Internet Resource:

HUGHES, Henry. "Familiarity of the Strange: Japan's Gothic Tradition." Criticism 42:1 (2000): 59-89. "The Japanese Gothic shares with the West its subversion of religious and social norms, an obsession with sex and death and fear of the supernatural or unknown."Ê

ARAKI, James T. "A Critical Approach to the Ugetsu Monagatari." Monumenta Nipponica 22:1-2 (1967): 49-64. Comments on the mythic, mystic, and Gothic properties of the tales as well as Akinari's conviction of the reality and immediacy of the supernatural."

FRANK, Frederick S. "Ueda Akinari." In Gothic Writers: A Critical and Bibliographical Guide, Eds. Douglass H. Thomson, Jack G. Voller, Frederick S. Frank. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 2002: 12-19. Discusses the Gothicism of the two collections of short stories. Tales of Moonlight and Rain and Tales of the Spring Rain. “All of the traditional features of the genre are firmly embedded in Akinari’s tales of terror. with a special place given to the psychological monstrosities of the dream life and the intrusion of the malicious supernatural into human lives at their most vulnerable moments.”

HAMEDA, Kengi. "Introduction" to Tales of Moonlight and Rain: Japanese Gothic Tales." 1328].

HUMBERTCLAUDE, Pierre. "Essai sur la vie et l'oeuvre de Ueda Akinari." Monumenta Nipponica 3 (1940): 98-119; 4 (1941): 102-125; 5 (1942): 52-85. A three part monograph on the life and works.

JACKMAN, Barry. "Introduction" to Tales of the Spring Rain. Tokyo: University of Tokyo Press, 1975: vii-xviii. Provides a biography of Akinari and comments briefly on the Gothic qualities of the nine stories. "Ghosts and evil spirits frequently appear, and many of the most effective stories depend on a supernatural twist of the plot at the conclusion."

TAKADA, Mamoru. "Ugetsu Monogatari: A Critical Interpretation" In Tales of Moonlight and Rain: Japanese Gothic Tales. Tokyo: University of Tokyo Press, 1971: xxi-xxix. Places the tales in a Gothic context and connects them with the horror motifs of western Gothicism.

ZOLBROD, Leon M. "Introduction" to Tales of Moonlight and Rain. Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 1974: 19-94. Gives a biography and discusses Akinari's style, influence, philosophy, and attitude toward the supernatural.

ANDERSON, Kenneth Mark. "The Foreign Relations of the Family State: The Empire of Ethics, Aesthetics, and Evolution in Meiji Japan." Dissertation Abstracts International 60:4 (1999): 1139 (Cornell University). Contains material on the Gothicism of Ozaki Koyo's serialized novel, The Gold Demon (1897-1903). "Ozaki Koyo's The Gold Demon adheres to the genre of the Gothic and evidences the contemporary capitalist decoding and recoding of custom and morality. Capital is portrayed as invading the social body." Also develops a comparison with Bram Stoker's contemporary British novel, Dracula. "In both works, community is restored through the sacrifice of women to patriarchy and the strength of civilized social conscience in resistance to the egotism of the foreign barbarian."

CARPENTER, Juliet. "Izumi Kyoka: Meija-Era Gothic." Japan Quarterly, 31:2 (1984): 154-158. A survey of the Gothic tales. Maternal obsessions and suicidal climaxes wrought against supernatural backgrounds and events distinguish Kyoka's work.

CORNYETZ, Nina. "Izumi Kyoka's Speculum: Reflections on the Medusa, Thanatos, and Eros." Dissertation Abstracts International 52 (1991): 3932A (Columbia University). "Confronts the question of the primacy of woman and mother in Kyoka's work." These figures are often "goddess-demon-mothers."

