The Hirabayashi Hatsunosuke Reader
Mass Culture and Intermediality in Imperial Japan
Published on 18. September 2025
Book
Hardback
256 pages
978-1-350-37815-5 (ISBN)
Description
This edited volume assembles a wide array of writings by Hirabayashi Hatsunosuke, one of 20th-century Japan's foremost intellectuals, translated for the first time into English.
It begins with an introduction by the editors, Seth Jacobowitz and Aaron William Moore, that contextualizes Hirabayashi's significance as a non-doctrinaire Marxist cultural critic, visionary thinker, and much-beloved popular fiction writer. The 'Short Stories', features a selection of Hirabayashi's literary work, including science fiction ('The Artificial Human'), detective fiction ('This is How I Died!'), and more idiosyncratic works such as 'Demon at the Pulpit', an antitheist and anticlerical story.
The 'Essays' provides a range of groundbreaking critical and theoretical tracts that address such topics as 'The Social Basis of Modernism', 'The Feminisation of Culture', 'Political Value and Artistic Value: A Re-Appraisal of Marxist Literary Theory', 'Film as a Mechanism of Americanization', 'The Technological Revolution in Literature and the Arts', and many more. Hirabayashi's systematic approach to cultural theory befitting the era of massification in the 1920s places him front and centre in the hothouse intellectual climate of pre-war Japan. It also affords striking parallels to the leading thinkers in Europe such as Walter Benjamin and Antonio Gramsci, thereby forming an integral part of the history of global modernity.
It begins with an introduction by the editors, Seth Jacobowitz and Aaron William Moore, that contextualizes Hirabayashi's significance as a non-doctrinaire Marxist cultural critic, visionary thinker, and much-beloved popular fiction writer. The 'Short Stories', features a selection of Hirabayashi's literary work, including science fiction ('The Artificial Human'), detective fiction ('This is How I Died!'), and more idiosyncratic works such as 'Demon at the Pulpit', an antitheist and anticlerical story.
The 'Essays' provides a range of groundbreaking critical and theoretical tracts that address such topics as 'The Social Basis of Modernism', 'The Feminisation of Culture', 'Political Value and Artistic Value: A Re-Appraisal of Marxist Literary Theory', 'Film as a Mechanism of Americanization', 'The Technological Revolution in Literature and the Arts', and many more. Hirabayashi's systematic approach to cultural theory befitting the era of massification in the 1920s places him front and centre in the hothouse intellectual climate of pre-war Japan. It also affords striking parallels to the leading thinkers in Europe such as Walter Benjamin and Antonio Gramsci, thereby forming an integral part of the history of global modernity.
Reviews / Votes
A major thinker of the twentieth century, Hirabayashi Hatsunosuke engages with media, class, politics, and gender forcing us to rethink our presentist notions about film, detective fiction, capitalism, and reproductive labor. This exemplary selection of his works (fiction and non-fiction) from the peak of his career captures his creative artistic brilliance and remarkably prescient thought processes. * Jonathan E. Abel, associate professor in the Department of Comparative Literature and Asian Studies, The Pennsylvania State University, USA * This volume examines the polyglot and politically charged world of one of Japan's most intriguing modernist intellectuals of prewar era. Hirabayashi's production stretched from popular to politics, and film, engaging with the burgeoning discourse on technology and society. He observed Japan at a crucial time, positing if 'conquering the world of fantasy would allow it to become a reality. * Barak Kushner, Professor of East Asian History, University of Cambridge, UK * The brilliant editors Seth Jacobowitz's and Aaron William Moore's timing is uncanny. Together with a cast of other talented translators they have not only secured Hirabayashi Hatsunosuke's works' survival (UEberleben) and continuing life (Fortleben), as Walter Benjamin would have it, but have indeed given a second life to one of interwar Japan's most visionary, critical voices. * Sabine Fruehstueck, Distinguished Professor and Koichi Takashima Chair, University of California at Santa Barbara, USA * Consciously departing from Orthodox Marxism, Hirabayashi innovatively contributed to early twentieth-century understandings of mass culture via the lens of science and technology. Through his own stories and writings on new art forms ranging from detective stories to radio and film, he reflected and refracted modern Japanese popular intellectual life. Jacobowitz and Moore's reader offers us an intriguing contribution to the global intellectual history of modernities. * Sho Konishi, Director Nissan Institute of Japanese Studies, University of Oxford, UK *More details
Series
Language
English
Place of publication
London
United Kingdom
Publishing group
Bloomsbury Publishing PLC
Target group
Professional and scholarly
Dimensions
Height: 240 mm
Width: 161 mm
Thickness: 18 mm
Weight
543 gr
ISBN-13
978-1-350-37815-5 (9781350378155)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Persons
Seth Jacobowitz is Assistant Professor of Japanese in the Department of World Languages & Literatures at Texas State University, USA. He is the author of Writing Technology in Meiji Japan: A Media History of Modern Japanese Literature and Visual Culture (2016), which won the International Convention of Asia Scholars Book Prize in the Humanities in 2017. He is the translator from Japanese of The Edogawa Rampo Reader (2008) and from Portuguese of Fernando Morais' Dirty Hearts: The History of Shindo Renmei (2021).
Aaron William Moore is Handa Chair of Japanese-Chinese Relations at the University of Edinburgh, UK. He is the author of many articles on Chinese and Japanese wartime childhood and youth, as well as two books: Writing War (2013), which analysed over 200 combat soldiers' diaries from China, Japan, and the United States, and Bombing the City (2018), which compared the air raid experiences of civilians in British and Japanese regional cities.
