Pretty clearly the best translation since Nobuyuki Yuasa's for Penguin (1966), but the thing that concerns me here is the production of the Kindle edition. I get the feeling that the text itself was lovingly prepared: clean, typo-free text, error-free line justification (what a relief!), and actively linked notes. I find it better than the print edition (the notes are less obtrusive). So overall I don't regret buying it.
But I am a little disappointed with the illustrations, which are poorly integrated with the text. Often they are too far from the passage they illustrate (spoiling the flow), and the captions easily get confused with the text (looking like the many lines of poetry quoted). They are also reproduced at a rather low resolution.
They are fine, characterful drawings by Yosa Buson done in 1779, but I would prefer to do without them altogether if they can't be handled better. I wonder if it could work if the text was broken into sections corresponding to the illustrations, each section starting on a fresh page, and the illustrations (with captions preferably integral to them) placed at the BEGINNING of each section? Or if the illustrations were placed in a separate section, each one linked to the relevant text in the body of the book?
P.S. Both the print edition and the Kindle edition are rather poor at keeping translations of lines of verse (as well as poem titles on the Kindle) distinct from the main text. The original Japanese is printed in italics, but the translations are in font identical to the main text - something which keeps tripping me up.
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ISBN-13:
978-1880656204
ISBN-10:
1880656205
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