1. MEMOIRS OF A GEISHA by Arthur Golden

Not literature, strictly speaking, and not by a Japanese either. But this story of a girl becoming a geisha in the 1930's is a lively and engrossing page-turner. The fact that the writer is American means that many aspects of Japanese traditional culture which a Japanese writer might take for granted are included and explained. Don't expect life in Japan today to be like this. But this book - apart from being a great story - gives fascinating insights into the attitudes and culture which lie behind modern Japan.

2. THE WIND-UP BIRD CHRONICLE by Haruki Murakami

Murakami has been described as “the first (Japanese) writer at home with the elements of American popular culture that permeate present-day Japan”. Whoever translates his novels (and three translators have tackled different works over the years) they all come out in a “cool”, informal American English with wry humour, easy to read. The hefty “Wind-Up Bird Chronicle” contains many of Murakami’s usual wacky and surreal themes, but offers serious modern reflections about Japan in the Second World War too.

3. HARD-BOILED WONDERLAND & THE END OF THE WORLD by Haruki Murakami

Murakami’s great success came in 1987 with “Norwegian Wood”, a novel which captivated a mass Japanese readership with its modern romanticism. But this earlier work (1985) tells the two incredible stories of “Hard-Boiled Wonderland” and “The End of the World” in alternate chapters until they collide at the end.
I’m limiting myself to two Murakami books. Otherwise he’d probably be in third and fourth place too.

4. AN ARTIST OF THE FLOATING WORLD by Kazuo Ishiguro

Although Ishiguro came to Britain when he was six years old and has lived here ever since, he explores Japanese essence and culture in several of his books. “An Artist of the Floating World” is not set in the eighteenth and nineteenth century when Japanese artists famously depicted the so-called Ukiyoe (the “floating world” of the theatre and amusement districts) in prints: the artist in this novel is working in the 1930s. In Ishiguro’s “The Remains of the Day” we become gradually aware that strong right-wing elements are at work. And the same process is at work here: the ageing painter looks back over his life and assesses a career that coincided with the rise of Japan militarism.

5. KITCHEN by Banana Yoshimoto (with MOONLIGHT SHADOW)

A young woman who is sometimes accused of being a literary featherweight, Mahoko “Banana” Yoshimoto gives a “taste of contemporary Japan” in her Kitchen. A novella Moonlight Shadow is included in the English editions. Yoshimoto offers a rich and strange imagination.

6. THE PILLOW BOOK by Sei Shonagon

She lived around 1000 AD, but the renown of Shonagon’s “Pillow Book” as a classic of Japanese literature means that it is preserved to this day and easily available in English translation. Shonagon was a courtier in the Imperial Palace, a lady-in-waiting to the Empress.
The Pillow Book is not a guide to the arts of the bedroom, as you might imagine, but a lively and amusing collection of personal anecdotes, reflections and stories of court life in Japan’s Heian period.

7. RASHOMON AND SEVENTEEN OTHER STORIES by Ryunosuke Akutagawa

An elegant addition to any bookshelf. Akutagawa (died 1927) is funny, shocking and imaginative. This combination of historical and modern stories gives a varied and startlingly individual view of Japan.

8. THE COUNTERFEITER AND OTHER STORIES by Yasushi Inoue

Written in the mid 1960s, these stories treat themes of authenticity and predestination (The Counterfeiter), tradition (Obasute) and company politics (The Full Moon). Thoughtful, clear, yet enigmatic.

9. SOME PREFER NETTLES by Junichiro Tanizaki

Tanizaki is one of Japan’s most celebrated writers, and described as a “comic master of sensuality”. This novel, about the breakdown of a marriage, was written in 1927 but has much to say about tradition, cultural conformity vs. individuality which is still relevant to Japan today.

10. AFTER THE QUAKE by Haruki Murakami

OK, I’m cheating. One more Murakami. A collection of short stories, all of which have some connection to the serious earthquake in Kobe in 1995.
“I am weak-kneed with admiration” – The Independent on Sunday