Taiwan Cultural Center in Japan and Eslite Spectrum Nihonbashi co-organized the Taiwan-Japan Literary Exchange Lecture series, the second event "Night of Strange Tales," was held on Oct. 22.
Xiao Xiang-shen (瀟湘神), a long-time researcher of Taiwanese supernatural tales and history, was invited to talk with well-known Japanese horror and speculative fiction writer Mitsuda Shinzo, sharing the similarities and differences between Taiwan and Japanese folk customs and the creation of the book "Chopsticks (筷)," co-authored by writers in Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Japan. The talk drew nearly 200 Japanese fans of the supernatural.
The Taiwan Cultural Center in Japan said that in recent years, a fad for the fearsome has risen in Taiwan, from books to the creative arts and musicals, "monster culture" has become a local landmark for Taiwan, while Japan has had its own strong monster culture for many years. The Cultural Center hopes to take advantage of this common fascination between Taiwan and Japan to bring Taiwanese supernatural novels to Japan. As such, this time, "Monsters of Taiwan" was chosen as the theme of the second Taiwanese Books Section in cooperation with Eslite Spectrum Nihonbashi Bookstore, with a selection of books related to monsters published by Taiwanese authors such as Ho Ching-yao (何敬堯)'s "Monsters of Taiwan (妖怪臺灣)" and "Port of Illusion (幻之港)," Xiao Xiang-shen's "Mo-sin-a (魔神仔)," and Chiaos Tseng's "Formosan Ghost Hunt (寶島搜神)" and "Mou-ji and the Sun (牟吉)."
In cooperation with Eslite Spectrum Nihonbashi and Kobunsha, the Japanese version of the "Chopsticks" was launched, aiming to harness the resources of Japanese bookstores and publishers to introduce the latest Taiwanese monster-related books to the Japanese public, exporting Taiwan's original cultural content and inspiring more translation and publication of works by Taiwanese writers in Japan.