Lafcadio Hearn (1850-1904) was one of the earliest foreign writers to publish stories and essays about Japan in English. Arriving in 1890, he taught English literature and began publishing books on Japan in 1894, soon becoming known as the most perceptive interpreter of all things Japanese to the West. His books on Japan include Glimpses of Unfamiliar Japan, Kwaidan and In Ghostly Japan.
Steve Kemme is president of the Lafcadio Hearn Society/USA and a former reporter for the Cincinnati Enquirer, where Hearn formerly worked. He is a member of the Japan Research Center of Greater Cincinnati and has spoken at Hearn symposiums worldwide.
Donald Richie (1924-2013), novelist, essayist, journalist, and film scholar, was born in Lima, Ohio, in 1924, but had spent most of the last sixty years witnessing and reporting on the transformation of Japan from postwar devastation to economic powerhouse. He was the author of some forty books of fiction and nonfiction, dozens of speeches and essays, and hundreds of book, film, and arts reviews.
"All nations believed in the rebirth of the soul and had probably
empirical evidence like that Lafcadio Hearn found among the
Japanese." —William Butler Yeats
"In the turbid, shallow flood of the ephemeral books of our time
Lafcadio Hearn's contribution to English letters has been partially
obscured. But day by day, as these sink unfruitfully into the sands
of time, more clearly emerge the stern and exquisite outlines of
his patient work." —Elizabeth Bisland
"I invested in a large number of books on Japan and tried to read
some of them. I felt rather lost in Japanese history, but I liked
the knightly tales and pleasant prose of Lafcadio Hearn."
—Jawaharal Nehru
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