Tea Talk - 1925

A factory director discovers that an employee’s own home is an old chicken coop. An actress complains because she received one fewer bouquet than she paid for. A lawyer’s pause turns a respectful courtroom speech into an apparent insult to the judge.

Susukida Kyūkin’s 1925 Tea Talk columns find comedy in the gap between reputation and reality. Japanese painters and literary men share the page with Mark Twain, Henry Ford, former American presidents, and European actors. Flattering words conceal barbed meanings, learned people reveal their ignorance, and domestic arrangements upset grand ambitions.

This new English translation presents the complete supplied work from the Tokyo Nichinichi Shimbun, Sunday Mainichi, and Bungei Shunjū. It preserves the dated columns and their original publication labels, along with dialogue, letters, quotations, and the author’s reported claims. Concise notes clarify Japanese customs, literary references, wordplay, uncertain identifications, and historical contradictions. Kyūkin’s voice moves from brisk jokes to quieter reflections on flowers, letters, and the cost of artistic freedom.