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Yei Theodora Ozaki was the daughter of a Japanese father and an English mother. After her parents' marriage ended, Ozaki began a life of world travel, first raised by her mother in England and then her father in Japan. Later she traveled through Europe, where she began to translate the traditional Japanese stories she loved into English. She went on to translate several collections of Japanese folk tales including this one. Lucy Fraser is Lecturer in Japanese at the University of Queensland (AUS) where she teaches Japanese popular culture, literature and language. Her most recent publication is the book The Pleasures of Metamorphosis: Japanese and English Fairy Tale Transformation of The Little Mermaid. Her research interests include animal-human interactions in Japanese fairy tale retellings.
Drawn from many Japanese sources and enhanced with dozens of woodcut-style drawings by Tokyo artist Kakuz Fujiyama, the stories succeed in meeting Ozaki's intention to interest young readers of the West. Most intriguing is Fraser's encouragement of a more critical reading, with an eye toward imperialist expansion, indigenous conflict, and gender inequity, issues as prevalent today as in centuries past. --Booklist
