A

RYŪNOSUKE AKUTAGAWA (1892–1927) remains one of the most widely read writers in Japan. A collection of his work can be found in Rashōmon and Seventeen Other Stories, selected and translated by Jay Rubin. “General Kim” appeared in vol. 3 of Monkey Business.

PAUL AUSTER (1947–2024), a leading American novelist, is also extremely popular in Japan. His numerous books include The New York Trilogy, The Book of Illusions, Oracle Night, and The Invention of Solitude (a memoir). He published “Invasions” and “The Hlumes” for the first time in vol. 3 of Monkey Business.

B

KEVIN BROCKMEIER (b. 1972) is the author of nine books, including the story collections The Ghost Variations and The View from the Seventh Layer and the novels The Illumination and The Brief History of the Dead. In 2014 he published A Few Seconds of Radiant Filmstrip: A Memoir of Seventh Grade. “Continental Drift” in vol. 7 of Monkey Business was inspired by one of Mina Ishikawa’s tanka poems, published in vol. 2 of Monkey Business. “Time as a Perpetual Motion Machine” appears in vol. 4 of MONKEY.

REBECCA BROWN (b. 1956) is known for her intense, spellbinding prose. Among her many books that have been translated into Japanese, The Gifts of the Body is especially popular. “At the Delta” was published in vol. 2 of Monkey Business. “Hemingway’s Valise,” in vol. 5 of Monkey Business, was originally written for the third issue of the Japanese Monkey, in response to the question “Which historical scene, real or imagined, would you have liked to witness?”

C

COMES IN A BOX (b. 1980) made his debut with “Black Space, the Sound of Rain” in vol. 2 of Monkey Business. It first appeared in the fifth issue of the Japanese Monkey Business, followed by “The Black Bell” in the eighth issue and “war in,” inspired by Hemingway’s 1924 In Our Time, in the fourteenth.

ANDREW COWAN (b. 1960) is a British novelist and Director of Creative Writing at the University of East Anglia. Among his books are Pig, Common Ground, What I Know, and Worthless Men. He published “Seals” for the first time in vol. 7 of Monkey Business.

CRAFT EBBING & CO. is a husband-and-wife team of visual artists who have published a number of books that minutely describe, verbally and visually, things and people that have never really existed. “Everybody’s Got Something to Hide Except Me and My Monkey” was created for the “Box” issue of the Japanese Monkey Business and, translated by David Boyd, appeared in vol. 4 of Monkey Business.

D

LINH DINH (b. 1963) has published five books of poetry, two collections of stories, a novel (Love Like Hate), and an illustrated book, Postcards from the End of America, based on his photo blog. He has also published widely in Vietnamese. He translates from Vietnamese to English. “Travel Tips,” a prose poem, appeared in vol. 6 of Monkey Business.

STUART DYBEK (b. 1942) is one of the most important short story writers in the United States today and is also much loved and respected in Japan. His poem “Nowhere” appears in vol. 2 of Monkey Business, the short story “Naked” in vol. 4, and “The Crullers” in vol. 5. “Lessons,” a poem and a story, appears in vol. 3 of MONKEY, and “Swifts, Swallows” in vol. 4.

E

RAMPO EDOGAWA (1894–1965) was instrumental in promoting mystery fiction in Japan. His pen name, Edogawa Rampo, is an homage to Edgar Allan Poe. Many of his novels and short stories were made into films. His translated works include Japanese Tales of Mystery and Imagination, translated by James B. Harris, and The Early Cases of Akechi Kogoro, translated by William Varteresian. “The Daydream” appeared in vol. 7 of Monkey Business.

TOH ENJOE (b. 1972) is known for his metafictional, self-referential and allusive writing. Self-Reference ENGINE was translated by Terry Gallagher. “The Thousand and One Tongues,” one of the twitter stories that appeared in vol. 5 (2015) of Monkey Business, was included in The Best Small Fictions 2016, edited by Stuart Dybek. His essay “Time in ‘Time’” was included in vol. 3 of Monkey Business, “A Record of My Grandmother” appeared in vol. 4, and “Shuffle Drive” in vol. 7.

STEVE ERICKSON (b. 1950), winner of the Lannan Literary Award for Lifetime Achievement, has published nine novels and two books of nonfiction, including Arc d’X and Shadowbahn. He has been hugely influential in Japan, inspiring many younger writers, including Hideo Furukawa. His story “3>16>44” appeared in vol. 5 of Monkey Business, and “Sonic Sky” appeared in vol. 6.

BRIAN EVENSON (b. 1966) is the author of more than a dozen books of fiction. His most recent work includes two story collections, Song for the Unraveling of the World and The Glassy, Burning Floor of Hell. “A Report on Hands,” “A Report on Squares,” and “A Report on Chimney Sweeps” appear in vol. 7 of Monkey Business. “A Report on Travel” is featured in vol. 2 of MONKEY.

F

KAORI FUJINO (b. 1980) is an award-winning author. Her debut work of fiction, “Greedy Birds,” was awarded the Bungakukai Newcomers Prize in 2006, and her novel Nails and Eyes won the Akutagawa Prize in 2013. In 2017 she was a resident at the University of Iowa’s International Writing Program. Her story “You Okay for Time?” was translated by Ginny Tapley Takemori and appeared in Granta in 2017. Nails and Eyes was translated by Kendall Heitzman (2023). Her stories “Someday with the One, the Perfect Bag” (MONKEY, vol. 3), “Transformers: Pianos” (vol. 4), and “To Abuse a Monster” (vol. 5) are translated by Laurel Taylor.

HIDEO FURUKAWA (b. 1966) is one of the most innovative writers in Japan today. His novel Belka, Why Don’t You Bark? was translated by Michael Emmerich; his partly fictional reportage Horses, Horses, in the End the Light Remains Pure: A Tale That Begins with Fukushima was translated by Doug Slaymaker with Akiko Takenaka; and his short novel Slow Boat was translated by David Boyd. His work appears in every issue of Monkey Business and MONKEY; vol. 1 of Monkey Business features an interview with Haruki Murakami by Hideo Furukawa; vol. 3 of MONKEY features “The Little Woods of Fukushima,” an excerpt from his memoir Zero F; vol. 4 includes an excerpt from his epic poem Ten-On; and vol. 5 features an excerpt from The Holy Family, translated by Kendall Heitzman.

