Immortalising Lafcadio Hearn, our man in Japan

I first came across Lafcadio Hearn when I was living in Japan in the 1980s. When people heard I was from Ireland their invariable response was, “Ah, Ireland, Lafcadio Hearn”. Sometimes they used his Japanese name: Koizumi Yakumo, which baffled me even more. I had never heard of this Irish man with a Japanese name. It happened so often I became curious and started to read his work .

When I moved back to Ireland, by strange coincidence, I found myself living close to one of Hearn’s childhood homes. Every day as I walked my dog I had to pass his house. He began to haunt me. I read more of his books. These were not ghost stories or fairy tales, for which he is most famous; these were books about Japanese society, religion and culture.

I began to understand why he was, and still is, so famous in Japan. They have a museum dedicated to him in the city of Matsue. His house, a former samurai residence beside Matsue Castle, has been preserved just as it was when he lived there.

I could not understand why he was not better known in Ireland. Why, as is our custom, we had not yet claimed him as another authentic Irish genius in exile. So I decided to do something about it. At first I wrote a play, then turned it into a film and then, having done much research, I realised it needed to be a novel.

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When you are writing you have to live in the world of the characters, so working on Black Dragonfly was a real pleasure because it allowed me to visit Japan every day from the comfort of my home here in Dublin. My objective in writing this book was to show the reader Japan, through Hearn’s eyes.

He wrote many books about Japan and his insights and observations are still relevant today even though the country has changed considerably since he lived there. You can walk along a busy street in any big Japanese city, round a corner and find a little shrine hidden away between the towering buildings: a haven of ancient peace amidst the chaos. Old Japan still exists in little pockets here and there in the cities, but more so in rural Japan and in the hearts of the people – the ancient rituals survive.

Hearn is not well known in the West outside of academic circles. I wanted to introduce him to a wider readership. He is considered one of the first great Western observers of the Japanese way of life. His books and essays shed enormous light on this highly evolved, but often misunderstood civilisation.

As he detested anyone editing his work, I see myself as an uninvited ghost writer, who has shamelessly plundered the best of his writing, edited and rearranged it in a way of which he would have thoroughly disapproved. Black Dragonfly is based on Hearn’s life and work but is a work of fiction. I have taken random sections from his letters, essays and books and woven them together to create a story that hopefully gives insight into his character and inner thoughts.

I did not want to just reproduce his work. I wanted readers to be with him as he experienced life in Japan with all its delights and difficulties. Hopefully, having read Black Dragonfly people will go back to the source. Reading Lafcadio Hearn’s work will promote deeper intercultural understanding and enrich any traveller’s visit to Japan.

Black Dragonfly is published by Balestier Press. The Lafcadio Hearn Memorial Gardens in Waterford will host a book launch for Black Dragonfly on Saturday, June 26th, Covid regulations permitting.