Torahiko Terada: 8 works in the original Japanese, with translation
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.
Works in the library
- 子猫Torahiko Terada · Intermediate
- 蓄音機Torahiko Terada · Intermediate
- 電車と風呂Torahiko Terada · Intermediate
- 丸善と三越Torahiko Terada · Intermediate
- 夏Torahiko Terada · Intermediate
- 石油ランプTorahiko Terada · Intermediate
- ねずみと猫Torahiko Terada · Intermediate
- 鸚鵡のイズムTorahiko Terada · Intermediate
Cultural notes (selection)
Tying up a captured mouse with thread and delivering it to the police box is a parody of the Japanese legal duty to hand in found lost property to a police officer. The author has the cat solemnly carry out this system, creating humour.
An armed anti-government rebellion launched in 1877 (Meiji 10) by samurai families from Kagoshima, led by Saigō Takamori; it was the last civil war of modern Japan. The author contrasts it with the fact that it fell in the same year as Edison's registration of the phonograph.
A type of wooden geta with two tall teeth on the sole, worn mostly by men when going out. In the text, 「堅い高足駄」 refers to geta with high teeth, which are unstable on muddy roads in the rain, so the author feels 「ぎごちない」 (awkward and clumsy).
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.