Cigar Notes

Author: (Japan) Ito Ikikuma
Publisher:
Publishing Date: 2005-07-01
Features: When Yu Qiuwei wrote no essays yet, he fell in love with the title "Smoking Pipe Notes" upon hearing it and immediately imagined the scene of holding a pipe and writing in front of a small window on a lonely island. I thought, that must be a standard "essays realm." However, back then, I never imagined I would have to wait another twenty years to read "Smoking Pipe Notes." It was this kind of "satisfying" feeling that gave his essays a kind of elegance that resisted the hustle and bustle, thus representing a cool island gaze cast back onto the homeland. However, his psychological detachment did not deliberately manifest as transcendent. Instead, by washing away the superficial waves, he paid more attention to the texture of life. To in the texture is what a true artist does. To the texture is what makes an excellent essayist.
Wu Zuqiang: "Smoking Pipe Notes" is a work by a composer who expresses inner feelings not with notes but with words. I don’t know all the content of the 1,800+ essays in "Smoking Pipe Notes," but from this Chinese translation excerpt, even these hundred essays are already dazzling. How much broader the entire collection must be can only be imagined. Tsujii Takao: "Smoking Pipe Notes" is a rare gem in modern essay literature. If compared to France, it could be called Montaigne’s Essais, or a literary branch with a different lineage like the aphorism collections of La Rochefoucauld. "Smoking Pipe Notes" is a vast series of essays that ran in Asahi Graph for thirty-six years and was widely known in Japan. This monograph is a selection of the author’s "Smoking Pipe Notes" column during his lifetime, compiling 100 essays. The column ran in Asahi Graph in Japan for 36 years, publishing over 1,800 essays on history, culture, ethnicity, music, human relations, social trends, and more, in a rich and diverse manner. It records the erudition of Mr. Ito Ikikuma and spreads his profound humanistic concern.