The Rise of Popular Arts in PreModern Japan
Vol. D (1650-1800) Also Called “The Edo Period”
Common images of pre-modern Japan include those of heroic
but brutal samurai, beautiful but oppressed geisha, elegant
gardens, the tea ceremony, and enlightened Zen monks.
Pre-modern Japan
Chapter Overview
• To sustain peace, the Tokugawa shoguns expelled
Portuguese traders and Christian missionaries,
who tended to play one feudal baron against
another in order to subvert local power, and
prohibited any Japanese from traveling abroad.
• During this period of peace and stability, the role
of samurai retainers in maintaining shogunal
authority shifted from warriors to bureaucrats.
• Often indifferent to tradition, this new merchant
class developed a culture of its own, reflecting the
fast pace of urban life in woodblock prints, short
stories, novels, poetry, and plays.
Overview Continued
• Ihara Saikaku is known as a founder of new,
popular "realistic" literature, writing about the
foibles of the merchant class in urban Osaka.
• Meanwhile, cultivating the persona of the lonely
wayfarer, Matsuo Basho's austere existence was
the antithesis to Saikaku's prosperity.
• Ueda Akinari is known for his successful
insinuation of the supernatural into everyday life
and his keen understanding of the irrational
implications of erotic attachment.
Political Realities
1. From the middle of the fifteenth century until
the beginning of the seventeenth, Japan was
splintered by chaos and bloodshed until the
Tokugawa clan reunited it under a strict but
peaceful rule.
2. To sustain peace, the Tokugawa shoguns
expelled Portuguese traders and Christian
missionaries, who tended to play one feudal
baron against another in order to subvert local
power, and prohibited any Japanese from
traveling abroad.
3. This policy of isolation was designed to freeze
political, social, and economic conditions.
How the Culture Affected the Arts
• During this period of peace and stability, the role
of samurai retainers in maintaining shogunal
authority shifted from warriors to bureaucrats.
• Urban samurai developed needs that were quickly
met by enterprising merchants, artisans, and
laborers.
• Although the new commercial class that emerged
from these changes was denied access to political
power, as the nation's bankers and suppliers they
did control much of the real power.
• Often indifferent to tradition, this new
merchant class developed a culture of its
own, reflecting the fast pace of urban life in
woodblock prints, short stories, novels,
poetry, and plays.
• Pun and parody were central to popular
literature.
• As publishing is itself a commercial
enterprise, books began to circulate in
printed form rather than manuscript form,
so that literature came to the urban masses.
Japanese Poetry
• Japanese poets first encountered Chinese poetry
when it was at its peak in the Tang Dynasty (June 18,
618–June 4, 907)). It took them several hundred
years to digest the foreign impact, make it a part of
their culture and merge it with their literary tradition
in their mother tongue, and begin to develop the
diversity of their native poetry.
• For example, in the Tale of Genji both kinds of
poetry are frequently mentioned. (Since much poetry
in Japan was written in the Chinese language, it is
perhaps more accurate to speak of Japanese-language
poetry.)
• A new trend came in the middle of the 19th century.
Since then, the major forms of Japanese poetry have
been tanka (new name for waka), haiku and shi.
Murasaki Shikibu
• Not part of this section living as
she did from 1014 or 1025).
• Lady Murasaki as she is often
known in English, was a Japanese
novelist, poet, and a maid of honor
of the imperial court during the
Heian period of Japan.
• She is best known as the author of
The Tale of Genji, written in
Japanese between about 1000 and
1008, which is the earliest known
novel in human history.
Early-modern literature
(1603–1868)
• Literature during this time was written during the largely
peaceful Tokugawa Period (commonly referred to as the
Edo Period).
• Due in large part to the rise of the working and middle
classes in the new capital of Edo (modern Tokyo), forms
of popular drama developed which would later evolve into
kabuki.
• The jōruri and kabuki dramatist Chikamatsu Monzaemon
became popular at the end of the 17th century. Matsuo
Bashō wrote Oku no Hosomichi (1702), a travel diary.
Hokusai, perhaps Japan's most famous woodblock print
artist, also illustrated fiction as well as his famous 36
Views of Mount Fuji.
Theater Definitions
• Joruri, or puppet theater, now more
commonly called bunraku, after the name
of the Osaka theater that by 1909 was the
only remaining venue for performances.
• For a time, though, joruri was more
popular than kabuki, with the dolls
acquiring all manner of refinements
during the 1730s, such as moveable eyes
and articulated fingers. The dolls also
came to measure some 1.2 meters in
height, which required three men to
operate.
• Kabuki is classical Japanese dance-drama.
Kabuki theatre is known for the stylization
of its drama and for the elaborate make-up
worn by some of its performers.
