The following is from the introduction to The Penguin Book of Japanese Short Stories. * From Seppuku to Meltdown I once heard the story that when jazz drummer Buddy Rich was being admitted to a hospital, the nurse at the front desk asked him if he had any allergies. “Only to country and western music,” he replied. In my case, my only allergy is to Japan’s so-called “I novel”—the form of autobiogra