The Legends of Tono

The various episodes selected from the countless field notes Yanagita took provide, from a literary point of view, a peerless model of conciseness. In his sentences can be found a perfect economy, his words used as sparingly as gold. -- Yukio Mishima
The Tono monogatari takes its place with the Kinder und Haus-Märchen of the brothers Grimm as a landmark collection in the history of folklore studies…In making The Legends of Tono available in English translation Ronald Morse, the perceptive biographer of Yanagita-sensei, has placed Asian and folklore scholars in his debt. It deserves a wide attentive audience outside its own country to match the readership it has rightfully earned at home. -- Richard M. Dorson
There is magic on every page of Yanagita's 'Legends,' and it's very hard not to be seduced by this reissued, 100th anniversary translation.... This handsome new edition updates Morse's excellent but rare 1975 translation with a new preface and introduction.... It's a must-have for everyone who wants to know what the psycho-spiritual lives of rural Japanese were like a century ago. Tono stands proud as Japan's heart of darkness, and Yanagita is its best guide. -- Tim Hornyak, 2009 * The Japan Times *
The stories themselves are a collage of disparate elements coming together to create an overall feel of the area. It creates a real sense of place and time and feeling. * Sci-Fi Japan, April 2010 *
That is the wonder of the Tono book. We are looking at tales in the making. Yanagita gives us a rare glimpse of story-telling as process, rather than product. -- A. W. Sadler