March Was Made of Yarn

In time for the one year anniversary of the 2011 earthquake in Japan, a collection of essays and stories by Japanese writers on the devastating disaster, its aftermath, and the resolve of a people to rebuild. On March 11, 2011, a massive earthquake occurred off the northeastern coast of Japan, triggering a 50-foot tsunami that crushed everything in its path-highways, airports, villages, trains, and buses-leaving death and destruction behind, and causing a major radiation leak from five nuclear plants. Here eighteen writers give us their trenchant observations and emotional responses to such a tragedy, in what is a fascinating, enigmatic and poignant collection.

Elmer Luke is a writer and editor who has worked in publishing houses in New York and Tokyo, with a range of authors including Tom Wicker, Haruki Murakami, Colleen McCullough, Hiromi Kawakami, and Robert Whiting. He is adviser to the Read Japan project. David Karashima is an author whose first novel, in Japanese, was recipient of a prize for new writers; he is also a widely published translator of contemporary Japanese fiction into English, having translated works by Hitomi Kanehara, Taichi Yamada, Yasutaka Tsutsui, and Hisaki Matsuura, among others. In 2008 he helped found the Read Japan initiative at the Nippon Foundation, a partnership among authors, translators, editors, publishers, and universities to facilitate the publication of Japanese literature in translation.

Foreword
by John Burnham Schwartz

Introduction
by Elmer Luke and David Karashima

The Island of Eternal Life
by Yoko Tawada

The Charm
by Kiyoshi Shigematsu

Nightcap
by Yoko Ogawa

God Bless You, 2011
with postscript and original 1993 version
by Hiromi Kawakami

March Yarn
by Mieko Kawakami

Lulu
by Shinji Ishii

One Year Later
by J. D. McClatchy

Grandma’s Bible
by Natsuki Ikezawa

Pieces
by Mitsuyo Kakuta

Sixteen Years Later, in the Same Place
by Hideo Furukawa

The Crows and the Girl
by Brother & Sister Nishioka

Box Story
by Tetsuya Akikawa

Dream from a Fisherman’s Boat
by Barry Yourgrau

Hiyoriyama
by Kazumi Saeki

Ride on Time
by Kazushige Abe

Little Eucalyptus Leaves
by Ryu Murakami

After the Disaster, Before the Disaster
by David Peace