Intended for both students and teachers of translation, and professional translators, this book offers an introduction to problems of and strategies for translating Japanese texts. It focuses on Japanese and English and attempts to highlight differences between these two languages.

The Routledge Course in Japanese Translation brings together for the first time material dedicated to the theory and practice of translation to and from Japanese. This one semester advanced course in Japanese translation is designed to raise awareness of the many considerations that must be taken into account when translating a text. As students progress through the course they will acquire various tools to deal with the common problems typically involved in the practice of translation. Particular attention is paid to the structural differences between Japanese and English and to cross-cultural dissimilarities in stylistics. Essential theory and information on the translation process are provided as well as abundant practical tasks. The Routledge Course in Japanese Translation is essential reading for all serious students of Japanese at both undergraduate and postgraduate level.

This book offers the first cultural history of translation in Japan during the Tokugawa period, 1600-1868.

This volume is a textbook for aspiring translators of Japanese into English, as well as a reference work for professional Japanese–English translators and for translator educators. Underpinned by sound theoretical principles, it provides a solid foundation in the practice of Japanese–English translation, then extends this to more advanced levels. Features include: 13 thematic chapters, with subsections that explore common pitfalls and challenges facing Japanese–English translators and the pros and cons of different procedures exercises after many of these subsections abundant examples drawn from a variety of text types and genres and translated by many different translators This is an essential resource for postgraduate students of Japanese–English translation and Japanese language, professional Japanese–English translators and translator educators. It will also be of use and interest to advanced undergraduates studying Japanese.

This book presents and comments on four short works of Japanese literature by prominent writers of the early twentieth century, including Natsume Sōseki and Miyazawa Kenji. These are their first-ever published English translations. The book is designed to be used as a textbook for the translation of modern Japanese literature—another first. Each chapter introduces the writer and his work, presents the original Japanese text in its entirety, and encourages students with advanced Japanese to make their own translation of it, before reading the author’s translation that follows. The detailed commentary section in each chapter focuses on two stylistic issues that characterise the source text, and how the target text—the translation—has dealt with them, before the chapter concludes with questions for further discussion and analysis.

How did a loner destined for a niche domestic audience become one of the most famous writers alive? A "fascinating" look at the "business of bringing a best-selling novelist to a global audience" (The Atlantic)―and a “rigorous” exploration of the role of translators and editors in the creation of literary culture (The Paris Review). Thirty years ago, when Haruki Murakami’s works were first being translated, they were part of a series of pocket-size English-learning guides released only in Japan. Today his books can be read in fifty languages and have won prizes and sold millions of copies globally. How did a loner destined for a niche domestic audience become one of the most famous writers alive? This book tells one key part of the story. Its cast includes an expat trained in art history who never intended to become a translator; a Chinese American ex-academic who never planned to work as an editor; and other publishing professionals in New York, London, and Tokyo who together introduced a pop-inflected, unexpected Japanese voice to the wider literary world. David Karashima synthesizes research, correspondence, and interviews with dozens of individuals—including Murakami himself—to examine how countless behind-the-scenes choices over the course of many years worked to build an internationally celebrated author’s persona and oeuvre. His careful look inside the making of the “Murakami Industry" uncovers larger questions: What role do translators and editors play in framing their writers’ texts? What does it mean to translate and edit “for a market”? How does Japanese culture get packaged and exported for the West?

On a planet where men are contained in ghettoised isolation, women enjoy the fruits of a queer matriarchal utopia -- until a boy escapes and a young woman's perception of the world is violently interupted. Two old friends enjoy cocktails on a holiday resort planet where all is not as it seems. A bickering couple emigrate to a world that has worked out an innovative way to side-step the need for war, only to bring their quarrels (and something far more destructive) with them. And in the title story, Suzuki offers readers a tragic and warped mirroring of her own final days as the tyranny of enforced screen-time and the mechanistion of labour bring about a shattering psychic collapse. At turns nonchalantly hip and charmingly deranged, Suzuki's singular slant on speculative fiction would be echoed in countless later works, from Margaret Atwood and Harumi Murakami, to Black Mirror and Ex Machina. In these darkly playful and punky stories, the fantastical elements are always earthed by the universal pettiness of strife between the sexes, and the gritty reality of life on the lower rungs, whatever planet that ladder might be on.

A great story can lead a reader on a journey of discovery—especially if it's presented in two languages! Beautifully illustrated in a traditional style, Japanese Stories for Language Learners offers five compelling stories with English and Japanese language versions appearing on facing pages. Taking learners on an exciting cultural and linguistic journey, each story is followed by detailed translator's notes, Japanese vocabulary lists, and grammar points along with a set of discussion questions and exercises. The first two stories are very famous traditional Japanese folktales: Urashima Taro (Tale of a Fisherman) and Yuki Onna (The Snow Woman). These are followed by three short stories by notable 20th century authors: Kumo no Ito (The Spider's Thread) by Akutagawa Ryunosuke (1892-1927) Oborekaketa Kyodai (The Siblings Who Almost Drowned) by Arishima Takeo (1878-1923) Serohiki no Goshu (Gauche the Cellist) by Miyazawa Kenji (1896-1933) Reading these stories in the original Japanese script--and hearing native-speakers read them aloud in the accompanying free audio recording--helps students at every level deepen their comprehension of the beauty and subtlety of the Japanese language. Learn Japanese the fun way—through the country's rich literary history.

Japan is often regarded as a 'culture of translation'. Oral and written translation has played a vital role in Japan over the centuries and led to a formidable body of thinking and research. This is rooted in a context about which little information has been available outside of Japan in the past. The chapters examine the current state of translation studies as an academic discipline in Japan and a range of historical aspects (for example, translation of Chinese vernacular novels in early modern times, the role of translation in Japan's modernization, changes in stylistic norms in Meiji-period translations, 'thick translation' of indigenous Ainu place names), as well as creative aspects of translation in modern and postwar Japan. Other chapters explore contemporary phenomena such as the intralingual translation of Japanese expressions embedded in English texts emanating from diasporic contexts, the practice of pre-translation or writing for an international audience from the outset, the innovative practice of reverse localization of Japanese video games back into Japanese, and community interpreting practices and research.

After becoming a rabbit, Haneru Sato gathers stars at an observatory, sails the sea in a watermelon, tastes the emotions captured in different colors of ice, and more.