Varanasi, one of the oldest living cities in the world, the largest holy place on the Ganges and the city of Shiva, is famous for the pilgrims who come from all over India to bathe in the river and for its naked ascetics. Takeshi Ishikawa has visited since 1980 and has gone back almost every year for forty years. His images capture the coexisting facets of the city: the poor and the rich, the lonely and the crowds, the naked and the adorned, the living and the dead. In the afterword he describes the ghosts of missing people looming over what is also called the city of the dead and the chanting that fills the alleys leading to the burning ghats; Varanasi is a place of life and death where pure and impure coexist. Texts by Kenin Ito give context on the city and the scenes in the images. All text is in Japanese and English.