The Exorcists: Kappa drawn by Akutagawa, 1927.
After the Disaster: Saika no Ato by Ikeda Yōson, ink and mineral pigments on silk, 1924. Collection of Kurashiki Shiritsu Bijutsukan.
Saint Kappa: Akutagawa, 1925.
The Spectres of Christ: the yukata made from material Akutagawa bought on his trip to China in 1922, and which he wore on the night of his death in 1927.
After the Fact: Akutagawa in death, by Ryūichi Oana, July 24, 1927.
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Certain chapters and sections of this novel were previously published in the following edited or substantially different forms:
After the Disaster, Before the Disaster in March Was Made of Yarn, a collection of stories written to commemorate the first anniversary of the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami, published in the US and UK by Vintage in 2012.
A Twice-Told Tale, under the title After Ryūnosuke, Before Ryūnosuke, in the Japanese literary journal Monkey Business in 2013.
After the War, Before the War in Granta 127 in 2014.
After the Thread, Before the Thread was originally written for Fantasma, an Italian collection of the three stories listed above, published by il Saggiatore in 2016.
Finally, parts of Saint Kappa were written for the twelfth Bridge the Gap? in Genoa, Italy, organised by the Centre for Contemporary Art Kitakyushu, Japan, and presented to the audience in the booklet After the Crash, Before the Crash on March 4, 2016.
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I would like to thank the following people: Ian Bahrami, Stephen Barber, Andrew Benbow, Ian Cusack, Walter Donohue, Didier Faustino, Laura Oldfield Ford, Luca Formenton, Giuseppe Genna, Jean-Paul Gratias, François Guérif, Jeanne Guyon, Mike Handford, Yuka Igarashi, Kazuo Ishiguro, Jason James, Joan Jonas, Rob Kraitt, Justin McCurry, Sonny Mehta, David Mitchell, Shunichiro Nagashima, Kazuo Okanoya, Anna Pallai, Richard Lloyd Parry, Roger Pulvers, Sukhdev Sandhu, Junzo Sawa, Katy Shaw, Anna Sherman, Motoyuki Shibata, Pelin Tan, Peter Thompson, Paul Tickell, Rirkrit Tiravanija, David Turner, Rob Turner, Kate Ward, Gen Yamabe, and the Peace family, here and there, and finally, Matteo Battarra, Angus Cargill, Hamish Macaskill, Akiko Miyake, and Jon Riley, without whom this book would never have been finished.
About the Author
David Peace – named in 2003 as one of Granta’s Best of Young British Novelists – was born and brought up in Yorkshire. He is the author of the Red Riding Quartet (Nineteen Seventy Four, Nineteen Seventy Seven, Nineteen Eighty, and Nineteen Eighty Three), GB84, which was awarded the James Tait Black Memorial Prize, The Damned Utd, and Red or Dead, which was shortlisted for the Goldsmiths Prize. The final part of his Tokyo Trilogy - to follow Tokyo Year Zero and Occupied City - will publish in Summer 2019. Patient X is his tenth novel. He lives in Tokyo.
By the Same Author
NINETEEN SEVENTY FOUR
NINETEEN SEVENTY SEVEN
NINETEEN EIGHTY
NINETEEN EIGHTY THREE
GB84
THE DAMNED UTD
TOKYO YEAR ZERO
OCCUPIED CITY
RED OR DEAD
Copyright
First published in the UK in 2018
by Faber & Faber Ltd
Bloomsbury House
74–77 Great Russell Street
London WC1B 3DA
Typeset by Ian Bahrami
This ebook edition first published in 2018
All rights reserved
© David Peace, 2018
Design by Luke Bird
Front cover image: hand-coloured Meiji Era photograph of Shinobazu, Tokyo. Public domain.
Back cover: Kappa drawing by Ryunosuke Akutagawa, courtesy of the author
The right of David Peace to be identified as author of this work has been asserted in accordance with Section 77 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988
This ebook is copyright material and must not be copied, reproduced, transferred, distributed, leased, licensed or publicly performed or used in any way except as specifically permitted in writing by the publishers, as allowed under the terms and conditions under which it was purchased or as strictly permitted by applicable copyright law. Any unauthorised distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the author’s and publisher’s rights, and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly
ISBN 978–0–571–33365–3
