Author Guide · 2026-05-01 · Reading time ~ 9 min
Eight Faces of Izumi Kyōka — From Ghost Stories to a Fashion Encyclopedia
Eight pieces by Izumi Kyōka now available in Korean on Pagera. Better known for ghost stories, Kyōka turns out to be an encyclopedist of late-Meiji manners, dialects, and dress.
Pagera Editorial
Korean readers know Izumi Kyōka (1873-1939) for ghost stories like "The Holy Man of Mt. Kōya." But laid out together, the eight pieces now translated on Pagera reveal a different writer: an encyclopedist of late-Meiji manners, dialects, and dress.
The Eight at a Glance
- Plum in Midsummer — self-mocking belles-lettres
- The 999th Recital — recollection with masked names
- Snowy-Mountain Tales / Hina Tales — ghost story proper
- A Landscape Notebook — Kanazawa region, in 71 anchored fragments
- The Secret Prescription — fantasy-tinted reminiscence
- To Iizaka — overnight onsen trip in Fukushima, July 1921
- A Glimpse of Modern Women's Dress — Meiji costume encyclopedia
- One Sitting's Tale — salon recollection (forthcoming)
Why one writer wrote so many things
Born in Kanazawa, trained under Ozaki Kōyō. While late-Meiji fiction tilted hard toward realism, Kyōka stubbornly kept ghosts, monsters, and ornate prose. But when not writing ghost stories, he was a careful observer of language and place — Kanazawa dialect, Fukushima dialect, Meiji women's dress (furisode, hem patterns, marumage hairstyles).
Recommended order for newcomers
Short reminiscence first → fashion encyclopedia → fantasy-tinted reminiscence → topographical essay → finally the ghost stories proper.