The kasa-obake or the umbrella ghost is one of the most prominent forms of the Japanese yokai, or monstrous spirits. Marion Rankine demonstrates how the umbrella has been regarded with reverence, superstition and fascination: the umbrella appears over 120 times in Dickens; Derrida and Nietzsche both wrote about umbrellas; Leonard Bast in E.M. Forster’s Howard’s End ‘could not quite forget his stolen umbrella.’ And Will Self’s Umbrella was on the 2012 Booker shortlist.
‘A work of profound scholarship and imaginative engagement’ The Literary Review
‘an eloquent and lively account’ The Observer
‘Illuminating and entertaining’ The Telegraph
‘Brolliology offers the feeling of having consumed something delicious but light’ The Washington Post
Marion Rankine is a London-based writer and bookseller. She has contributed to among other publications The Times Literary Supplement, The Guardian, Overland and For Books’ Sake. Dennis Johnson founder of Melville House publisher of Brolliology says, ‘I first met Marion when my wife and I walked into Foyles and she tried to sell us a copy of one of our own books.’