G

KEITA GENJI (1912–1985) is the pen name of Tomio Tanaka, a prolific novelist who wrote more than a hundred books of fiction about the Japanese “salaryman.” For more than two decades before and after World War II, Genji was employed by Sumitomo, one of the powerful megacompanies (keiretsu) in Japan. “Mr. English” appeared in vol. 2 of Monkey Business.

H

MIMI HACHIKAI (b. 1974) is an award-winning poet and novelist and a professor at Rikkyo University. Her collections of poetry include the 2015 Water for Washing Your Face, winner of the Ayukawa Nobuo Prize. She has translated several children’s books, including The Dark by Lemony Snicket. “Just Like Her” was first published in vol. 28 of the Japanese MONKEY.

RIVER HALEN (b. 1983) is the author of Match (Coach House, 2011), which was shortlisted for the Trillium Book Award for Poetry, and Dream Rooms (Book•hug, 2022), a collection of essays and poems dealing with relation, ecology, transformation, and sexuality. Based in Montreal, Halen is a member of the poetry acquisitions team at Brick Books. “Some Animals and Their Housing Situations” appears in vol. 7 of Monkey Business. “Horseplay: Some Poses in Search of Love,” translated by Motoyuki Shibata, appears in vol. 14 of the Japanese MONKEY.

YŌKO HAYASUKE (b. 1982) made her debut with the story “John,” which appeared in the twelfth issue of the Japanese Monkey Business and later in vol. 2 of Monkey Business. “Eri’s Physics” was published in vol. 4. “This Is How We Talked About It” appeared in 2014 in the fourth issue of the Japanese Monkey, and in vol. 5 (2015) of Monkey Business.

LAFCADIO HEARN (1850–1904) served as the West’s window on Japan at the turn of the twentieth century. His versions of Japanese legends and ghost stories are still much beloved, especially in Japan, where he is known as Koizumi Yakumo. A manga by Fumiko Takano, which appeared in vol. 2 of Monkey Business, was based on “The Futon of Tottori” by Hearn.

ICHIYŌ HIGUCHI (1872–1896) was a celebrated poet and short story writer. She studied classical poetry at Haginoya under Utako Nakajima. Following her father’s death, she became the head of household at the age of seventeen and began to write stories to help support her mother and sister. She also ran a small shop near the Yoshiwara pleasure quarters, which became the setting for many of her later stories. A selection of Ichiyō’s work was published in translation by Robert Lyons Danly in his critical biography In the Shade of Spring Leaves. Her stories, translated by Hitomi Yoshio, are featured in vols. 4 and 5 of MONKEY.

TOSHIKO HIRATA (b. 1955) is a poet and novelist known for witty wordplay and wickedly dark humor. Her 2015 collection of poetry Freedom of Quips won the Murasaki Shikibu Literary Award. “Rain Clouds” was first published in vol. 28 of the Japanese MONKEY.

SHIN’ICHI HOSHI (1926–1997) was a prolific and extremely popular writer of short-short science fiction, publishing more than a thousand and one stories in his lifetime. Some of his short-shorts have been translated by Marina Hoshi Whyte and Kim Hines and published as ebooks (A Well-Kept Life and The Whimsical Robot). “Shoulder-Top Secretary” appeared in vol. 6 of Monkey Business.

JASON HRIVNAK (b. 1973) is the author of two novels, The Plight House and Mutilation Song, both of which have also been published in French. “The Novice,” an excerpt from Mutilation Song, appears in vol. 6 of Monkey Business. He lives in Toronto.

LAIRD HUNT (b. 1968) is the author of nine novels, a story collection, and two book-length translations from the French. His most recent novel, Zorrie, was a finalist for the 2021 National Book Award. Kind One won the Anisfield-Wolf Book Award for Fiction and was a finalist for the PEN/Faulkner, and Neverhome won the Grand Prix de Littérature Américaine and the Bridge Prize and was shortlisted for the Prix Femina Étranger. He is a 2024 Guggenheim Fellow and teaches in Literary Arts at Brown University. “Star Date” appears in vol. 5 of Monkey Business; “Whale Leg” appears in MONKEY, vol. 2; and “A Bear’s Tale” in vol. 5.

I

IKO IDOGAWA (b. 1987) is a poet and novelist and teaches Japanese at a high school. She was the winner of the prestigious Akutagawa Prize in 2022 with her second novel The Joy of This World. “Someday, my annihilation will come” was first published in vol. 28 of the Japanese MONKEY.

NAOYUKI II (b. 1953) is the author of sixteen books of fiction and two of nonfiction, and has won numerous awards. The essays “What’s Eating Soichirō Mogi” and “Living in Your Own Private Cubicle” were included in vol. 2 and vol. 3 of Monkey Business. “The Sculpture That Kept Searching for Its Real Name” in vol. 6 of Monkey Business is the title story of his first collection of stories, published in 1991.

NATSUKI IKEZAWA (b. 1945) is a Japanese novelist, poet, essayist, and translator. He has won numerous literary awards, including the Akutagawa Prize, Tanizaki Prize, Yomiuri Prize, and Mainichi Shuppan Bunka Award. He is an avid traveler, and much of his work deals with cultural identity, as well as the intersections between humanity and the natural world. “Bearman,” part of a novel of interconnected short stories written in response to the 2011 Tohoku disaster, appears in MONKEY, vol. 5.

TARUHO INAGAKI (1900–1977) was a prolific Japanese modernist writer known for his highly idiosyncratic voice and vision, which by the 1970s had gathered a cult-like following in Japan. While a young student at an international school in Kobe, he became fascinated with other cultures, aeronautics, astronomy, and attractive young men—interests that recur throughout his oeuvre.  His books include the playful collection One Thousand One-Second Stories (1923), from which Jeffrey Angles selected 11 pieces for MONKEY, vol. 4. Angles also translated Inagaki's Miroku (1946) and the award-winning essay collection The Aesthetics of Boy-Love (1968).

