This book is based upon two assumptions: that it is possible for an
author to be better and more important than any one of his works;
and that it is possible for an author to have a certain universal appeal
and yet be so firmly attached to a particular setting as to make a knowl-
edge of that setting essential to a complete awareness of the appeal. It
follows that a general survey of the writing, together with representa-
tive bits and snatches from it, and a description of the setting are neces-
sary if the new reader is to be properly introduced. No single book may
seem worthy of translation, and yet the author and his setting may
seem worthy of a book.

It is my feeling that Nagai Kafi is such an author. This book is
therefore an introduction to the man and his city, accompanied by a
fairly generous sampling from his works. It is neither pure biography
nor pure criticism nor yet a pure anthology, but a blending of the
three. The result will probably seem satisfactory to almost no one, for
almost everyone will wish to have had one of the three in a less adul-
terated form. I doubt, however, if Kafii would have accommodated
himself to any other sort of introduction, and I have long thought him
one of the fine writers of modern Japan.