Significantly expanded and updated—a lively excursion into Japanese folklore and its increasing influence within global popular culture.
Monsters, spirits, fantastic beings, and supernatural creatures haunt the folklore and popular culture of Japan. Broadly labeled yōkai, they appear in many forms, from tengu mountain goblins and kappa water sprites, to shape-shifting kitsune foxes and long-tongued ceiling-lickers. Popular today in anime, manga, film, and video games, many yōkai originated in local legends, folktales, and regional ghost stories. The Book of Yōkai invites readers to examine how people create, transmit, and collect folklore, and how they make sense of the mysteries in the world around them.
Revised and expanded, this second edition features fifty new illustrations, including an all-new yōkai gallery of stunning color images tracing the visual history of yōkai across centuries. In clear and accessible language, Michael Dylan Foster unpacks the cultural and historical contexts of yōkai, interpreting their varied meanings and introducing people who have pursued them through the ages.
By:
Michael Dylan Foster
Illustrated by:
Shinonome Kijin
Imprint: University of Calgary Pre
Country of Publication: United States
Edition: 2nd edition
Dimensions:
Height: 229mm,
Width: 152mm,
Spine: 33mm
Weight: 771g
ISBN: 9780520403888
ISBN 10: 0520403886
Pages: 480
Publication Date: 14 January 2025
Audience:
College/higher education
,
Further / Higher Education
Format: Paperback
Publisher's Status: Active
Contents List of Illustrations Preface and Acknowledgments Names, Dates, Places PART I. YOKAI CULTURE 1. Introducing Yōkai Yōkai, Folklore, and This Book The Language of Yōkai Event Becomes Object Questioning Yōkai 2. Shape-Shifting History Heroes of Myth and Legend Weird Tales and Weird Tastes Modern Disciplines Postwar Animation and the Yōkai Boom 3. Yōkai Practice / Yōkai Theory Yōkai Culture Network Zones of Uncertainty PART II. YOKAI CODEX 4. The Order of Yōkai 5. Wilds 6. Water 7. Countryside 8. Village and City 9. Home PART III. YOKAI GALLERY 10. Seeing Yōkai 11. Illustrating Yōkai 12. A Completely Incomplete Yōkai Exhibition Epilogue: Monsterful Notes Bibliography Alphabetized List of Yōkai in the Codex Index
Michael Dylan Foster is Professor in the Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures at the University of California, Davis. He is author of many works on Japanese folklore, including Pandemonium and Parade: Japanese Monsters and the Culture of Yōkai.
