Podcasts

BOA Podcast 6: Lena Baibikov, translator of Haruki Murakami non-fiction


 

In this episode of the Hon podcast, host Amy Chavez talks with Lena Baibikov who has translated Haruki Murakami’s non-fiction works from Japanese into Russian. Lena has translated What I Talk About When I Talk About Running, Radio Murakami and a book of Murakami’s short stories as well as works by Banana Yoshimoto, Ryu Murakami, and Yukio Mishima and several children’s book authors. This podcast recording takes place in Lena’s kitchen in Ashiya, just 100 meters from where Murakami’s parents lived until the Kobe Earthquake of 1995. Lena also took Amy on a tour of the neighborhood Murakami grew up in. She tells us how she got started translating and what it is that intrigues her about Murakami’s works. (Click “more” below to see the Show Notes).

 

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Podcasts

BOA Podcast 5: William Scott Wilson, author of Walking the Kiso Road


In this episode of the “Hon” podcast, host Amy Chavez talks with William Scott Wilson, author and translator of over a dozen books on Japan and China. They briefly discuss a few of these including, Hagakure: The Book of the Samurai (by Yamamoto Tsunetomo), The Book of 5 Rings (by Miyamoto Musashi), and Cultivating Ch’i: A Samurai Physician’s Teachings on the Way of Health (by Kaibara Ekiken) before they zero in on the writing of Walking the Kiso Road. In this episode the author reveals a surprising fact about himself that we never knew before! (hint: If you like to kayak, you’ll definitely want to check this out). Show Notes available by clicking “more” below but be warned, they include spoilers.

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Podcasts

BOA Podcast 3: Juliet Winters Carpenter talks about translating Japanese Literature

In this episode of the Books on Asia podcast, Amy meets up with Juliet Winters Carpenter to talk about her 70 or so translated works of Japanese literature including Shion Miura’s The Great Passage, Minae Mizumura’s A True Novel, Shiba Ryōtaro’s Clouds Above the Hill, Jun’ichiro Saga’s Memories of Wind and Waves, and Abe Kōbō’s Secret Rendezvous. (more…)

Podcasts

BOA Podcast 2: Judith Pascoe on Wuthering Heights

In this episode of the Books on Asia Podcast, Amy talks with Dr. Judith Pascoe in her office on the campus of Florida State University while a Brontëesque storm rages outside their window. Pascoe discusses aspects of her book On the Bullet Train with Emily Brontë: Wuthering Heights in Japan, and even offers up some unique Japanese language learning tips.

You’ll find her book, as well as others discussed in the podcast in Issue 2 of the Books on Asia website.