• It apparently began with a female priestess
or shaman who performed a new style of
dance drama in the dry riverbeds of Kyoto
• The structure of a kabuki play was
formalized during the Edo period, as were
many elements of style. Conventional
character types were established. Kabuki
theater and ningyō jōruri, the elaborate form
of puppet theater (that later came to be
known as bunraku) became closely
associated with each other, and each has
since influenced the other's development.
Katsushika Hokusai
• In Japanese: (葛飾 北斎)
September 23, 1760 – May 10,
1849
• He was a Japanese artist, ukiyo-e
(wood cuts depicting the “floating
world” painter and printmaker of
the Edo period.
• Born in Edo (now Tokyo),
Hokusai is best known as author
of the woodblock print series
Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji
Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji
(富嶽三十六景 c. 1831)
• Many other genres of literature made their début
during the Edo Period, helped by a rising literacy
rate among the growing population of
townspeople, as well as the development of
lending libraries.
– Yomihon (Reading books) they had few illustrations,
and the emphasis was on the text
• Although there was a minor Western influence
trickling into the country from the Dutch
settlement at Nagasaki, it was the importation of
Chinese vernacular fiction that proved the
greatest outside influence on the development of
Early Modern Japanese fiction..
• Ihara Saikaku (1642-1693) might be said to have given birth to
the modern consciousness of the novel in Japan, mixing
vernacular dialogue into his humorous and cautionary tales of
the pleasure quarters.
• Jippensha Ikku (1765-1831) wrote Tōkaidōchū Hizakurige,
(Shank’s Mare) which is a mix of travelogue and comedy
• Tsuga Teisho, Takebe Ayatari, and Okajima Kanzan were
instrumental in developing the yomihon, which were historical
romances almost entirely in prose, influenced by Chinese
vernacular novels such as Three Kingdoms,Shui hu zhuan, and
Journey to the West (Monkey).
Chonin:町人("townsman") was a social class that emerged in
Japan during the early years of the Tokugawa period. The
majority of chōnin were merchants, but some were craftsmen,
as well. ("townsman") was a social class that emerged in Japan
during the early years of the Tokugawa period. The majority of
chōnin were merchants, but some were craftsmen, as well.
• Two yomihon masterpieces were written by
Ueda Akinari: Ugetsu monogatari (Tales
of the Moon and Rain) and Harusame
monogatari. (Tales of Spring and Rain)
• Kyokutei Bakin wrote the extremely
popular fantasy/historical romance Nansō
Satomi Hakkenden (106 vols) The Eight
Dog Chronicles, in addition to other
yomihon.
• Santō Kyōden wrote yomihon mostly set
in the gay quarters until the Kansei edicts
banned such works, and he turned to
comedic kibyōshi (graphic novels).
Beauties of Yoshiwara Admiring Brocade Rolls
Ritarō stands confused, torn between the good and bad souls in the
corridor outside the courtesan’s parlor.
• Genres included horror, crime stories, morality
stories, comedy, and pornography—often
accompanied by colorful woodcut prints.
• Nevertheless, in the Tokugawa, as in earlier
periods, scholarly work continued to be
published in Chinese, which was the language
of the learned much as Latin was in Europe.
• Tokugawa: Refers to a feudal regime of Japan
established by Tokugawa Ieyasu and ruled by
the shoguns of the Tokugawa family during
the Edo period.
Ihara Saikaku
• He is known as a founder of
new, popular "realistic"
literature, writing about the
foibles of the merchant class
in urban Japan.
• Inheriting his family's business at a young age,
Saikaku "retired" after the death of his wife before
his thirtieth birthday. A few days after her passing in
an act of grief and true love Saikaku started to
compose a thousand-verse haikai poem in a matter
of twelve hours. When this work was published it
was called ‘Haikai Single Day Thousand Verse’
(Haikai Dokugin Ichinichi).
• Scholars have described numerous extraordinary
feats of solo haikai composition at one sitting;
most famously, over the course of a single day and
night in 1677, Saikaku is reported to have
composed at least 16,000 haikai stanzas, with
some rumors placing the number at over 23,500
stanzas.
• Later in life he began writing racy accounts of the
financial and amorous affairs of the merchant
class and the demimonde (mistresses). These
stories catered to the whims of the newly
prominent merchant class, whose tastes of
entertainment leaned toward the arts and pleasure
districts.
• As Saikaku’s popularity and
readership began to increase and
expand across Japan so did the
amount of literature he published.
• When he died in 1693 at the age of
fifty-one Saikaku was one of the
most popular writers of the entire
Tokugawa period.
•
Yet at the time his work
was never considered high
literature because it had
been aimed towards and
popularized by the chonin.
Chōnin (町人?, "townsman") was a social class that emerged in Japan during
the early years of the Tokugawa or Edo period.
Saikaku's 1686 novel Kōshoku
Ichidai Onna was adapted in 1952
into Mizoguchi's movie The Life of
Oharu (poster pictured).
