British Children's Literature in Japanese Culture

Wonderlands and Looking-Glasses

Catherine Butler

• Publisher: Bloomsbury Academic
• Year: 2023
• Print ISBN: 9781350195479
• eBook ISBN: 9781350195493
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: English Literary Criticism
• Index: Literature

Whether watching Studio Ghibli adaptations of British children's books, visiting Harry Potter sites in Britain or eating at Alice in Wonderland -themed restaurants in Tokyo, the Japanese have a close and multifaceted relationship with British children's literature. In this, the first comprehensive study to explore this engagement, Catherine Butler considers its many manifestations in print, on the screen, in tourist locations and throughout Japanese popular culture. Taking stock of the influence of literary works such as Gulliver's Travels, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, The Tale of Peter Rabbit, Tom's Midnight Garden, and the Harry Potter series, this lively account draws on literary criticism, translation, film and tourist studies to explore how British children's books have been selected, translated, understood, adapted and reworked into Japanese commercial, touristic and imaginative culture. Using theoretically informed case studies this book will consider both individual texts and their wider cultural contexts, translations and adaptations (such as the numerous adaptations of British children's books by Studio Ghibli and others), the dissemination of distinctive tropes such as magical schools into Japanese children's literature and popular culture, and the ways in which British children's books and their settings have become part of way that Japanese people understand Britain itself.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half-Title
• Series
• Dedication
• Title
• Contents
• List of Figures
• Acknowledgements
• Note on the text
• Introduction: Writing from the outside in
• 1 Wonderland or Looking-Glass? Meiji Japan through the lens of children’s literature
• 2 Britain and the origins of Japanese children’s literature
• 3 Canons to the West, canons to the East: British children’s books in Japan
• 4 Hayao Miyazaki and British children’s literature
• 5 Children’s literature, tourism and the Japanese imagination
• Postscript: Reading from the inside out
• References
• Index
• Copyright