FRANK, Frederick S. "Izumi Kyoka." In Gothic Writers: A Critical and Bibliographical Guide, Eds. Douglass H. Thomson, Jack G. Voller, Frederick S. Frank. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 2002: 225-234. Kyoka's Gothic vision focuses on the spectral and spiritual side of life in opposition to the materialism, nationalism, and martial severity of his society. "Much of the fiction is dominated by lovely and deadly mother figures and the fusion of love and death into climactic moments of demonic beauty."

INOUYE, Charles Shiro. "Water Imagery in the Works of Izumi Kyoka." Monumenta Nipponica 46:1 (1991): 43-68. Explores the symbolic value of water in various Kyoka's stories.

________., Ed. Japanese Gothic Tales of Izumi Kyoka, translated by Charles Shiro Inouye. University of Hawaii Press, 1996. Kyoka's tales define Japanese Gothic: masterpieces of Japanese Ghost Stories and, at the same time, short stories about love which exceeds death's boundries. "The Surgery Room" is a vivid tale of a surgeon torn between saving his patient's life or letting her die with her secrets. In "Osen and Sokichi" a boy finds salvation in a prostitute only to learn later the terrible price of sacrifice. "One Day in Spring" chronicles the passion between two loves: one which transcends time and threatens to literally trap others in the flowing lines of their poetry. Finally, in "The Holy Man of Mt. Koya"--the best story--we learn of a mountain seductress who tempts a monk to forsake his vows and, possibly, his humanity. Unlike Banana Yoshimoto and other modern writers who can only write about their boredom with life, Kyoka gives us a compelling description of the Japanese and their culture: what they love to fear. Contents: Introduction: The Familiarity of Strange Places,The Surgery Room, The Holy Man of Mount Koya, One Day in Spring, Osen and Sokichi, Afterword: A Discussion of the Tales. The "Introduction: The Familiarity of Strange Places " Draws parallels between the Gothics of Poe and Kyoka. "Great Gothic writers such as Poe and Kyoka are understandable across differences of time and space, because though they might speak eloquently of their particular cultures, their concerns transcend national circumstance."

________. The Similitude of Blossoms: A Critical Biography of Izumi Kyoka (1873-1939), Japanese Novelist and Playwright. Harvard East Asian Monographs. Cambridge: Harvard University Asia Center, Harvard University Press, 1998. Critical biography.

JEWEL, Mark. "Aspects of Narrative Structure in the Work of Izumi Kyoka." Dissertation Abstracts International 46 (1984): 155A (Stanford University). Kyoka is "the foremost romanticist of Meiji literature."

KAWAKAMI, Chiyoko. "The Hybrid Narrative World of Izumi Kyoka." Dissertation Abstracts International 57 (1996): 3924A (University of Washington). Studies the ghostly and the supernatural and demonic transformation in Kyoka's fiction by tracing "their evolutional change."

KEENE, Donald. "Izumi Kyoka" In Dawn to the West: Japanese Literature of the Modern Era. New York: Holt, Rinehart & Winston, 1984: 200-219. Discusses Kyoka's important place in twentieth century Japanese letters.

MC GOVERN, Jon Patrick."Japanese Gothic Fiction: Izumi Kyoka's Biwa's Message and Sakuragai." Master's Thesis, Indiana University, 1997.

POULTON, Cody. "The Grotesque and Gothic: Izumi Kyoka's Japan." Japan Quarterly 41:3 (1994): 324-335. Critical readings of Kyoka's Gothic fiction including "The Surgery Room" and The Holy Man of Mount Koya." "While all of Kyoka's works presume some kind of social context, what is stressed is his stance against that context. Kyoka's protagonists are typically characters who have become estranged physically and psychologically from society." Ê

KOTANI, Mari."Techno-Gothic Japan: From Seishi Yokomizo's The Death's Head Stranger to Mariko O'Hara's Ephemera the Vampire" In Blood Read: The Vampire as Metaphor in Contemporary Culture, Ed. & Intro. Veronica Holliger, Brian Aldiss. Philadelphia: Pennsylvania UP, 1997: 189-198.