A posthumous collection of 36 early works by Patrick Lafcadio Hearn, also known as Koizumi Yakumo European-born American-Japanese author, orientalist and philosopher, who wrote novels and articles with exotic themes in highly precise and polished prose. Lyrical and passionate, these brief romantic sketches can be regarded as prose poems. The “Fantastics” proper and the “Other fancies” have been grouped indiscriminately in chronological order, though differing greatly in spirit and in excellence of style. But it is not alone the charm that clings about all that is weird and fanciful that gives value to this early work of Hearn’s. It sheds rich light upon one phase of his development and forms an essential part of his biography; and it helps to furnish proof, along with much else of varying form and excellence that he put forth a vast deal of literary effort in the years of his stay in New Orleans…