MINA ISHIKAWA (b. 1980) is one of the new voices in tanka poetry, a 1,500-year-old tradition. “The Sleep Division,” a poem, appeared in vol. 1 of Monkey Business; “Tales in Tanka” in vol. 2; “Urashima,” tanka poems, in vol. 3; “The Lighthouse on the Desk,” tanka poems, in vol. 4; and “Ten Tales in Tanka” in vol. 6.

HIROMI ITŌ (b. 1955) is one of the most important voices in contemporary Japanese poetry. English translations of her poetry collections include Killing Kanoko and Wild Grass on the Riverbank, both translated by Jeffrey Angles. Monkey Business (vols. 5–7) and MONKEY (vols. 1–2) feature excerpts from her novel The Thorn Puller, translated by Jeffrey Angles and published under the Monkey imprint at Stone Bridge Press in 2022. “Wild Boar,” translated by Jeffrey Angles, appears in MONKEY, vol. 5.

SEIKŌ ITŌ (b. 1961) is a writer, performer, and one of the pioneers of Japanese rap. His novel Imagination Radio (2013) reflects on the March 2011 earthquake and nuclear disaster through the eyes of a deejay. He also writes nonfiction, including a 2017 book on Doctors Without Borders. Itō has long been interested in Noh, and he and Jay Rubin have collaborated with Grand Master Kazufusa Hōshō in a contemporary performance of the traditional Noh play Hagoromo. Rubin’s translation of Itō’s Fujito appears in vol. 1 of MONKEY, Kurozuka in vol. 2, Tadanori in vol. 3, Takasago in vol. 4, and Utō in vol. 5.

J

KEITA JIN (b. 1981) is a psychiatrist living in Hokkaido. English translations of his work have appeared in Monkey Business and Words without Borders. “Bridges” appeared in vol. 2 of Monkey Business, “Exorcizing Dreams” in vol. 3, and “The Girl Behind the Register Blows Bubbles” in vol. 4. “Rivers” appeared in 2013 in the second issue of the Japanese Monkey, and in vol. 5 (2015) of Monkey Business. “Our Bathrooms and the Great Sea” appeared in vol. 7.

K

FRANZ KAFKA (1883–1924) was a German-language Jewish writer who lived in Prague. He is recognized as one of the most important writers of the twentieth century. His work has been widely adapted by artists of various media, including the comic artist R. Crumb, the filmmaker Valeri Fokin, and the animator Kōji Yamamura. Monkey Business has published three manga by The Brother and Sister Nishioka based on stories by Kafka: “A Country Doctor” in vol. 1, “A Fasting-Artist,” in vol. 2, and “The Metamorphosis,” in vol. 3.

MOTOJIRŌ KAJII (1901–1932) left only two dozen poetic stories in his short lifetime, but many readers, especially fellow writers, express their admiration for his work. His stories “Lemon” and “The Ascension/ Drowning of K” have been translated into English. “Under the Cherry Trees” appeared in vol. 5 of Monkey Business.

BEN KATCHOR (b. 1951) is an esteemed cartoonist whose books include Julius Knipl, Real Estate Photographer: The Beauty Supply District (which has been translated into Japanese), The Cardboard Valise and Hand-Drying in America. His picture-stories appear in Metropolis magazine. The two strips that appeared in vol. 5 of Monkey Business are from the series Shoehorn Technique.

YASUNARI KAWABATA (1899–1972) won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1968 for his strikingly visual and lyrical novels, among them Snow Country, The Sound of the Mountain, and Beauty and Sadness. He was first published in the Atlantic Monthly in 1955, with “The Izu Dancer.” As president of PEN Japan from 1948 to 1965, he encouraged the translation of Japanese literature. Michael Emmerich’s translation of “From the Northern Sea” appears in MONKEY, vol. 2.

HIROMI KAWAKAMI (b. 1958) is one of Japan’s leading novelists. Many of her books have been published in English, most recently the story collection Dragon Palace and the novel The Third Love, both translated by Ted Goossen. Other titles include Manazuru, translated by Michael Emmerich; Record of a Night Too Brief, translated by Lucy North; and The Nakano Thrift Shop, Parade: A Folktale, Strange Weather in Tokyo (shortlisted for the Man Asian Literary Prize in 2013), and The Ten Loves of Nishino, translated by Allison Markin Powell. People from My Neighborhood, translated by Ted Goossen, was published by Granta Books in 2020. “The Dragon Palace,” appears in vol. 3 of Monkey Business and “Hazuki and Me” in vol. 5. “Banana,” which was published in vol. 4 of Monkey Business, was included in The Best Small Fictions 2015 (Queen’s Ferry Press). “Sea Horse” appears in MONKEY, vol. 2; “Yoshiwara Dreaming” in vol. 4; and “The Cathedral” in vol. 5.

MIEKO KAWAKAMI (b. 1976) is an award-winning novelist and poet. Her novel Breasts and Eggs, translated by Sam Bett and David Boyd, was published by Europa Editions in 2020 to great acclaim. Heaven, also co-translated by Bett and Boyd, was published in 2021, and All the Lovers in the Night in 2022. Her short novel Ms Ice Sandwich (Pushkin Press, 2018) was translated by Louise Heal Kawai. Her stories and prose poems, translated by Hitomi Yoshio, appear in vols. 1–7 of Monkey Business. “Good Stories Originate in the Caves of Antiquity,” a conversation with Haruki Murakami, was published in MONKEY, vol. 1; “Seeing,” a poem, appears in MONKEY, vol. 2; “Upon Seeing the Evening Sky,” an essay, in vol. 3; and “The Day Before,” a poem, in vol. 4.

SACHIKO KISHIMOTO (b. 1960) is known for her translations of Nicholson Baker, Lucia Berlin, Judy Budnitz, Lydia Davis, Thom Jones, and Miranda July. She is also a popular essayist; her latest collection, Seas I’d Like to See Before I Die, appeared in 2020. Excerpts from The Forbidden Diary, a fictional diary, translated by Ted Goossen, are featured in vols. 1–7 of Monkey Business. His translations of “Misaki” appears in vol. 1 of MONKEY and “I Don’t Remember” in vol. 3. “Tamba-Sasayama,” translated by Margaret Mitsutani, is featured in vol. 5.

