3388 Herons Gate

Virginia Beach, VA 23452

January 17, 2018

Ms. Joss Micabee, Editor

Phoenix Publishing
1600 Fiery Lane
Reading, PA 19607

Dear Ms. Micabee:

I am a 7th grade student at Old Donation School, and I would like you to consider my story, “The Cat of
Kagawa Prefecture” for your anthology because it parallels the lessons and themes in Japanese culture.
I chose Japanese literature because I have read numerous books and stories about Japanese culture,
and they have inspired me. My realistic fiction story would therefore be a great addition to your anthology.

The three main purposes of storytelling are to inform, entertain, and persuade the reader. It is common in
traditional Japanese literature to also highlight the importance of character and respect. In traditional
Japanese literature, the stories were often written to entertain their audience while teaching a lesson. In
The Tongue Cut Sparrow the old, mean woman cuts the tongue of her husband’s sparrow because she is
angry that it stole her starch. She then acts greedily and suffers a horrible consequence. I incorporated a
sense of entertainment into my story by including parallels to Japanese cultural lessons as well as
suspense.. The reader of my story will enjoy the suspense created by a fire which destroys the main
characters’ home which mirrors the entertaining suspense created in Japanese literature and teaches a
lesson of kindness to the old man who is the main character. A story also needs to be persuasive and
A Woman and the Bell of Miidera is an example of this. The purpose of the story is to persuade the
reader that vanity creates negative consequences. In my story I used a similar lesson by persuading my
audience of the importance of being respectful to all living things even a cat, which is a symbol of good
luck in Japanese culture. The old man learns to be respectful to a cat who saves his life.

Traditional literature reveals many important elements of Japanese culture such as returning favors or
gifts in order to not be publicly shamed. Culturegrams.com states, “Customarily, the Japanese feel an
obligation to return favors and gifts. They honor age and tradition.” This is seen in the story The Tongue
Cut Sparrow after the old man spent time at the sparrow's house, and the sparrow gave him a gift of gold.
Even when the cruel, old dame came to the sparrow’s house, she still received a gift even though she cut
the sparrow's tongue. Japanese literature also highlights the importance of traditions, good character, and
respect, and learning lessons.

My story, The Cat of Kagawa Prefecture, would be an interesting addition to your anthology because it
highlights and parallels elements of Japanese literature and culture by teaching important lessons about
character and respect. If you have any questions, please contact me at jbry3194@gmail.com or at (757)
333-5048. Thank you for your interest in my story.

Sincerely,

Joshua Bryant
Joshua Bryant
7th grade student
Old Donation School
 The Cat of Kagawa Prefecture

Once upon a time, there lived a man and a woman in a small house
near Kagawa Prefecture. The woman lived with a cat the woman had found
on the streets near where she worked. She named it 小さな靴 (Chīsana kutsu)
or Little Shoes because the little white paws the cat had resembled little
shoes. The woman loved the cat with all her heart’s content; however, the
man absolutely despised it. Day after day he refused to feed or care for it.
Little Shoes favored the woman over the man because the woman was the
only one who cared for her..
On one day on his way to work, the man decided to leave the door to
the house open, he did this so the cat would escape and he would never have
to see it again. Later that day, the cat escaped through the open door to get
some fresh air and got lost. When the woman came home, she could not find
her cat. Knowing that he didn’t adore little shoes, The woman questioned her
husband about what happened to her precious Little Shoes. Her husband lied
to cover his mistake and explained that he left the door open as an accident.
So the woman spent her last few dollars on food and supplies and left in
search of her beloved animal.
The woman searched for her pet for days without success, she was
short on food and nearly gave up when she came upon a mansion near
Kumamoto Prefecture. Knocking on the door, she begged for food and
supplies. She explained to the man who owned the house that she had lost
her cat. As luck would have it the owner had the precious little shoes. The
owner of the mansion stated that the cat had been very polite and that he
considered looking for its owner to compliment her on how well she raised it.
The man invited the woman to stay at the mansion for as long as she liked.
When the woman left their home, she was grateful and thanked the man for
his hospitality and started on her journey back home with Little Shoes with
her.
As she was walking by a lush, green rice paddy, she saw a large wooden
crate buried in the ground, she lifted it out, curious to see what was inside.
When she opened the crate, she was surprised to find millions upon millions
of yen along with a mirror inside. On her way back through the city of Kyoto,
Her hands were so full of yen that she dropped the mirror. After a few
minutes, a man came up behind her and asked her if she had dropped it. She
replied yes , but she explained that she really didn’t need it, so he could have
it. He graciously thanked her and promised to give it to his young daughter.
Once she returned home, her husband was outraged to find that she spent
three days away from home looking for an animal that he despised. He was
so angered that he didn’t even notice or question the crate of Yen.
Later that night, an ember from the wood-burning stove caught their
house on fire while the couple was sleeping. As the smoke filled the house,
the cat was awoken from a deep sleep. Because Little Shoes was such a loyal
and loving cat, it saved the wife and the husband by pawing and meowing
incessantly and waking them up. They barely escaped the burning house
without injury. The man was forever thankful for the cat, and he respected
and loved it for the rest of his life.
 Traditional Cultural Literature From Japan
“A Woman and the Bell of Miidera.” Japan Powered, 24 May 2016,
www.japanpowered.com/folklore-and-urban-legends/woman-bell-miidera.

