One of the world's most ruthless warriors, Chinggis Khan conquered nearly all of Asia in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, transforming the scattered and impoverished Mongols into an exceptionally proud and powerful nation. In this riveting and thoroughly researched portrait, Japan's celebrated epic novelist drives at the root of the khan's great desires and insatiable appetite for supremacy. Beginning with his birth in 1162, The Blue Wolf follows the crucial alliances that led to Chinggis Khan's great campaigns in North China, Bukhara, and Samarkand, as well as the state of Khorazm. The khan was obsessed with his ancestry, not knowing whether he was the descendent of the blue wolf (mythical progenitor of the Mongols and the noble Borjigin line) or merely the bastard son of a Merkid tribesman. For Inoue Yasushi, Chinggis's ancestral anxiety lies at the center of his relentless push for empire. He struggled with his paternity as intensely as he fought his battles, and his victories stood as proof that the brave warrior was a true Mongol. The question of paternity also formed the largest wedge between Chinggis and his eldest son, Jochi, a boy born in captivity and of similarly questionable heritage. Hailed for its sophistication and rich imagining of a remote world, The Blue Wolf puts a human cast on a legendary force that changed Asia and the world.

The Blue Wolf: A Novel of the Life of Chinggis Khan (Weatherhead Books on Asia)

Literature & Fiction

Yasushi, Inoue

Literary

Columbia University Press

The Hunting Gun, set in the period immediately following WWII, follows the consequences of a tragic love affair among well-to-do people in an exclusive suburb of the great commercial cities of Osaka and Kobe. Told from the viewpoints of three different women, this is a story of the psychological impact of illicit love. First viewed through the eyes of Shoko, who learns of the affair through reading her mother's diary, then through the eyes of Midori, who had long known about the affair of her husband with Saiko, and finally through the eyes of Saiko herself.

The Hunting Gun

Contemporary

Peter Owen Ltd

The Counterfeiter and Other Stories

Tuttle Pub

Izu Dancer and Other Stories: The Counterfeiter, Obasute, The Full Moon (Tut Books. L)

Yasunari, Kawabata

Tuttle+publishing

Yasushi Inoue, who has been aptly described as the Grand Old Man of Japanese letters, was also one of the most popular novelists in Japan. His novel Confucius (Koshi) topped sales of 700,000 copies in its first year of publication. The story is told through the eyes of Yen-chiang, a fictitious disciple of the Master, who, in his advanced years, lectures a younger generation of followers. Yen-chiang rescues Confucius from the obscurity of the past with a series of vivid set pieces. He guides his listeners - and the reader - across the vast Chinese landscape and the turmoil of the warring states on an intimate journey with the Sage. The brilliantly crafted historical narrative is interwoven with famous lines from the Analects, immortalized through the centuries. Tantalizing glimpses of Confucius himself flicker from the pages, his extraordinariness harmonizing with his humanness. An elusive yet lifelike portrait of Confucius emerges. At the same time the novel provides a stimulating introduction to the great philosopher for readers uninitiated in Far Eastern thought, and a refreshing new perspective for the veteran Sinologist.

Confucius A Novel

Journey beyond Samarkand

Kodansha America, Inc

Letters written between two Japanese authors discuss their travels, experiences with sickness and death, memories of the past, and visions of the future

Letters of Four Seasons

DAISAKU IKEDA

Richard L. Gage

Kodansha USA Inc

From Japan's master of historical fiction, winner of its highest cultural award, six stories in quest of the hidden treasures of Asia's past. 
The six stories, translated by two outstanding translators from the Japanese, exemplify Inoue's skill at both evoking an historical atmosphere and telling a gripping tale, and they will convey to a Western reader exactly why Inoue was one of the most popular writers in Japan today. The majority of the stories may be generally classified as "historical fiction," but, more precisely, they are extremely well-researched forays into remote geographical areas and little-known periods of history. 
The title story, "Lou-lan," recounts the turbulent history and final disappearance of an ancient city in Central Asia. "The Sage" and "Princess Yung-t'ai's Necklace" also recreate the tempestuous past of continental Asia. The remaining three stories--"The Opaline Cup," "Passage to Fudaraku," and "The Rhododendrons"--are set in Japan. The first of these is about a pair of cups that were treasured by an ancient king and are brought together after being separated for over a thousand years. The second is a narrative centering around a custom that arose in a remote Buddhist temple, whereby the abbot was cast adrift in a boat to die at sea. And the third is a masterly characterization of an old scholar reminiscing about his life.

Lou-Lan and Other Stories (Japan's Modern Writers) (English and Japanese Edition)

A disillusioned scholar wanders off to the western desert frontier of eleventh-century China and participates in the struggle between the Hsi-hsia tribes and the powerful Sung dynasty

Tun-Huang

Genre Fiction

Kodansha International

A famous Japanese novelist recounts the last fifteen years of his mother's life and the way her family adjusted to her increasing senility

Chronicle of My Mother (English and Japanese Edition)

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Books by Yasushi, Inoue