SATOSHI KITAMURA (b. 1956) is an award-winning picture-book author and illustrator. His own books include Stone Age Boy, Millie’s Marvellous Hat, and The Smile Shop. He has worked with numerous authors and poets. His graphic narratives are featured in vols. 5–7 of Monkey Business: “Mr. Quote” in vol. 7, “Igor Nocturnov” in vol. 6, and “Variation and Theme,” inspired by a Charles Simic poem, in vol. 5. In vol. 1 of MONKEY, he published “The Heart of the Lunchbox”; “The Overcoat” appears in vol. 2, “The Cave” in vol. 3, and “Five Parallel Lines” in vol. 4, to which he also contributed the cover illustration. “Fish in Muddy Waters,” appears in vol. 5.

JON KLASSEN (b. 1981) is an award-winning Canadian writer and illustrator of children’s books and an animator. This Is Not My Hat won both the Caldecott Medal and the Kate Greenaway Medal. His work has appeared in the Japanese MONKEY. 

TAEKO KŌNO (b. 1926) won the Akutagawa Prize, the most prestigious literary prize in Japan, in 1963 and has since been one of the major female writers in Japan. Her English translations include Toddler-Hunting and Other Stories. “In the Box,” which appeared in vol. 5 of Monkey Business, was included in Historiettes, a collection of short stories published in 1977.

MASAYO KOIKE (b. 1959) has written numerous books of poetry, short story collections, and essays. In 1997 she won the fifteenth Gendaishi Hanatsubaki Prize for The Bus That Never Comes, and in 2000 she won the thirtieth Takami Jun Prize for The Most Sensuous Room. Her poem “When Monkeys Sing” appeared in vol. 1 of Monkey Business.

JUN’ICHI KONUMA (b. 1959) is a well-known music and literary critic and a professor of music culture at Waseda University. He has written extensively on both popular culture and high culture; among his most important subjects are Tōru Takemitsu, Bach, and Colin McPhee. He was awarded the Idemitsu Music Prize in 1998 for his critical writing. He has published numerous books, including a recent collection of his own poetry, Sotto. His essay “Every Reading, Every Sound, Every Sight,” translated by Sam Bett, appears in MONKEY, vol. 2.

HIROKAZU KOREEDA (b. 1962) is an internationally beloved film director, producer, screenwriter, and editor. His films include After Life (1998), Nobody Knows (2004), Still Walking (2008), and After the Storm (2016). Among his prizes are the Jury Prize at the 2013 Cannes Film Festival for Like Father, Like Son and the Palme d’Or at the 2018 Cannes Film Festival for Shoplifters. He has contributed to the Japanese MONKEY twice. His comments on Naoya Shiga’s “The Razor” appear in vol. 9 (June 2016), and in translation in MONKEY, vol. 1. “The Crab,” his contribution to “My First Trip,” translated by Morgan Giles, appears in vol. 2.

NAOKO KUDŌ (b. 1935) is a poet and author of children’s books. Her books have been beloved both by adults and children for nearly half a century. “Cat to the Sea,” which appeared in vol. 6 of Monkey Business, was included in The Philosophical Lion, her 1962 collection of children’s poems.

DOPPO KUNIKIDA (1871–1908) was a major figure in the world of letters in Meiji Japan. “Unforgettable People” is considered one of his best stories. The translation by Jay Rubin in vol. 4 of Monkey Business has been substantially revised from the version that appeared in Monumenta Nipponica 27:3.

YUKI KURITA (b. 1972) won the Subaru Literary Award in 2002 and has been an Akutagawa Prize finalist three times. She has published six books of fiction, including Grasshoppers and Little Birds Don’t Perch Here. Her short story “Pako,” translated by Jeffrey Angles, appeared in vol. 3 of Monkey Business.

NATSUKO KURODA (b. 1937) is a writer whose uncompromising style is distinctive for its evocative power as well as its grammatical and visual strangeness. Kuroda founded the literary journal Sajō while at Waseda University and won the Yomiuri Shimbun debut short story prize in 1963 for “Ball.” In 2012 she published the novella a b sango, which was selected for the journal Waseda Bungaku and subsequently won the Akutagawa Prize. Her story “The City Bird,” translated by Asa Yoneda, appears in MONKEY, vol. 3.

L

KELLY LINK (b. 1969) has published five collections of short stories, including Get in Trouble, Magic for Beginners, and White Cat, Black Dog. In 2024 she published her first novel, The Book of Love, which quickly became a national bestseller. She has won a Hugo Award, three Nebula Awards, and a World Fantasy Award for her fiction, and was a 2018 MacArthur Fellow. With Gavin Grant, she is the co-founder of Small Beer Press and is the owner of Book Moon, an independent bookshop in Easthampton, Massachusetts.  “Horoscopes,” a collection of very short stories, appeared in vol. 6 of Monkey Business, and “Other People’s Ghost Stories” is featured in vol. 5 of MONKEY.

M

SHIN’ICHI MAKINO (1896–1936) wrote many novels and a number of fantastical short stories. He studied English literature at Waseda University. Following his suicide, he became a cult figure. As far as we know, the publication of his short story “The Elevator and the Moon,” which appeared in vol. 7 of Monkey Business, is the first time his work has appeared in English.

AOKO MATSUDA (b. 1979) is a writer and translator. In 2013 her debut, Stackable, was nominated for the Mishima Yukio Prize and the Noma Literary New Face Prize. In 2019 her short story “The Woman Dies” (from the collection The Year of No Wild Flowers), translated by Polly Barton and published by Granta online, was shortlisted for a Shirley Jackson Award. And in 2021, Where the Wild Ladies Are, translated by Polly Barton, won a World Fantasy Award in the best collection category. Her short novel The Girl Who Is Getting Married was published by Strangers Press in 2016. She has translated work by Karen Russell, Amelia Gray, and Carmen Maria Machado into Japanese. Her stories appear in vols. 5–7 of Monkey Business, translated by Jeffrey Angles. Her short fiction, translated by Polly Barton, is featured in vols. 1–5 of MONKEY.

