About Happa-no-Kofu

Happa-no-Kofu is a non-profit web publisher that has distributed Japanese translations from English works and English translations from Japanese works since April 2000.  A year later, we started  transforming some of the web contents into paper books and e-books, and sold them on our website and in book shops.

Happano is also a kind of art project that lives out a dream we eagerly desire.  So we think Happano and its authors are like-minded friends who share a dream and a purpose, and in addition “the labors (by both sides)” and the costs (by publisher)  to fulfill the goal.  The project works only by devoting ourselves to it, both the publisher and the authors.

And what our activities have supported was the development of technology such as desktop publishing and the Internet.  It became surprisingly  easy to publish books without high costs, and open to anyone who wants to do it.  Even small publishers like Happano that don’t have a lot of funds and enjoy a big market can publish books.  We continue publishing with tiny profits.

I think we could continue our activities for fifteen years (this is 2015), because our mission was not gaining a profit but having a good world where people think, write and publish to provide inspiration to other people.  

We will get going as we’ve done before, publishing both on the web (at no charge) and in e-book & paper book forms, continuing to meet different people, and continuing working with people who are highly motivated along the same lines as we are.  We believe that doing so will change the world a little for the better. 

Founding Editor: Kazue Daikoku

Email: editor [atmark] happano.org

Here is the old version of our “about” published at the time of founding.