The Book of Yokai
eBook - PDF

The Book of Yokai

  1. 336 pages
  2. English
  3. PDF
  4. Available on iOS & Android
eBook - PDF

The Book of Yokai

About this book

A lively excursion into Japanese folklore and its ever-expanding influence on global popular culture through the concept of yokai. Monsters, ghosts, fantastic beings, and supernatural phenomena of all sorts haunt the folklore and popular culture of Japan. Broadly labeled yokai, these creatures come in infinite shapes and sizes, from tengu mountain goblins and kappa water spirits to shape-shifting foxes and long-tongued ceiling-lickers. Currently popular in anime, manga, film, and computer games, many yokai originated in local legends, folktales, and regional ghost stories. Drawing on years of research in Japan, Michael Dylan Foster unpacks the history and cultural context of yokai, tracing their roots, interpreting their meanings, and introducing people who have hunted them through the ages. In this delightful and accessible narrative, readers will explore the roles played by these mysterious beings within Japanese culture and will also learn of their abundance and variety through detailed entries, some with original illustrations, on more than fifty individual creatures. The Book of Yokai invites readers to examine how people create, transmit, and collect folklore, and how they make sense of the mysteries in the world around them. By exploring yokai as a concept, we can better understand broader processes of tradition, innovation, storytelling, and individual and communal creativity.

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Yes, you can access The Book of Yokai by Michael Dylan Foster in PDF and/or ePUB format, as well as other popular books in History & Asian History. We have over one million books available in our catalogue for you to explore.

Information

Table of contents

  1. Cover
  2. The Book of Yōkai
  3. Title
  4. Copyright
  5. Dedication
  6. Contents
  7. List of Illustrations
  8. Water Goblin Tales: Preface and Acknowledgments
  9. Names, Dates, Places
  10. PART I. YŌKAI CULTURE
  11. PART II. YŌKAI CODEX
  12. Epilogue: Monsterful
  13. Notes
  14. Bibliography
  15. Alphabetized List of Yōkai in the Codex
  16. Index