Under the Sakura Canopy

Ikhara Saikaku is a recognized classic of Japanese literature, honing the craft of everyday storytelling—writing with a vivid and concise style, intricate inventiveness, flashes of humor, and wordplay. The genre range of Saikaku's work is extraordinarily wide. In this book, the reader will find diverse works—love stories, everyday tales, magical-fantastical narratives, judicial accounts, and others. Irony, sarcasm, and parodic grotesque are the author's favorite techniques, but in his laughter, one can hear the sadness over the vicissitudes of life and human fate.