This paper will contrast and compare the movie The Twilight Samurai with various
primary and secondary historical accounts of samurai life during the late Tokugawa period. My
analysis will focus specifically on the movie’s depiction of the economic challenges faced by
samurai, social stratification and conventions for samurai men and women, education of young
samurai girls, and the evolved sense of samurai honor during this period.
The Ruling Class?
By the late Tokugawa period, the samurai class had been the undisputed ruling class of
Japan for over half a millennium. However, their real position, as measured in terms of their
relative quality of life and the respect they held in the eyes of non-samurai was eroding rapidly,
in large part due to the stagnation of samurai income. At the highest level, the daimyos (and
even the shogun) whose tax collection process was still based on land and rice, became unable to
capture new economic growth as tax revenue. The daimyos’ and the shogun’s inability to keep
up economically had a knock-on effect at every level of the samurai ladder. As merchants
thrived, for example, samurai—whose stipends were fixed as a function of the land based tax
system—experienced an ineluctable slide into increasing poverty at every level. One strategy
could have been for daimyos to increase the tax burden on peasants, but the threat of peasant
protest and revolt was also an increasing reality (Yamamura, 1971).
Overall, the dichotomy
between samurai social position and economic status was pernicious and a very real contributing
factor to the internal and external conflicts that would ultimately bring down the bakufu.
Throughout the Tokugawa period, the samurai class became significantly stratified with
extremely fine definitions between ranks in the honor culture. This stratification was not just
social, but also economic. The movie’s hero, Seibei Iguchi, is near the bottom rung of the
samurai ladder. Although he heads his own household, he is a “petty samurai” whose yearly
2
stipend of 50 koku is barely enough on which for his family to survive. Due to the expenses
from his wife’s illness and funeral, he is in debt and can only realize 30 koku. For himself, his
mother, his two daughters, and his retainer, this is far below subsistence level.
Seibei’s circumstances, while dramatically enhanced in the movie, fit quite well with
what the sources say about the real-life challenges of lesser samurai during this period. Ikegami
(1995) tells us the samurai population, at this time, was so radically stratified that the status of a
lower-ranking samurai was nothing more than symbolic; a man such as Seibei did not reap the
benefits of being in the ruling class. Kozo Yomamura (1971), who conducted a quantitative
analysis of the increasing poverty of Tokugawa samurai, found that bannermen, who were direct
retainers of the shogun and thus well above Seibei, were under severe economic stress with
incomes at austerity levels. Yamamura speaks of “one relatively poor bannerman, with a stipend
of 300 koku” (p.394), and notes that the increasing rate of poverty for marginal samurai, men
such as Seibei, followed a similar pattern. Moore (1969) on the other hand, noted that many
historians have overstated the importance of economic pressures in the overthrow of the
Tokugawa bakufu, for example. However, he concludes that economic issues “…were deeply
involved in the complaints that samurai voiced in the late Tokugawa period” (p. 85). That many
lesser samurai existed on incomes and in conditions as difficult as Seibei’s cannot be doubted.
Women and Girls
In The Twilight Samurai women play an important role. First and foremost it is
important that the story itself is presented as the recollections of an older woman from when she
was a five-year old girl. We observe quickly that Tokugawa society is one with strict definitions
on the roles of women. At the same time we see that those definitions are starting to bend.
3
Early in the movie, we hear Seibei’s co-workers lamenting not only his economic
difficulties but the fact that he is weighed down by so many women: a senile mother and two
daughters. That his economic difficulties have been exacerbated by another woman, his
deceased wife, adds to the onerous reputation of women in general. Given the realities of the
samurai world, Seibei’s household seems to be at a dead end. With no son to inherit his less than
modest stipend, his family line will likely be extinguished. To be the head of a household under
threat of extinction was in itself a stain on one’s honor. In more prosperous samurai households,
a samurai could adopt son from another samurai house, but Seibei’s situation would not be
attractive for even the second or third son of a modest samurai house. Moore (1969) tells us that
among lower-ranking samurai some adoption occurred with commoners; but by the late
Tokugawa period commoners often had greater economic prospects than lower-ranking samurai.
Seibei could marry again and try for a son, but this would mean even more mouths to feed.
