Does anyone know the name of this book series?

Question

I remember reading a series of books as a child (1960-s 70's?). They were about a Japanese or Okinawan magistrate (judge) who went around to the various prefects and wisely ruled on disputes. They were all morally based. An example I remember is the fishmonger who claimed that the poor student above his fish store was "stealing" the smell of his fish to compliment his meager bowl of rice. As punishment, the judge made the student jingle all of his money and then proclaimed that the proper payment to the fishmonger for having the "smell" of his fish stolen was to "hear" the sound of the student's money. There were several "cases" in each book. Does anyone know these stories?

thank you

Answer 1

I have this book! It's called "The Case of the Marble Monster and Other Stories" by I. G. Edmonds, and it's a Scholastic book from the 1960's. The judge's name was Ooka the Wise, and that was also the original name of the book before Scholastic republished it. That's the only book I know of, though, but it does have 17 stories in it.

Answer 2

I remember these... but not the guy's name. I mainly remember them because I had a sort of a crush on this guy Greg when I was in 4th grade and he was reading aloud from one of these stories and mispronounced "embarrassed" as "embraced."

I remember having at least one of these books, ordered from Scholastic...

I'll be interested to see if anyone knows the name.

Answer 3

Judge Dee