We just published a great traditional Japanese folk tale on Scribd titled My Lord Bag of Rice, hopefully to re-kindle interest in our fledgling publishing company, Shisei-Do Publications. This is an exceprt from Uncle Hayato's Story Book, a collection of stories that have been featured here and on the now defunct Yahoo 360 website over the years, as well as new stories, told by Hayato Ojisan. Our biographical essay on Yoshida Shoin and Eastern Jewel, Japan's Mata Hari, have been very successful and well-received - more successful than we had possibly imagined with Eastern Jewel becoming the primier non-fiction source on the life of Kawashima Yoshiko.
We will soon be publishing our first books, The Annotated In Ghostly Japan, by Lafacadio Hearn, which I edited and illustrated with historic photographs, original shin hanga prints, and traditional ukiyo-e prints; plus our second book, The Annotated Bushido, by Inazo Nitobe, completely revised into contemporary English with detailed explanations of the authors references, anaysis of the book, and copius illustrations. Both books are in the final stages of illustration and editing and we hope to have them available on Amazon by the end of the year.
My Lord Bag of Rice is a traditional Japanese folk tale dating back to the early Heian Period and has been the subject of many forms of Japanese performance art and graphic art for centuries and tells the fantastic story of a brave samurai:
In olden times, when Fujiwara no Hidesato (who lived in the first half of the tenth century) crossed the bridge, a big serpent lay across it. The hero, however, was not at all afraid, and calmly stepped over the monster which at once disappeared into the water and returned in the shape of a beautiful woman. Two thousand years, she said, she had lived under this bridge, but never had she seen such a brave man as he. For this reason she requested him to destroy her enemy, a huge centipede, which had killed her sons and grandsons.
If you would like to read the entire story, please follow the link below to our Scribd site where the entire text is available to read or even download, as well as A Most Audacious Young Man, the biography of one of Japan's greatest intellectuals and revolutionaries at the time when Commodore Perry was knocking on the door of a reclusive Japan, and Eastern Jewel, Japan's Mata Hari, the live of Yoshiko Kawashima, a story of intrique in the days preceeding World War II.
http://www.scribd.com/full/19568969?access_key=key-fakn7avunch07x7pmrz