Seibei is exceptionally fond of his young girls. In the movie, we see Seibei as he sits up
at night with them reveling in the warmth of a special bond. At this moment, we recognize that
he is an anachronism. He is a man of modern sensitivities and sensibilities trapped in a narrow
world. Seibei’s obvious pleasure in, and support of, his daughter’s schooling in Confucian
classics indicate that he—unlike the typical closed-minded samurai, represented best by his
uncle—accepts women on a more equal cognitive, if not social, level. Seibei’s interactions with
Tomoe also paint him as a sensitive man who accepts the premise that women as well as men can
have honor. One recent review of the movie hones in on this anachronism:
“I suppose some of the things he [Seibei] does might strike one as perhaps too PC or
modern. For example, he encourages his daughters to learn in an era when sewing was
considered the only proper education for girls. And he refuses to remarry simply to get a
wife partially because he considers it dishonorable to the woman in question.
(www.opuzine.com)
4
But how far from reality is the character of Seibei? Are his feelings toward Tomoe and his
daughters, and his support for his daughters’ education, as examples, completely fictionalized in
order to draw an artistic contrast between our modern sensibilities and nineteenth-century
realities? Or, do they represent a true, if inchoate, social movement that actually existed? I will
argue that they indeed represent real aspects of real people—although amalgamated in one
character—who were fomenting change on the fringes of late-Tokugawa samurai society.
Seibei’s demeanor puts him at odds with just about everything we read about the samurai
mindset, particularly their views about the roles of women. Nariaki’s view that the only
important function of women was to bear children was quite common among samurai at the time
(Kikue, 2001). However, two things are undeniable. First, during the late Tokugawa period
there was increasing discontent with the samurai status quo. Discontent rarely affects only one
part of a system; therefore, it is likely that the status of women, along with many other accepted
norms, was increasingly questioned. Second, that men existed within the samurai class with
proto-modern ideas of female equality is clear. The emergence of such a man as Yukichi
Fukuzawa is a case in point. Fukuzawa, importantly, emerged from the lower samurai ranks.
The ideas Fukuzawa synthesized must have existed, if not all in one place, in various forms
among some samurai. When Fukuzawa said things such as “Heaven never created a man above
another nor a man below another,” or “I am honor bound to destroy [the feudal system],” or
“How devious of men to make their wives share the burden of their own crime!” (Kiyooka &
Blacker,1966; Kikue, 2001), his words were revolutionary mainly because they were gathered
together in one place and printed for all the world to see. That other petty samurai harbored
some of these same sentiments is a safe bet. I am reminded of Cornell professor, Frank Drake,
who created an equation to calculate the probability of other intelligent life in our universe. He
5
found that, the universe being so vast, even with an infinitesimal number of variables, there are
probably millions of advanced civilizations out there. Quite a shock! Similarly, because the
samurai population was large enough, it was very likely that there were some men who, though
not in the mainstream, thought and acted just as Seibei did. In support of this divergence from
the samurai mainstream, Katsu Kokichi (a.k.a. Musui) in his autobiography reminds us that
Tokugawa society was not as rigidly regulated and controlled, as seen in his “disarmingly
cheerful confession of how he bent and broke the rules” (Nakai, 1990).
The education of Seibei’s daughters as depicted in the film follows a similar, if slightly
less likely, line of discourse. On the surface, samurai girls studying Confucian classics openly in
school appears to be a creative device to help show Seibei’s mental and emotional foresight.
Kobayashi (1965) in his analysis of Tokugawa education noted: “There were three types of
institutions for samurai education: bakufu schools, han schools, and private schools. They were
entirely for boys; girls were usually educated informally at home” (p. 290). Kobayashi also
confirmed that samurai schools served as a center for classical Confucian learning. For
commoners, including the children of ronin, there were terakaya which were voluntary, nongovernment-regulated schools that accepted both boys and girls.
Samurai schools were not for
girls and a samurai child attending a terakaya would encounter social stigma far beyond
attending a local festival for example. Therefore, compared to the movie’s depiction of Seibei’s
personal attitudes and economic distress, the depiction of his daughters’ education is unlikely.
Yet, Kobayashi’s statement that samurai girls were “usually” schooled at home, combined with
the turbulent times at the end of the Tokugawa period, and informed by an understanding that
some customs were different in different localities at least opens up the possibility of alternative
6
pedagogical opportunities for some samurai girls of the period. It is unlikely, yes; impossible,
no.
Overall, Seibei’s household is consistent with Kikue’s (2001) description of lesser
samurai houses where “…the atmosphere…was open and free from formalistic restraints” (p.21)
for men as well as women.
Honor
The Twilight Samurai is most intriguing as a commentary on Tokugawa samurai honor
culture. It reflects clearly how honor had evolved since earlier medieval times. It also reveals
the growing internal conflicts among samurai who were supposed to revere a sense of personal,
militaristic honor during a period when those impulses were contradicted, and often subsumed
by, a centralized, bureaucratic power structure.