Aaron William Moore is Handa Chair of Japanese-Chinese Relations at the University of Edinburgh, UK. He is the author of many articles on Chinese and Japanese wartime childhood and youth, as well as two books: Writing War (2013), which analysed over 200 combat soldiers' diaries from China, Japan, and the United States, and Bombing the City (2018), which compared the air raid experiences of civilians in British and Japanese regional cities.
Content
Editors' Introduction: Hirabayashi Hatsunosuke and Modern Japan's Mass Culture
Short Stories
1. The Artificial Human, Seth Jacobowitz (Apr. 1928)
2. The Devil's Altar, Rebecca Suter (Jan. 1927)
3. A Night at the Zoo, Seth Jacobowitz (Oct. 1928)
4. This Is How I Died! Seth Jacobowitz (Jun. 1929)
5. Mystery Woman, Gabriel Fernandes (Jan. 1932)
The Essays
I. Social Criticism and the Cultural Sciences
6. The Embodiment of the Modern Era, Yingzi Feng (Jan. 1929)
7. The Social Basis of Modernism, Yingzi Feng (Mar. 1929)
8. The Problem of the Cultural Sciences, Christopher Perkins (Jan. 1927)
9. The Limits of So-Called 'Scientific Criticism', Edwin Michielsen (Nov. 1930)
10. The Objective of the Women's Movement, Aaron William Moore (Aug. 1922)
11. The Feminisation of Culture, Jorinde Wels (Apr. 1926)
12. The Social Duty of Youth Groups, Aaron William Moore (n.d.)
II. Literary Theory and Proletarian Culture
13. Literature of the Fourth Class, Edwin Michielsen (Nov. 1921)
14. The Arts of the Proletariat, Edwin Michielsen (Jun. 1922)
15. The Scope of What I Can Know, Christopher Perkins (Jan. 1923)
16. Self-Reflection, Christopher Perkins (Oct. 1925)
17. The Essence of Literature, Parts 1 and 2, James Dorsey (Mar. 1927)
18. Theorising Depictions of Psychology in Fiction, Aaron William Moore (Apr. 1929)
19. Political Value and Artistic Value: A Re-examination of Marxist Literary Theory, Stefano Romagnoli (Apr. 1929)
III. Popular Literature and Genre Fiction
20. The Genius of Popular Literature, Gala Maria Follaco (Jul. 1925)
21. On Popular Literature, Gala Maria Follaco (Mar. 1929 - Feb. 1930)
22. The Modern Novel as Commodity, Nathan Shockey (May 1929)
23. Modern Japanese Detective Stories: On Edogawa Rampo in Particular, Seth Jacobowitz (Apr. 1925)
24. A Personal View on Agrarian Literature, Seth Jacobowitz (May 1929)
IV. Film and Media Theory
25. Film as a Mechanism of Americanisation, Aaron William Moore (Feb. 1929)
26. On Reality in the Arts, Giuseppe Strippoli (Aug. 1930)
27. The Technological Revolution in Literature and the Arts, Seth Jacobowitz (Jan. 1928)
28. Literature Fifty Years in the Future, Aaron William Moore (Mar. 1928)
Index
Short Stories
1. The Artificial Human, Seth Jacobowitz (Apr. 1928)
2. The Devil's Altar, Rebecca Suter (Jan. 1927)
3. A Night at the Zoo, Seth Jacobowitz (Oct. 1928)
4. This Is How I Died! Seth Jacobowitz (Jun. 1929)
5. Mystery Woman, Gabriel Fernandes (Jan. 1932)
The Essays
I. Social Criticism and the Cultural Sciences
6. The Embodiment of the Modern Era, Yingzi Feng (Jan. 1929)
7. The Social Basis of Modernism, Yingzi Feng (Mar. 1929)
8. The Problem of the Cultural Sciences, Christopher Perkins (Jan. 1927)
9. The Limits of So-Called 'Scientific Criticism', Edwin Michielsen (Nov. 1930)
10. The Objective of the Women's Movement, Aaron William Moore (Aug. 1922)
11. The Feminisation of Culture, Jorinde Wels (Apr. 1926)
12. The Social Duty of Youth Groups, Aaron William Moore (n.d.)
II. Literary Theory and Proletarian Culture
13. Literature of the Fourth Class, Edwin Michielsen (Nov. 1921)
14. The Arts of the Proletariat, Edwin Michielsen (Jun. 1922)
15. The Scope of What I Can Know, Christopher Perkins (Jan. 1923)
16. Self-Reflection, Christopher Perkins (Oct. 1925)
17. The Essence of Literature, Parts 1 and 2, James Dorsey (Mar. 1927)
18. Theorising Depictions of Psychology in Fiction, Aaron William Moore (Apr. 1929)
19. Political Value and Artistic Value: A Re-examination of Marxist Literary Theory, Stefano Romagnoli (Apr. 1929)
III. Popular Literature and Genre Fiction
20. The Genius of Popular Literature, Gala Maria Follaco (Jul. 1925)
21. On Popular Literature, Gala Maria Follaco (Mar. 1929 - Feb. 1930)
22. The Modern Novel as Commodity, Nathan Shockey (May 1929)
23. Modern Japanese Detective Stories: On Edogawa Rampo in Particular, Seth Jacobowitz (Apr. 1925)
24. A Personal View on Agrarian Literature, Seth Jacobowitz (May 1929)
IV. Film and Media Theory
25. Film as a Mechanism of Americanisation, Aaron William Moore (Feb. 1929)
26. On Reality in the Arts, Giuseppe Strippoli (Aug. 1930)
27. The Technological Revolution in Literature and the Arts, Seth Jacobowitz (Jan. 1928)
28. Literature Fifty Years in the Future, Aaron William Moore (Mar. 1928)
Index