ERIC McCORMACK (1938–2023) was a Scottish-born Canadian writer known for skillfully blending elements of gothic fiction, black humor, metafiction, magic realism, and straightforward good storytelling. He published a collection of stories and five novels, including The Paradise Motel, First Blast of the Trumpet Against the Monstrous Regiment of Women, and The Dutch Wife. His last novel, Cloud (Penguin, 2014), was translated by Motoyuki Shibata and published in Japan. “Family Traditions” appears in Monkey Business, vol. 5, and “The Trail” in MONKEY, vol. 2. His “Letter to the Silent Book Club” appears in vol. 5.

STEVEN MILLHAUSER (b. 1943) is an American novelist and short story writer. He won the Pulitzer Prize in 1997 for Martin Dressler, and the Story Prize in 2012 for We Others: New & Selected Stories. Many of his stories have appeared in the New Yorker. His work has been translated into fifteen languages. “A Tired Town” appears in MONKEY, vol. 1.

MIZUKI MISUMI (b. 1981) has published nine volumes of poetry, including Overkill, the 2005 Nakahara Chūya Prize winner, and A Room Without Neighbors, the 2014 Hagiwara Sakutarō Prize winner. “Reach Out Those Young Limbs” was first published in vol. 28 of the Japanese MONKEY.

KENJI MIYAZAWA (1896–1933) was virtually unknown during his lifetime. Yet his stories, poems, and plays now enjoy an avid readership who appreciate his innovative language, spiritual and religious depth, and his profound empathy with nature. “The Restaurant of Many Orders,” in vol. 4 of Monkey Business, was originally published in 1924.

SHION MIZUHARA (b. 1959) is one of the most popular tanka poets in Japan. She has written eight books of tanka and has received many awards. She has recently published a collection of short stories as well. “Monkey Tanka,” translated by Ted Goossen, appeared in vol. 1 of Monkey Business.

TAKI MONMA (b. 1933) is a novelist and short story writer who lives in Saitama, near Tokyo. Four of her stories, translated by Ted Goossen, appeared in vols. 3–5 and 7 of Monkey Business. Her work has been published in the Japanese editions of Monkey Business and MONKEY.

KUNIKO MUKŌDA (1929–1981) was a novelist, essayist, and screenwriter. A collection of her short stories, The Name of the Flower, was translated by Tomone Matsumoto and published by Stone Bridge Press in 1994. Mukōda won the Naoki Prize in 1980. A year later, she died in a plane crash.

HARUKI MURAKAMI (b. 1949) is one of the world’s best-known and best-loved novelists. All his major novels—including Hardboiled Wonderland and the End of the World, The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, and 1Q84—have been translated into dozens of languages. “On Writing Short Stories” in vol. 7 of Monkey Business is the second half of his conversation with Motoyuki Shibata, published in vol. 9 (Summer/Fall 2016) of the Japanese MONKEY. An interview by Hideo Furukawa appears in vol. 1 of Monkey Business. His essays “The Great Cycle of Storytelling” and “So What Shall I Write About?” appear in vol. 2 and vol. 5 of Monkey Business. Vol. 4 of Monkey Business includes an essay by Richard Powers on Murakami’s fiction. “Good Stories Originate in the Caves of Antiquity,” a conversation with Mieko Kawakami, appears in vol. 1 of MONKEY; the essay “Jogging in Southern Europe” in vol. 2; the story “Creta Kano,” translated by Gitte Hansen, in vol. 3; “The Zombie,” translated by Jeffrey Angles, in vol. 4; and “Remembering Seiji Ozawa,” translated by Ted Goossen, in vol. 5.  

N

KAFŪ NAGAI (1879–1959) is considered one of the most important Japanese novelists from the early twentieth century, known for his evocations of fading Edo culture. English translations of his work include Rivalry: A Geisha’s Tale, translated by Stephen Snyder, and the excellent selection of his writings, translated by Edward Seidensticker, in Kafū the Scribbler. “Behind the Prison,” translated by Jay Rubin, appears in vol. 7 of Monkey Business.

MASAYA NAKAHARA (b. 1970) is a novelist, short-story writer and musician. “Who’d Have Thought Tsutomu Would Die?” (see vol. 6 of Monkey Business) was included in his first collection of stories, Mari and Fifi’s Massacre Songbook, published in 2001.

ATSUSHI NAKAJIMA (1909–1942) was a master stylist who often turned to the Chinese classics for his material, but he was also an avid reader of Western writers like Aldous Huxley and Robert Louis Stevenson; the latter would become the hero of Nakajima’s fictional biography set in Samoa. “Li Ling,” a story by Nakajima translated by Paul McCarthy, appeared in issue 8 of A Public Space. “Sandy’s Lament,” translated by Cody Poulton, appeared in vol. 1 of Monkey Business.

SAWAKO NAKAYASU (b. 1975) is an artist working with language, performance, and translation—separately and in various combinations. Her most recent books include Pink Waves (Omnidawn), a finalist for the PEN/Voelcker Award; Some Girls Walk into the Country They Are From (Wave Books), and the pamphlet Say Translation Is Art (Ugly Duckling Presse). Translations include The Collected Poems of Chika Sagawa (Modern Library), as well as Mouth: Eats Color—Sagawa Chika Translations, Anti-translations, & Originals (Rogue Factorial), a multilingual work of both original and translated poetry. “Ant as a Glass of Water” appears in MONKEY, vol. 4, and four more of her poems are featured in vol. 5.

SŌSEKI NATSUME (1867–1916), a founding father of modern literature in Japan, is still read and revered today. English translations of his work include Sanshirō and The Miner, both translated by Jay Rubin. Michael Bourdaghs’s new translation of Ten Nights of Dreams was published in vol. 6 of Monkey Business, and “The Carlyle Museum” in vol. 7.

