Alan Cummings is Senior Teaching Fellow in Japanese at the School of Oriental & African Studies, University of London. His research focusses on kabuki playwriting and performance in the mid to late 19th century and theatrical conceptions of time, criminality, and modernity. He has published several annotated translations in the Kabuki Plays On Stage series (University of Hawai’i Press, 2002-2003). He also works on Japanese musical subcultures of the twentieth century. He is currently working on a book of haiku translations for The British Museum Press.