The work of Masuji Ibuse is an acquired taste; not in the sense that it is difficult to enjoy on first reading, but in the sense that extensive acquaintance with it deepens one's pleasure and understanding of its art….

The range of themes, as the ten stories in [Lieutenant Lookeast and Other Stories] show, is wide. (p. 7)

Despite the variety of themes, the stories share certain characteristics of technique and manner. There is the absence of extended descriptive passages, of "fine writing" for its own sake. Characters and physical settings are sketched in with a few details that are concrete and particular. Around them, there is space. The effect is to give the characters something of the quality of caricatures, or of actors on a stage: they are simultaneously slightly larger than life and seen at a distance.

The writing is spare. Carefully molded images and fragments of...