Often considered an exotic garment of “traditional Japan,” the kimono is in fact a vibrant part of Japanese modernity, playing an integral role in literature and film throughout the twentieth century. Reading the Kimono in Twentieth-Century Japanese Literature and Film is the first extended study to offer new ways of interpreting textual and visual narratives through “kimono language”—what these garments communicate within their literary, historical, and cultural contexts. Kimonos on the page and screen do much more than create verisimilitude or function as one-dimensional symbols. They go beyond simply indicating the wearer’s age, gender, class, and taste; as eloquent, heterogeneous objects, they speak of wartime and postwar histories and shed light on everything from gender politics to censorship. By reclaiming “kimono language”—once a powerful shared vernacular—Michiko Suzuki accesses inner lives of characters, hidden plot points, intertextual meanings, resistant messages, and social commentary. Reading the Kimono examines modern Japanese literary works and their cinematic adaptations, including Tanizaki Jun’ichirō’s canonical novel, The Makioka Sisters, and its film versions, one screened under the US Occupation and another directed by Ichikawa Kon in 1983. It also investigates Kōda Aya’s Kimono and Flowing, as well as Naruse Mikio’s 1956 film adaptation of the latter. Reading the Kimono additionally advances the study of women writers by discussing texts by Tsuboi Sakae and Miyao Tomiko, authors often overlooked in scholarship despite their award-winning, bestselling stature. Through her analysis of stories and their afterlives, Suzuki offers a fresh view of the kimono as complex “material” to be read. She asks broader questions about the act of interpretation, what it means to explore both texts and textiles as inherently dynamic objects, shaped by context and considered differently over time. Reading the Kimono is at once an engaging history of the modern kimono and its representation, and a significant study of twentieth-century Japanese literature and film.

The third collection of deadpan absurdist poetry by a Certified Journeyman Farrier from Montana.

Based on twelve months of in-depth ethnographic research in Japan with retailers, customers, wholesalers, writers and craftspeople, Selling the Kimono is a journey behind the scenes of a struggle to adapt to difficult economic conditions and declining demand for the kimono. The kimono is an iconic piece of clothing, instantly recognised as a symbol of traditional Japanese culture. Yet, little is known about the industry that makes and sells the kimono, in particular the crisis this industry is currently facing. Since the 1970s, kimono sales have dropped dramatically, craftspeople are struggling to find apprentices, and retailers have closed up shop. Illuminating recent academic investigations into the lived experience of economic crisis, this volume presents a story of an industry in crisis, and the narratives of hope, creativity and resilience that have emerged in response. The ethnographic depth and theoretical contribution to understanding the effects of economic crisis and the transformation of traditional culture will be of broad interest to students, academics and the general public.

Modern Japanese quilting blends Eastern and Western techniques to create quilts of extraordinary style and beauty. Using designs borrowed from a rich decorative arts heritage, and often incorporating traditional kimono fabrics, Japanese quilters have developed a distinctive style based on unusual motifs and striking color combinations. With Japanese Quilted Blocks to Mix and Match, any quilter can create exquisite and unique works of patchwork art in the Japanese tradition. The book presents more than 125 different block patterns, each with complete instructions and a color photograph, representing a variety of pattern sources: kamon (family crests), Hakone yosegi (parquetry) and traditional textiles, such as kasuri weave. Each 9-inch block includes a full cutting guide and fabric palette; suggestions for use, either mixing and matching or adapting to an all-over design; and icons indicating techniques and skill level. The blocks on each spread are related in design and technique. In addition to the Block Directory, Japanese Quilted Blocks to Mix and Match features an Inspiration Gallery, showcasing examples of finished quilts from leading quilters. Using these examples, author Susan Briscoe explores such topics as color ideas from traditional Japanese textiles and quilts, motifs, and recommendations for combining fabric patterns and block designs. An extensive section on technique, as well as several pages about the fabrics themselves and a listing of suppliers and organizations make this volume as practical and informative as it is beautiful.

PC John Bragg is young and full of ambition, and with his eye on making Superintendent one day, he squares up to each case that comes his way as an opportunity to show himself brave, reliable and a good detective. In town and country, at scenes of murder, robbery, fraud, abduction, military and industrial spying and arson, PC John Bragg's character grows as his mettle is tested. From dealing with artists' models in a murder case, to ensuring a bejewelled, high-spirited American heiress doesn't attract the wrong sort of attention, to protecting the pay destined for a staff of quarrymen, PC Bragg has his work cut out for him.

Showcases and analyzes a private collection of 130 kimonos made for men, women, and children between 1900 and 1940, evaluating the historical and cultural factors that have inspired their designs, in a volume that features three hundred commissioned photographs.

In the ancient city of Kyoto, contemporary artisans and designers are using heritage techniques and traditional clothing aesthetics to reinvent wafuku (Japanese clothing, including kimono) for modern life. Japan Beyond the Kimono explores these shifts, highlighting developments in the Kyoto fashion industry such as its integration of digital weaving and printing techniques and the influence of social media on fashion distribution systems. Through case studies of designers, artisans, and retailers, Jenny Hall provides a comprehensive picture of the reasons behind the production and consumption of these rejuvenated fashion goods. She argues that conceptualisations of Japanese tradition include innovation and change, which is vital to understanding how Japanese cultural heritage is both sustained and evolving. Essential reading for students and scholars of fashion, anthropology, and Japanese studies, Jenny Hall's sensory ethnography is the first of its kind, describing the lived experiences of people in the Kyoto textiles industry, explaining the renewal of traditional techniques and styles, and placing them both within contexts such as transnational 'craftscapes' and fast or slow fashion systems.