Last year, I did a brief article for Black Gate on the Japanese editions of Robert E. Howard’s tales of Conan. These were published in two distinct series. The first series, consisting of eight books, was published by the Hayakawa Bunko imprint of Hayakawa Shobo between 1970 and 1973.

These Conan books were part of the Hayakawa Bunko SF series line that reprinted several vintage U.S. SF and fantasy stories during the 1970s, including works by Edgar Rice Burroughs and A. Merritt, as well as some of Ed Hamilton’s Captain Future novels.

Over the years I’ve managed to acquire two of the Merritt books; I don’t know if others were published. The books are profusely illustrated, each with a double-page color interior as well as several black and white interiors. I’ll show several examples here.

The earlier book that I have is Merritt’s Dwellers in the Mirage, published September 30, 1970 as SF 6. This was translated by Akira Kagami, with art by Yanagi Shuhji (who did the art for a number of Japanese editions of Conan’s tales).

The other in my collection is The Snake Mother, which presumably is what was published as the combined novel The Face in the Abyss in the U.S. I’ve not been able to determine the translator or artist for this one, though the book was published in early 1971 (likely February or March).

I have no idea how faithful these translations are; it would be interesting to hear from a Japanese fan of Merritt who’s read these who could opine to that and could let us know what ending of “Dwellers” was used.