These essays showcase four types of trees that afford great pleasure. The Japanese love seeing rows of them along rivers, the seashore, and avenues (especially on the world's longest tree-lined road), and people famously picnic under cherry blossoms. To the Japanese, the pine, cedar, willow, and cherry also symbolize key qualities: transience and mortality (the cherry); longevity, vitality, and sincerity (the cedar); emotional flexibility, weakness, sadness, and thinness (the willow); and superior rankings (the pine). Moreover, these trees play key roles in the arts, such as haiku, woodblock prints, ink paintings, lyrics, Noh theater, and ghost stories.

Japanese craftsmanship is legendary, and the artisans know well how types of wood will behave, whether in chopsticks, barrels for soy sauce and saké, or traditional paper. One kind of tree grows so fast that it greatly aided postwar reconstruction. Another type is suitable for alcove posts and chests of drawers, being hard and shiny with a distinctive woodgrain pattern. A third sort is hard but easily cracks, making it ideal for paneling in traditional furniture and Japanese umbrellas. The last type is pliable and can become everything from wicker to toothpicks, also having medicinal properties. See which is which!