Editorial Introduction: Children's Literature in Japan

Abstract

As this issue reaches readers, my time as a Megumi Kai Visiting Professor at Kobe College is coming to a close. In this editorial, I share the insights into children’s literature in Japan that I have gleaned through the past year’s teaching, research, and tourism. I was invited to this historic women’s university in Japan’s Kansai region primarily to teach Shakespeare, theatre, and an introductory literature survey course. This opportunity allowed me the scope to explore with students aspects of Anglophone children’s culture, including Little Angel Theatre’s pandemic puppet theatre shows streamed on YouTube and the use of Lewis Carroll’s Alice books by Anglophone adult visitors to Japan to make sense of their experiences. The latter session was thanks to the English department sponsoring a visit from Catherine Butler (Cardiff University) to share research from her forthcoming book British Children’s Literature in Japan: Wonderlands and Looking Glasses (Bloomsbury). I ran a panto season before Christmas, exploring some traditions and critiques of this peculiar British theatre form through productions by CBeebies and Peter Duncan’s lockdown-originating Panto Online (Ohh no, you didn’t! Oh yes, we did!). I also taught a “special lecture” course on children’s literature. We explored Australian, English, European, and Japanese picture books, comics, manga, fan cultures (since character merchandise is ubiquitous in Japan, across generations and genders), stage and animated adaptations—not neglecting the work of Japan’s most beloved animation studio, Studio Ghibli! Fortunately, since teaching contemporary children’s literature can easily become an expensive business, Kobe College has an excellent collection of picture books in Japanese, by Japanese authors, and in translation: I did not want out-of-copyright texts to be the backbone of the course, and web comics were a blessing. My students were particularly struck by web comics’ use of colour throughout, since they are used to reading manga printed in black and white. Exhibitions centred on children’s literature are a staple of local museums and galleries in Japan, often focused on illustrations from European children’s literature. In the autumn, my host institution held its own successful children’s literature exhibition, open to the public. Kobe College, with its strong reputation for translation and English programs, was the alma mater of one of Japan’s great children’s librarians and translators of children’s literature, Kyoko Matsuoka. This exhibition celebrated her life, study, and work: she passed away in March 2022. Her firm place in Japanese hearts and minds was demonstrated by the steady trickle of visitors onto campus during the exhibition, which took place in the stunning space of the main library, one of the Spanish mission-style buildings designed by American missionary and architect William Merrell Vories. My students were given a guided tour by librarian Yoshie Makita. She showed them