THE BROTHER AND SISTER NISHIOKA have attracted a cult following with their literary manga. They created manga versions of Kafka’s stories for the Japanese Monkey Business, which resulted in Kafka: Classics in Comics, published by VillageBooks in 2010. Three of their Kafka stories appeared in Monkey Business: “A Country Doctor” in vol. 1, “A Fasting-Artist” in vol. 2, and “The Metamorphosis” in vol. 3. Their version of the Polish writer Bruno Schulz’s story “Tailors’ Dummies” appeared in vol. 4.  

O

MIMEI OGAWA (1882–1961) is one of Japan’s best-known children’s writers, sometimes called the “Japanese Hans Christian Andersen.” “Sleepy Town,” which appeared in vol. 2 of Monkey Business in a translation by James Dorsey, was first published in 1914, in a journal called The Japanese Boy.

YŌKO OGAWA (b. 1962) is one of the most highly regarded Japanese novelists. Translations of her work have appeared in the New Yorker and A Public Space, among others. Four of her books have been translated into English, all by Stephen Snyder, including The Housekeeper and the Professor and Revenge: Eleven Dark Tales. “The Tale of the House of Physics” and “Boys and Girls,” translated by Ted Goossen, appeared in vols. 1 and 6 of Monkey Business; “A Peddler of Tears,” translated by Sam Bett, appeared in vol. 7.

KANOKO OKAMOTO (1889–1939) was a poet and novelist known for her rich use of language. Influenced by her older brother’s classmate Jun’ichirō Tanizaki and the poet Akiko Yosano, she started contributing tanka to magazines when she was seventeen. With Yosano, in 1911 she became one of the first contributors to Seitō (Bluestockings), an early feminist journal. After publishing four tanka anthologies, she became a novelist, starting with a novella about the last days of Akutagawa Ryūnosuke (Tsuru wa yamiki, 1936). “Portrait of an Old Geisha” (1938), translated by Cody Poulton, was published in the Oxford Book of Japanese Short Stories, edited by Ted Goossen. Her novella A Riot of Goldfish (1937) was translated by Keith Vincent. Her story “Sushi,” translated by David Boyd, appears in MONKEY, vol. 2.

MASATSUGU ONO (b. 1970) launched his career writing about a mythical fishing village in southern Japan, though his scope has widened considerably since then. He is also an active critic and translator from French and English (Amitav Ghosh, V.S. Naipaul, etc.). “The Great Noise,” which appeared in vol. 5 of Monkey Business, was included in his 2010 short story collection Larger Than Night. He won the Akutagawa Prize in 2015. Three of his stories, translated by Michael Emmerich, appeared in vols. 2, 3, and 4 of Monkey Business.

MIDORI OSAKI (1896–1971) was a modernist writer. Born in Tottori prefecture, she was most active in the 1920s and 1930s. Her best-known work, “Wandering in the Realm of the Seventh Sense,” was translated by Kyoko Selden and Alisa Freedman. Her stories, translated by Asa Yoneda and David Boyd, appear in vols. 3–5 of MONKEY. Hitomi Yoshio’s translation of the 1929 play “Apple Pie Afternoon” is featured on the MONKEY website under “Translators to watch for.” Her life was the subject of the 1998 film Wandering in the Realm of the Seventh Sense: In Search of Midori Osaki by pink film director Sachi Hamano.

SAYAKA ŌSAKI (b. 1982) is a poet, and her second collection of poetry, Pointing Impossible, was awarded the 2014 Nakahara Chūya Prize. She has also written two children’s books. “I Cook, and Eat” was first published in vol. 28 of the Japanese MONKEY.

HIROKO OYAMADA (b. 1983) is one of Japan’s most promising young writers. Her short novels The Factory, The Hole, and Weasels in the Attic were translated by David Boyd and published by New Directions. Her story “Spider Lilies” was translated by Juliet Winters Carpenter and published in the Japan issue of Granta (Spring 2014). “Lost in the Zoo” and “Extra Innings,” translated by David Boyd, appear in vols. 6 and 7 of Monkey Business. Her stories are featured in MONKEY, vols. 1–5.

KENJI OZAWA (b. 1968) is one of the most popular singer-songwriters in Japan. The original Japanese version of “Silver Coins from the Red Mountain” appeared in the sixth (“Music”) issue of the Japanese Monkey, and in vol. 6 (2016) of Monkey Business.

MINORU OZAWA (b. 1956) is a leading haiku poet in Japan and heads the haiku poet coterie Sawa. He also edits the highly regarded haiku journal of the same name. He won the Yomiuri Prize for Literature with his 2005 collection The Moment. The ghost haiku that appear in vol. 2 of Monkey Business were originally written for the eleventh (“Ghost”) issue of the Japanese Monkey Business. “Monkey Haiku” appeared in vol. 1 of Monkey Business.

P

DAVID PEACE (b. 1967) is the author of the Red Riding Quartet, GB84, The Damned Utd, Tokyo Year Zero, Occupied City, and Red or Dead. He was named one of Granta’s Best Young British Novelists in 2003, and received the James Tait Black Memorial Prize in 2005. He lives in Tokyo. His story “After Ryūnosuke, Before Ryūnosuke” appeared in vol. 4 of Monkey Business.

RICHARD POWERS (b. 1957) is one of America’s most important novelists. His award-winning books include The Overstory and Plowing the Dark. His short story “Lodestar” appeared in vol. 3 of Monkey Business. The essay “The Global Distributed Self-Mirroring Subterranean Neurological Soul-Sharing Picture Show,” which was later published in vol. 4 of Monkey Business, was presented at “A Wild Haruki Chase,” an international conference of Haruki Murakami translators held in Tokyo in March 2006. An edited version appears in A Wild Haruki Chase: Reading Murakami Around the World.

S

ADAM EHRLICH SACHS (b. 1985) is the author of three books: Gretel and the Great War, The Organs of Sense, and Inherited Disorders. His fiction has appeared in The New Yorker, n+1, and Harper’s, and he was a finalist for the Believer Book Award and the Sami Rohr Prize for Jewish Literature. Aoko Matsuda translated five of his stories from Inherited Disorders for the Japanese MONKEY (Spring 2018); for the same issue, she wrote a story in response to his work, which was translated into English by Polly Barton as “A Father and His Back” and published in MONKEY New Writing from Japan, vol. 3. “The Heron” appears in MONKEY, vol. 5.