The author of this article, Chris Kincaid, is an author of 4 books including “A Time for Every
Purpose Under Heaven – One Woman’s Trip to Africa: My Story” & “The Christmas Story in 40
Days”. She Is also a blogger, A humanitarian, and a speaker.
This article gives a summary of the story and the characteristics of the woman are.
This article is meant for readers in 5th grade and above studying Japanese literature.
The author, Chris Kincaid, focuses the reader’s attention to summarizing the events of the story
so the reader can better comprehend the sequence of events as well as the problem and the
solution. The author also gives the reader helpful background and historical information to aid in
comprehension. The author also includes additional information about how the folktale might be
linked to the to a time in Japanese history when the temple if Miidera was burned during the
Genpei War.

Hadland, Davis. "A Woman and the Bell of Miidera."Myths and Legends of Japan. Ed. George G.
Harrap and Company. London: NA, 1912. pp. 141-42. Print.

In the prefecture of Miidera there was an incredibly shiny bell and the priests didn’t want any
woman to touch it (discrimination) or else it would lose its shine. There was a woman who
thought she was worthy and pretty enough to touch the bell so she put on her makeup and went
to touch the bell while the priests were doing religious practices. When she touched the bell, she
put a hole in the bell where she touched it and it shrunk and lost all of its shine. The importance
of this story to Japanese culture is to teach people that being vein will not get yourself anywhere
in life. This is shown in the story when the woman was being vein and thought she was beautiful
enough to touch the bell. This story is also teaching another lesson which is to not be selfish. I
say this because if the woman had not thought about herself and about how beautiful she is and
about the consequences of touching the bell would be the story would have a happy ending.

NA. "The Tongue Cut Sparrow ." Tales of Old Japan. Macmiller & Company. London: , 1871, 249-250.
Print.

The story of the Tongue cut Sparrow starts with an old man and a dame and the old man has a
pet sparrow. The old man goes away and the dame goes to starch clothes and the sparrow ate
the starch and the woman got mad and cut the sparrow’s tongue and it flew away. When the old
man came back he couldn’t find the sparrow and asked the dame where it went and she told
him she cut its tongue off so the old man went looking for the sparrow. While looking for the
sparrow, he and the sparrow crossed ways and the sparrow showed him to its home. The
sparrow’s family welcomed the old man to their house and he spent many days at the house
and when he left the sparrow gave him a parting gift and asked him to choose between a light
 basket and a heavy basket and since the man was crippled and old, he chose the light basket
and it was filled with gold and other gems. When he returned home the dame became very
greedy so she went to the sparrow’s house and tried to flatter the sparrow so that she could get
a gift of gold and gems but the sparrow nothing about a parting gift so she asked for a parting
gift and chose the heavy basket and when opened, she was tormented by elves and goblins (In
a rendition of this story, she was strangled to death by a python).The story of “The Tongue Cut
Sparrow” was explaining to its Japanese culture that being greedy is not acceptable. This story
teaches a lesson that if you always be kind and polite and to care about others you will get good
things in return. But if you are selfish and greedy, bad luck will come upon you.

Sazanamis, Iwaya . "The Mirror of Matsuyama."Myths and Legends of Japan . Ed. George G. Harrap
and Company . Place of Publication: London, George G. Harrap and Company, 1912. pp.
196-98. Print.

In this story, the father goes away on a business trip and promised his daughter that he would
bring her something back if she was helpful around the house. When he returned, the daughter
had been helpful so he gave her a doll, a box of cakes, and a mirror. Since the mother or the
daughter had never seen a mirror before, the mom thought there was a person looking back at
her though the mirror and the daughter saw a younger version of her mother in the mirror. Some
time after the daughter was given the gift by her father, the mom died and she added that when
the daughter was feeling down, she could look into the mirror and see her “mother”, and the
mom died. The father got remarried to a mean wife and the wife thought that her step daughter
was trying to do witchcraft to try and kill her but when the dad investigated, he found out what
the daughter was doing wasn’t witchcraft. This short story is a piece of japanese cultural
literature and was written by Iwaya Sazanamis (巌谷 小波) and explains to its culture that one,
something that is unknown to someone (the mirror/the daughter and mother) can provoke
imaginative thoughts in someone . Two, don’t make assumptions about someone you don’t
have all of the details about.

Culturegram about Japanese culture:

"Japan: General Attitudes." CultureGrams Online Edition, ProQuest, 2018,
https://online.culturegrams.com/world/world_country_sections.php?cid=82&cn=Japan&sname
General_Attitudes&snid=6.