Sakura-ko was a samurai’s daughter who had become a geisha to feed her mother after her father died. She lived on a narrow street. Sounds of geisha practicing their shamisen filled the air at all hours. Sakura-ko proved gifted with the shamisen. She also played the koto and the biwa. Sakura-ko’s liquid eyes and ivory…

Lafcadio Hearn was an American journalist who, along with Basil Hall Chamberlain, collected and wrote down Japan’s folktales. While many Japanese, in the past, had also recorded various folktales, it wasn’t until Westerners took an interest in Japanese folklore the keepers of this cultural oral tradition began be given a long shift. Hearn and Chamberlain…

  In Yedo there dwelt a samurai called Hagiwara. He was a samurai of the hatamoto, which is of all the ranks of samurai the most honourable. He possessed a noble figure and a very beautiful face, and was beloved of many a lady of Yedo, both openly and in secret. For himself, being yet…