KYŌHEI SAKAGUCHI (b. 1978) is a writer, artist, and architect. His work explores alternative ways of being, as in his books Zero Yen House and Build Your Own Independent Nation. His novel Haikai Taxi was nominated for the Yukio Mishima Prize in 2014. Translated by Sam Malissa, “Forest of the Ronpa” appears in vol. 1 of MONKEY, “The Lake” in vol. 2, “The Tale of Malig the Navigator” in vol. 3, “Listen for the Perfume” in vol. 4, and “Bird’s-Eye View” in vol. 5.

YI SANG (1910–1937) was a highly innovative writer in colonial Korea. “Crow’s Eye View,” his major poetical work, consists of fifteen sections, six of which were newly translated into Japanese for the ninth issue of the Japanese Monkey Business. A translation of the first five sections by Maxie Bai and Ted Goossen appeared in vol. 3 of Monkey Business.

BRUNO SCHULZ (1892–1942) was a Polish writer whose career was tragically terminated by a Nazi officer. His two books, Sklepy Cynamonowe (Cinnamon Shops—the English title is The Street of Crocodiles) and Sanatorium Pod Klepsydrą (Sanatorium Under the Sign of the Hourglass) are considered two of the most important books to have come out of Eastern Europe. The Brother and Sister Nishioka created a manga version of Schulz’s story “Tailors’ Dummies,” which appeared in vol. 4 of Monkey Business.  

MATTHEW SHARPE (b. 1962) is highly regarded for his versatile and innovative style. He has published four novels, including The Sleeping Father and Jamestown (both Soft Skull Press), as well as a collection of short stories. “In Another Time and Place” appears in vol. 5 of Monkey Business. “2020 Triptych” is featured in MONKEY, vol. 3. 

TOMOKA SHIBASAKI (b. 1973) is a novelist, short story writer, and essayist. Her story collection A Hundred Years and a Day, translated by Polly Barton, will be published under the Monkey imprint in 2025. She won the Akutagawa Prize in 2014 with Spring Garden, which has been translated by Polly Barton (Pushkin Press). “The Seaside Road” appears in vol. 2 of Monkey Business, “The Glasses Thief” in vol. 3, “Background Music” in vol. 6, translated by Ted Goossen, and “Peter and Janis” in vol. 7, translated by Christopher Lowy. Her stories, translated by Polly Barton, are featured in vols. 1–5 of MONKEY.

TATSUHIKO SHIBUSAWA (1928–1987) was a prolific translator of French literature, known for his translations of the Marquis de Sade and the French surrealists. He wrote several collections of short stories, but Takaoka’s Travels was his only novel. Shibusawa is also known for his essays, which deal with topics from dreams to the occult. He was a friend of Yukio Mishima, who based the character Yasushi Imanishi in The Temple of Dawn on Shibusawa. 

NAOYA SHIGA (1883–1971) was a master stylist closely associated with the development of the “I novel.” His short stories, such as “The Razor” (1910) and “Night Fires” (1920) established his reputation. Ted Goossen’s translation of “Night Fires” appears in the Oxford Book of Japanese Short Stories. The novella Reconciliation (Wakai, 1917), translated by Goossen, was published by Canongate in 2020. Shiga’s only full-length novel, An’ya Koro (1921–37), was translated by Edwin McClellan as A Dark Night’s Passing.

SHII is the pen name of a poet who often combines poetry with her own photography. She was the 2020 winner of the Contemporary Poetry Notebook Award. “For Yoko Sensei” was first published in vol. 28 of the Japanese MONKEY.

ELENI SIKELIANOS (b. 1965) is the author of ten books of poetry, including The California Poem (Coffee House Press, 2004) and Your Kingdom (Coffee House Press, 2023). She has also published two hybrid memoir-verse-image-novels: The Book of Jon and You Animal Machine. She has been at the forefront of ecopoetics and hybrid work since the early 2000s, exploring family as well as animal lineages. Her work has been translated into French and Greek, among a dozen other languages. She is a professor of Literary Arts at Brown University. Two of her poems appear in MONKEY, vol. 5.

CHARLES SIMIC (b. 1938) was appointed the fifteenth Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress in 2007. His books include The World Doesn’t End, Dime-Store Alchemy: The Art of Joseph Cornell, and New and Selected Poems: 1962–2012. “Doubles” was included in That Little Something, his 2008 collection of poems; it inspired “Variation and Theme,” a graphic narrative by Satoshi Kitamura that appeared in vol. 5 of Monkey Business.

KEIJIRŌ SUGA (b. 1958) is a noted poet and critic. His Agend’Ars poetry series was released in four separate volumes from 2010 to 2013. Ten collections of critical essays have also been published, including Shasen no Tabi (Off the Beaten Path), which was awarded the Yomiuri Prize for Literature in 2011. His Japanese translations from French, Spanish, and English include works by Isabel Allende, Aimee Bender, J.M.G. Le Clézio, Maryse Condé, Édouard Glissant, and Jamaica Kincaid. He teaches critical theory at Meiji University, Tokyo. His poem “With the Archaeopteryx,” translated by Chris Corker, appears in vol. 3 of MONKEY.

T

INUO TAGUCHI (b. 1967) is an award-winning poet. His second poetry collection, Moo Shōgun, published by Shinchōsha in 2000, won the 31st Takami Jun Award. He has published a series of collections including Armadillogic, Taishi: Doro no koyomi (dialogue-poems: co-authored with Yasuhiro Yotsumoto), and Sei Franchesca no Tori. In 2021, Haydn na Asa, his first collection in twelve years, was published by Nanarokusha; it was translated into English by Takako Lento and published as Haydn Morning (Vagabond Press, 2022). “A Phone Call from Emily Dickinson,” translated by Leo Elizabeth Takada, is featured in MONKEY, vol. 5.

