Abstract
Terayama Shūji (1935–1983) is best known for his work with the experimental theater group Tenjō Sajiki. He was also a poet, photographer, essayist, filmmaker, and the author of a number critically neglected short stories that have been described as gensō dōwa—fantastic fairy tales. In addition to exploring Japanese folktales and legends, Terayama appropriated themes and motifs from the European fairy-tale canon. In 1979 he not only premièred his play Aohigekō no shiro (Duke Bluebeard’s Castle) but also published two collections of fairy tales. The first of these, Boku ga ōkami datta koro: sakasama dōwa shi (When I Was a Wolf: Topsy-Turvy Fairy Tales), is a collection of classic fairy tales and other canonical works that he “tests” by taking them apart and, as the subtitle suggests, turning them inside out and upside down before reconstructing them in his own inimitable style. “Akazukin”—translated here as “Red Riding Hood”—is taken from this collection and is the first of Terayama’s topsy-turvy fairy tales to be translated into English.
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