丸善と三越
Memories of the bookstore Maruzen and the department store Mitsukoshi.
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Each word has its meaning in this sentence underneath, and each sentence has a full translation. Read the original and glance down only when you need to.
About the book
This text traces the author's longing for the Maruzen bookstore from childhood, recalling the anticipation and anxiety of ordering books through a rural shop and, later, browsing the shelves on Maruzen's second floor in Tokyo. The tone is quiet and personal, tinged with nostalgia for youth and a subtle sense of loss at the store's renovation into a brick building.
Cultural notes (selection)
Background a translation can’t carry: social roles, history and allusions. While reading, tap “Note” at the end of a sentence to see them all.
Maruzen is a famous Japanese bookshop dealing in imported Western books and publishing, founded in Yokohama in 1869, with its head office later established at Nihonbashi in Tokyo. In the Meiji and Taishō periods it was the main channel through which Japanese intellectuals purchased Western academic books.
At the time, book prices were not displayed openly; instead, katakana characters replaced the numerals in a cipher, though almost everyone understood it. “アンカナ” meant one yen twenty-five sen. The author felt it resembled an Italian place name (like Ancona), which is why he never forgot it.
This means department store (a loanword from English). Promoted from the late Meiji period by Mitsukoshi, Shirokiya and others, it was a symbol of the new consumer culture of the Taishō period, representing modern commerce with clearly marked prices and open-display shelving.
About the author
Torahiko Terada (November 28, 1878 – December 31, 1935) was a Japanese physicist and author born in Tokyo, who served as a professor at Tokyo Imperial University and conducted research at RIKEN and the Earthquake Research Institute. He studied literature under Natsume Sōseki, wrote under the pseudonym Fuyuhiko Yoshimura, and is best known for his numerous essays on topics ranging from science to manga.
How the glosses are made
Word glosses and sentence translations are generated in context by AI models (DeepSeek and Zhipu GLM), and every word is checked to have a gloss. AI can make mistakes; you can report problems from the book page.
FAQ
Is this the original text?
Yes. The library holds the opening section of the public-domain original, taken from 青空文库.
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What level is it?
This one is marked “Intermediate”. Every word is glossed, so you can keep reading even with a small vocabulary.
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