Eiko Kadono, the author behind Japan’s most famous – and almost certainly most beloved – literary witch, has a little trouble going up the stairs these days.
At 91, she’s still writing every day and hasn’t stopped loving the color pink, dressing up or believing in the magic of books.
"Kiki’s Delivery Service,” which was first published in 1985 and turned into a 1989 animated film by Hayao Miyazaki’s Studio Ghibli, is among 200 books she has written.
"I never tire of writing,” she told The Associated Press (AP) at her home in the picturesque seaside town of Kamakura, south of Tokyo.
With a little pink gate, the house is filled with books, pink chairs and her collection of animal figures.
"I’m probably a child at heart,” Kadono says with a small laugh.
Wearing her signature boldly framed glasses, Kadono is dressed in a colorful smock that her daughter designs especially for her.
She explains proudly that the sleeves are elastic at the wrists so they can be pulled up easily when she writes.
These days, she uses a keyboard, punching the keys slowly, one at a time. But when she is creating a story, it still all starts with writing by hand. She also draws pictures.
"I want to write so that the reader can visualize what I am writing,” she said. "I love to write.”
Still quick with her retorts, laughs and thoughts, Kadono shrugs off the fact that she’s wearing a wig. She doesn’t understand why people might want to hide that. She wears red lipstick and acts a bit shy about her wrinkles.
Still, her writing hasn’t basically changed over the years. Though when she looks back on her past writing, she feels it’s wordier than her current crisp style.
The Kiki series in the original Japanese spans six books and three spinoffs. The first installment was translated into English in 2020 by Delacorte Press. It is now in 25 foreign languages.
Now, the second in the series, "Kiki and the New Magic,” is set for release in August in English, translated by Emily Balistrieri and illustrated by Yuta Onoda.
Kadono, who won the prestigious Hans Christian Andersen Award in 2018, never set out to become a writer. She was basically a housewife, married to a designer and raising a daughter.
She lived in Brazil for two years during her 30s and was asked to write about that experience. That’s when she discovered she liked writing as a fun thing to do, not as a job. It was certainly not something she was ordered or pushed to do.
The character of the sprightly, no-nonsense Kiki was inspired by a drawing her daughter did when she was 12: A cute witch was flying on a broomstick toward the moon.
Kadono decided to create a coming-of-age story about a little witch who goes on an adventure, traveling with her black cat Jiji.
The rest is history.
Kiki’s Museum of Literature, which opened in Tokyo in 2023, now sells Kadono’s smocks, as well as pink mugs and T-shirts decked with the characters she has created, as well as displays rows upon rows of books, including other authors.
"The other-worldly fantasy that Kadono creates has overcome the boundaries of language, to become appreciated by a wide global audience, including children and adults, and won international accolades,” reads a statement in pink lettering on the museum wall.
Five-year-old Tsukiko Fukuda, who was visiting the museum with her family, had a more to-the-point reaction: The books are fun, and pink is her favorite color, too.
Kadono hopes there will be a continuous flux of talented writers of children’s books so that the future generation can grow up to love books.
Now is a crucial period, she believes, that may decide whether that can really happen.
The walks in the woods and other activities that captured the imagination of children of the past no longer exist, said Kadono. There are other digital and modern diversions.
And so they must read.
"People must think on their own to be able to create. That’s what being human means,” Kadono said with a passion in her voice.
"Books are the only thing now that can bring about creation and imagination.”