GEN’ICHIRŌ TAKAHASHI (b. 1951) is the author of nineteen books of fiction, as well as more than two dozen volumes of essays. His novel Sayonara, Gangsters was translated by Michael Emmerich and published in 2008. He is an active social commentator and has written widely about the post-March 11 situation in Japan. “Dear Cindy,” translated by Michael Emmerich, appeared in vol. 3 of Monkey Business, and “Demon Beasts,” translated by Ryan Shaldjian Morrison, in vol. 4. “Goodbye, Christopher Robin” is the title story of his collection of short stories published in 2012; translated by David Boyd, it is included in vol. 5 of Monkey Business.

MUTSUO TAKAHASHI (b. 1937) is one of Japan’s most prominent and prolific living poets. Since first attracting the attention of the Japanese literary world in the 1960s with his bold evocations of homoerotic desire, he has published forty-eight books of poetry and numerous collections of essays, literary criticism, and fiction. These include his magnum opus Tsui kinō no koto (Only Yesterday), which describes travels in Greece and his interest in Ancient Greece. Several collections of Takahashi’s poetry are available in English translation including On Two Shores (Dedalus, 2006) and Poems of a Penisist (University of Minnesota Press, 2012). His memoir Twelve Views from the Distance (University of Minnesota Press, 2012), translated by Jeffrey Angles, was shortlisted for a Lambda Literary Award. “Only Yesterday” appears in vol. 3 of MONKEY.

FUMIKO TAKANO (b. 1957) is a manga artist of almost legendary reputation. Her literary manga creations include Absolutely Safe Razor, A Yellow Book, and There Is a Stick. Her imaginative adaptation of Hans Christian Andersen’s “The Little Match-Girl” appeared in the eleventh issue of the Japanese Monkey Business and in vol. 4 of Monkey Business; “The Futon of Tottori,” based on a story by Lafcadio Hearn, appeared in vol. 2 of Monkey Business.

MAKOTO TAKAYANAGI (b. 1950) has published numerous books of poetry. His collected works appeared in two volumes in 2016. A third volume was published in 2019. Aliceland was his first publication, in 1980; a translation by Michael Emmerich appears in vol. 7 of Monkey Business. “Five Prose Poems” appears in vol. 1 of MONKEY, “The Graffiti” in vol. 3, selections from The Art of Interstellar Transcription in vol. 4, and selections from Communications from a Wandering Comet in vol. 5 (all translated by Michael Emmerich).

KIKUKO TSUMURA (b. 1978) is a writer from Osaka, and she often uses Osaka dialect in her work. She has won numerous Japanese literary awards, including the Akutagawa Prize and the Noma Literary New Face Prize. Her first short story translated into English, “The Water Tower and the Turtle,” won a PEN/Robert J. Dau Short Story Prize for Emerging Writers. Her novel There’s No Such Thing as an Easy Job, translated by Polly Barton, was published by Bloomsbury in 2020. Her stories, translated by Polly Barton, appear in MONKEY, vols. 2, 3, and 5.

YŪKO TSUSHIMA (1947–2016) was a prolific Japanese fiction writer, essayist, and critic. Called “an archeologist of the female psyche” (Village Voice) and “one of the most important Japanese writers of her generation” (New York Times), Tsushima won numerous awards for her writing. Three of her novels, Child of Fortune, Woman Running in the Mountains, and Territory of Light, and one of her story collections, The Shooting Gallery, were translated by Geraldine Harcourt. Her novel Laughing Wolf won the Jirō Osaragi Prize in 2001, and was translated by Dennis Washburn. Tsushima was the daughter of the celebrated Japanese novelist Osamu Dazai (1909–1948). “Flying Squirrels,” an excerpt from a novella, translated by Rose Bundy, is featured in MONKEY, vol. 2.

U

HYAKKEN UCHIDA (1889–1971) attracts avid readers who value his sly humor and dark fantasy. English translations include Rachel DeNitto’s Realm of the Dead. “The Sarasate Disk,” which appeared in vol. 4 of Monkey Business, was the primary source for the 1980 cult film Zigeunerweisen, directed by Seijun Suzuki.

KŌJI UNO (1891–1961) challenged the dominant literary naturalism, laying the groundwork for contemporary experimental writing. Influenced by Gogol and the symbolist poets, he is best known for two novellas, In the Storehouse and Love of Mountains, which are collected in Love of Mountains, translated by Elaine Gerbert and published by University of Hawai’i Press. “Closet LLB,” translated by Jay Rubin, appeared in vol. 1 of Monkey Business.

W

ELI K.P. WILLIAM (b. 1984) is the author of The Jubilee Cycle, a trilogy set in a dystopian future Tokyo: Cash Crash Jubilee (2015), The Naked World (2017), and A Diamond Dream (2022). A Canadian, he has been a resident of Japan since 2009. He has published in the Japan Times, Cha, and Writer’s Digest, among other publications. His essays and book reviews have appeared in the literary journal Subaru. His translation of A Man by Keiichiro Hirano was published in 2020, and his short story translations have appeared in Granta, The Southern Review, and Kyoto Journal. His story “Lost and Found Babies” is featured in vol. 3 of MONKEY.

ROB WINGER (b. 1974) is the author of four books of poetry, most recently It Doesn’t Matter What We Meant (Penguin Random House Canada, 2021). He’s been shortlisted for a Governor General’s Literary Award, the Trillium Book Award for Poetry, and the Ottawa Book Award. He lives in the hills northeast of Toronto, where he teaches English and creative writing at Trent University.

Y

RIICHI YOKOMITSU (1898–1947) was a modernist, often highly experimental writer in the first half of the twentieth century. “Time” was first published in 1931, and was reprinted in the tenth issue of the Japanese Monkey Business; it appeared in vol. 3 of Monkey Business, translated by David Boyd.

BARRY YOURGRAU (b. 1949) is a writer of very short stories. His collection Wearing Dad’s Head was reissued in 2016, and A Man Jumps Out of an Airplane in 2017. His memoir Mess: One Man’s Struggle to Clean Up His House and His Act was published in 2015. His stories appeared in vols. 1–3 of Monkey Business. “Private Tour,” a companion piece to Mess, appeared in vol. 7. “Goose” appears in vol. 1 of MONKEY and “Toad” in vol. 2. His work regularly appears in the Japanese MONKEY, translated by Motoyuki Shibata.