By the time of the late Tokugawa period, samurai honor culture was reflected more in
idiosyncratic etiquette than any real martial skill. As Ikegami (1995) noted, most Tokugawa
samurai were more interested in where they sat at formal ceremonies and what they were
allowed to wear than in actual fighting. Although samurai were still trained in the martial arts,
the passionate desire to use those skills to rush headlong into one’s death had long since passed,
notwithstanding attempts to resuscitate such desires in works like Hagakure. In the movie,
therefore, it rings true when Seibei’s co-workers become more than a little bit frightened about
how much they have mocked him, once they find out he is a “fighter,” and a darned good one at
that.
It would be easy to jump to the conclusion that Seibei, with his impressive martial skills
and deeply held sense of individualism, is a throwback to earlier samurai archetypes. Nothing
could be further from the truth. Seibei is their antithesis. In his first duel, he uses his skill to
7
win, yes, but he also uses it to save his own skin. By not cutting down his opponent and merely
humiliating him, he skirts the tenets of kenka ryoseibai. True archetypal samurais were not
supposed to hold too much attachment to their own lives. As Hagakure stated, they were
supposed to be already “dead to one’s self.” Seibei, on the other hand, is completely attached to
and enthralled by his simple, if difficult, life. He finds great pleasure, for example, in watching
his children grow. Rather than being remembered for his glorious death, he would prefer to not
be remembered at all and to spend his life as a simple farmer. Even when he is offered a chance
to significantly improve his lot in life by fighting for his lord against the recalcitrant Yogo, he
refuses. He only agrees to the fight when he is threatened with being expelled from the clan. As
he later states to Tomoe, he may be “petty,” but he is still a samurai. Whether it is classical
samurai honor that drives this decision or whether he realizes that life for his family would be
even more difficult if he continues to refuse is unclear. Either way, Seibei’s primary motivations
are private, emotional attachments, not sekken-defined honor.
Despite Seibei’s differences in motivation, his skills reflect the most revered aspects of
samurai martial achievement and mental composure. In the best tradition of Miyamoto Musashi,
Seibei approaches battle by exhibiting a bearing of mind that is no different from his normal state
and by using his equanimity to twist the mind of his opponent (Sato, 1995). He does not do this
to protect his personal reputation, however, or because he cannot “live under the same heaven”
as the enemy of his master, but rather, to protect his friends, his loved ones, his family, and
himself. As a fighter, Seibei is a model samurai; as for his motivations, he is a renegade and—
judged by the paradigm of the newly-resurgent, martial honor culture, as propagandized by
Hagakure, and as represented by such groups as the Shinsengumi—a failure. In the words of one
8
samurai, commenting on the case of the forty-seven ronin: “Anyone who doesn’t have the
resolve to avenge his master…is no samurai at all” (p.328).
Summary
The Twilight Samurai is a beautifully-made film. On one level it allows the audience,
through Seibei, to test their modern moral and emotional sensibilities against mid-nineteenthcentury realities. On another level, it is a fairly accurate depiction of the economic and social
challenges faced by marginal, lower samurai in the dwindling days of the Tokugawa Era. To
look at the story exclusively on one level or the other is, to my mind, to miss the point. Hence, I
would revise the point of view of another recent review of the movie. The reviewer states that
The Twilight Samurai is “The touching story of a man outcast by the changing times he lives in”
(kfccinema.com). I would amend this to read: “The touching story of an outcast changing the
times in which he lives.”
9
References
Bryson, B. (2003). A short history of nearly everything. Broadway Books: New York.
Kikue, Y. (1992). Women of the Mito domain. Stanford university Press: Stanford, CA.
Kiyooka, E. & Blacker, C. (1966). The autobiography of Yukichi Fukuzawa. Columbia
University Press: New York.
Kobayashi, T. (Oct., 1965). Tokugawa education as a foundation of modern education in Japan.
Comparative Education Review, 9, 3, pp. 288-302.
Moore, R. A. (1969). Samurai discontent and social mobility in the late Tokugawa period.
Monumenta Nipponica, 24, ½, pp. 79-91.
Nakai, K. W. (June, 1990). Review of Musui’s story: the autobiography of a Tokugawa samurai.
The American historical review, 95, 3, p. 887.
Neveu, J. (n.d.). Review of Twilight Samurai. Retrieved on March 22, 2006 from http://www.
kfccinema.com/reviews/swordplay/twilightsamurai/twilightsamurai.html.
Review of The Twilight Samurai (2004). Retrieved on March 22, 2006 from http://www.
opuszine.com/blog/entry.html?ID=2523.
Yamamura, K. (June, 1971). The increasing poverty of the samurai in Tokugawa Japan, 16001868. The Journal of Economic History, 31, 2, pp.378-406.