A few years in the past, the College of Minnesota Press and Jeffrey Angles, professor of Japanese at Western Michigan College, teamed as much as convey us English translations of the Godzilla and Godzilla Raids Once more novelizations. Now, they’re again at it with the primary official English translation of the novella The Luminous Fairies and Mothra, the story that introduced Godzilla‘s fellow kaiju the paranormal Mothra into existence! With a web page depend of 128, the e book is about to achieve retailer cabinets on January 13, 2026.
The Mothra e book was a collaboration between three authors: Shin’ichirō Nakamura, a critic, scholar, and writer of dozens of novels, a lot of which characteristic the expertise of intellectuals throughout and after World Struggle II; Takehiko Fukunaga, a prolific poet, translator of French fiction, and novelist, recognized for his delicate, poetic writing fashion and curiosity in existential themes; and Yoshie Hotta, an essayist and novelist concerned in leftist politics and the worldwide nonalignment motion of the Nineteen Sixties.
Right here’s the outline of the English translation coming from the College of Minnesota Press and Jeffrey Angles: Mystical and benevolent, the colossal lepidopteran Mothra has been some of the beloved kaiju since 1961, when The Luminous Fairies and Mothra was initially printed in Japanese. Commissioned by Tōhō Studios from three of Japan’s most outstanding postwar literary writers (Shin’ichirō Nakamura, Takehiko Fukunaga, and Yoshie Hotta), the novella fashioned the idea for the now-classic monster movie Mothra, with a protagonist second solely to Godzilla in variety of movie appearances by a kaiju. Lastly obtainable in its first official English translation, The Luminous Fairies and Mothra will captivate ardent, longtime followers of the movies in addition to newcomers.
Written simply months after the most important political demonstrations Japan had ever seen, The Luminous Fairies and Mothra displays the rebellious spirit of the time. On this unique story, explorers go to a South Pacific island and seize a bunch of fairies, inciting the fury of the goddess Mothra, who units out for Japan on a mission of rescue and revenge. Expressing a robust social stance about Japan’s have to chart its personal international coverage through the Chilly Struggle, the novella’s political message was in the end toned down within the Tōhō Studios movie. By this translation, Anglophone audiences will uncover Mothra as a determine of protest fiction intricately reflecting the advanced geopolitical state of affairs in early Nineteen Sixties Japan.
The Luminous Fairies and Mothra is translated into energetic prose by Jeffrey Angles, who additionally wrote an in depth afterword concerning the novella’s cultural context, the bizarre story of its composition, and the event of the 1961 movie. Following Angles’s best-selling translation of the unique Godzilla novellas, this new work will as soon as once more delight kaiju followers in all places.
You’ll be able to take a look at the e book’s webpage and pre-order a duplicate at THIS LINK. It’s additionally obtainable for pre-order on Amazon.
I loved the English translations of the Godzilla and Godzilla Raids Once more novelizations, so I’m wanting ahead to studying The Luminous Fairies and Mothra. Will you be choosing up a duplicate of this e book? Tell us by leaving a remark beneath.
