Makuragaeshi

What is a Makuragaeshi?
Rather, who is the Makuragaeshi?

The makuragaeshi is just one of many Japanese yōkai. But this mischievous creature comes in the night to flip over one’s pillow. Yes. It is a pillow-flipping monster.

Makuragaeshi

Size: Three Pieces, each 36x48”
Mediums: Acrylic, gold and copper leaf, and glass bead medium, on canvas.

I cannot express how much I love this little monster.

Perhaps it’s because I have long battled with sleepless nights. The Makuragaeshi stole my heart when I learned that his main mission was to flip pillows of unsuspecting sleeping victims.

Not only does he flip-pillows, he might even go as far as to flip YOU while asleep in your bed… maybe even sprinkle a bit of sand in your eye. Have you ever woken up, head where feet should be and feet where head should be? That’s him. No, no, you didn’t just flip and turn yourself around. That would be too ordinary. HE flipped YOU around.

The Makuragaeshi may have been conjured up by the Japanese sometime in the Edo period as a story for children, or perhaps even as a rationalization to explain the exceptionally mundane. But I like to believe he is real and that we simply don’t give credit where credit is due.

Maybe his skin is dry, and that is what caused this curious fetish for soft things.

Maybe he lives in a sandy space under your home and unintentionally sprinkles dust in your eye.

Maybe he’s a ghost or sprit that, when alive, just didn’t get enough sleep. Now part of the spirit realm he jealously disrupts the slumber of others.

—T.G.Novy