Lafcadio Hearn

Patrick Lafcadio Hearn , known also by the Japanese name Koizumi Yakumo , was an international writer, known best for his books about Japan, especially his collections of Japanese legends and ghost stories, such as Kwaidan: Stories and Studies of Strange Things. In the United States, Hearn is also known for his writings about the city of New Orleans based on his 10-year stay in that city. Hearn was born in Lefkada , one of the Greek Ionian Islands. He was the son of Sergeant Major Charles Bush Hearn and Rosa Antoniou Kassimati, a Greek woman of noble Kytheran lineage through her father,... Anthony Kassimati. His father was stationed in Lefkada during the British occupation of the islands. Lafcadio was baptized Patricio Lefcadio Hearn in the Greek Orthodox Church. It is not known whether Hearn's parents were ever legally married, and the Irish Protestant relatives on his father's side considered him to have been born out of wedlock. This may, however, have been because they did not recognize the legitimacy of a Greek Orthodox marriage ceremony for a Protestant.
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