There’s no such thing as an overnight success in literature — years can pass between an idea and a story, or between a commission and publication. The short story collection “Things Remembered and Things Forgotten” by Kyoko Nakajima is a case in point. The title story was first translated by Ian MacDonald for a special Japanese issue of Granta in 2014 and the second, Ginny Tapley Takemori’s translation of “When My Wife Was a Shiitake,” was published by Words Without Borders in 2015. It’s only now, in 2021, that we’re getting a full collection of 10 stories from Sort of Books, out on May 13.
“We initially approached Kyoko Nakajima and asked if she would be interested in a collection with related themes,” says Nat Jansz, the editor of the collection. “It proved a wonderful collaboration. Nakajima first sent us a long list of acclaimed and much-loved stories and, with the help of the translators, we finalized the selection.”
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