the core of the poems.This volume includes 245 of Santoka's poems and of excerpts from his prose diary, along with a chronology of his life and a compelling introduction that provides historical and biographical context to Taneda Santoka's work.

Combining the whimsy and possibility of The Midnight Library with the mystery and revelatory power of The Secret, Come along for the ride of a lifetime in this heartwarming Japanese bestseller, a story about recognizing opportunities, embracing happiness, and discovering what true fulfillment looks like. What if a single journey could change everything for you? What if it could lead you to new possibilities, help you reconnect with loved ones, or bring peace to your past? In this charming story, the unluckiest man in Japan is given a chance to flip his fortunes when a mysterious driver appears, offering him the opportunity to seize a new path. Life’s setbacks can often feel overwhelming, but in The Lucky Ride, you’ll embark on a journey of self-growth that shows us that luck isn’t something you’re born with—it’s a result of the choices you make and the positive energy you bring into the world. Set off on this heartwarming adventure and discover that luck isn’t a random gift—it’s something you build over time, a treasure that can be passed down through the generations. Yasushi Kitagawa’s uplifting and compassionate parable will inspire you to find joy in every moment, recognize the blessings in your life, and understand that by living each day with a good spirit, you’re crafting your own luck, one ride at a time. Translated from the Japanese by Takami Nieda

Hospitalized with the dreaded atom bomb disease, leukemia, a child in Hiroshima races against time to fold one-thousand paper cranes.

"Silence I regard as a masterpiece, a lucid and elegant drama". Irving Howe. -- The New York Review of Books

As the dramatic climax of The Sea of Fertility, 'The Decay of the Angel' brings together the dominant themes of the three previous novels- the meaning and decay of Japan's courtly tradition and samurai ideal; the essence and value of Buddhist philosophy and aesthetics; and, underlying all, Mishima's apocalyptic vision of the modern era, which saw the dissolution of the moral and cultural forces that throughout the ages nourished a people and a world. The time is the late 1960s. Honda, now an aged and wealthy man, discovers and adopts a sixteen-year-old orphan, Toru, as his heir, identifying him with the tragic protagonists of the three previous novels, each of whom died at the age of twenty. Honda raises and educates the boy, yet watches him, waiting.

Read this imaginative masterpiece from the internationally bestselling author of Norwegian Wood The year is 1984. Aomame sits in a taxi on the expressway in Tokyo. Her work is not the kind which can be discussed in public but she is in a hurry to carry out an assignment and, with the traffic at a stand-still, the driver proposes a solution. She agrees, but as a result of her actions starts to feel increasingly detached from the real world. She has been on a top-secret mission, and her next job will lead her to encounter the apparently superhuman founder of a religious cult. Meanwhile, Tengo wishes to become a writer. He inadvertently becomes involved in a strange affair surrounding a literary prize to which a mysterious seventeen-year-old girl has submitted her remarkable first novel. It seems to be based on her own experiences and moves readers in unusual ways. Can her story really be true? Both Aomame and Tengo notice that the world has grown strange; both realise that they are indispensable to each other. While their stories influence one another, at times by accident and at times intentionally, the two come closer and closer to intertwining. 'It is a work of maddening brilliance and gripping originality, deceptively casual in style, but vibrating with wit, intellect and ambition' The Times