The Vanishing Taste of Edo and Other Essays

Awashima Kangetsu finds a world in small things: a kite, a clay doll, a shop sign, a fragment of poetry, or a remembered street cry. These eleven essays follow the pleasures of Edo into a rapidly changing Tokyo, recording performers, fairs, crafts, books, and the curious people who made them memorable.

The collection also reveals a restless observer who refuses to confine himself to nostalgia. Kangetsu recalls his enthusiasm for Western civilization, his experiments with religion, and his delight in foreign motion pictures. Toys become companions and historical witnesses; old entertainments expose both charm and roughness. His memories repeatedly acknowledge uncertainty and the loss of collections and notes in the earthquake.

This complete English translation preserves all eleven supplied essays, their poems and section divisions, and the separately dated additions and publication citations. Translator’s notes clarify names, historical terms, crafts, wordplay, and contradictory recollections without smoothing away the author’s distinctive voice. AI-assisted translation.