Men take their misfortunes to heart, and keep them there. A
gambler does not talk about his losses; the frequenter of brothels,
who finds his favorite engaged by another, pretends to be just as
well off without her; the professional street-brawler is quiet about
the fights he has lost; and a merchant who speculates on goods
will conceal the losses he may suffer. All act as one who steps on
dog dung in the dark.
Ihara Saikaku,
"What the Seasons Brought to the Almanac-Maker" (1686)
Yomihon
• (読本, yomi-hon, "reading books") is a type of
Japanese book from the Edo period (1603–1867),
that was influenced by Chinese vernacular novels.
The Haiku
Frosty morn, sun clouds
Small hand, chattering high voice,
Dad walks girl to school.
• Haiku (俳句) is a mode of Japanese poetry which
developed from the combination of Hokku (the opening
stanza of an orthodox collaborative linked poem, or renga),
and of its later derivative, renku (or haikai no renga).
• By the time of Matsuo Bashō (1644–1694), the hokku had
begun to appear as an independent poem, and was also
incorporated in haibun (a combination of prose and
hokku), and haiga (a combination of painting with hokku).
the late 19th century revision by Masaoka Shiki of the
older hokku (発句, hokku?), the opening verse of a linked
verse form, haikai no renga. The traditional hokku
consisted of a pattern of approximately 5, 7, 5 on.
• The Japanese word on, meaning
"sound", corresponds to a mora,
a phonetic unit similar but not
identical to the syllable of a
language such as English. (The
words onji, ("sound symbol") or
moji (character symbol) are also
sometimes used.) A haiku
contains a special season word
(the kigo) representative of the
season in which the renga is set,
or a reference to the natural
world.
• In Japan Hokku usually
combines two (or rarely, three)
Graphic taken from
http://www.benybont.co.uk/moreword/haiku.htm
different phrases, with a distinct
grammatical break (kireji)
usually at the end of either the
first five or second seven morae.
• These elements of the older hokku are considered by many to be
essential to haiku as well, although they are not always included
by modern writers of Japanese "free-form haiku" and of nonJapanese haiku. Japanese haiku are typically written as a single
line, while English language haiku are traditionally separated into
three lines.
• Japanese hokku and haiku are traditionally printed in one vertical
line, though in handwritten form they may be in any reasonable
number of lines. Here are some examples of classic hokku by
Bashō:
古池や蛙飛込む水の音
Furu ike ya kawazu tobikomu mizu no oto
Old pond
Frog jump-in
Water sound
初しぐれ猿も小蓑をほしげ也
Hatsu shigure saru mo komino wo hoshige nari
the first cold shower;
even the monkey seems to want
a little coat of straw.
[At that time,
Japanese rain-gear
consisted of a large,
round hat and a
shaggy straw cloak.]
Haiku in English
• This is a development of the Japanese haiku poetic form in
the English language.
• Contemporary haiku are written in many languages, but
most poets outside of Japan are concentrated in the
English-speaking countries.
• It is impossible to single out any current style, format, or
subject matter as definitive. Some of the more common
practices in English include:
* Use of three lines of up to 17 syllables;
* Use of a season word (kigo);
* Use of a cut or kire (sometimes indicated by a
punctuation mark) to compare two images implicitly.
Matsuo Basho
•
•
•
Even before his "retirement," he was
well known as an "amateur" poet,
particularly for the new form of "chain
poetry" that involved the collaboration
of several poets in a stream-ofconsciousness-like manner.
Restrained by poetry, he turned to
prose fiction at age forty.
After the death of his friend and poetry
companion, Matsuo Basho moved to
Edo (now Tokyo) to better his chances
at establishing a career as a teacher and
corrector of poetry.
• Cultivating the persona of the lonely
wayfarer, Matsuo Basho's austere
existence was the antithesis to Saikaku's
prosperity.
• As a prose equivalent of a linked sequence
of haiku, Basho embedded haiku into the
travel narrative of The Narrow Road of the
Interior.
• Some 250 years after his death, the
publication of the second diary of Sora,
Basho's traveling companion, revealed
that Basho was more practical and wily
than in his own recording and that he had
altered details of their trip in order to
cultivate patrons and students.
Ueda Akinari
• A physician and scholar, (although he
started as a merchant) Ueda Akinari
is best remembered as a writer of
ghost stories. (Healed as a child)
• Ueda Akinari is known for his
successful insinuation of the
supernatural into everyday life and
his keen understanding of the
irrational implications of erotic
attachment.
• He was a student of Japanese classics,
medieval Japanese folktales, Chinese
literature, and the theater.
“Bewitched”
Ueda Akinari (1734-1809):
Real name: UEDA SENJIRO
My thanks to
Dr. Theresa Thompson
Who made the following slides for her
English 2130 class
Fall 2009
More of Ueda Akinari’s Biography
• Probably born in Osaka in 1734, in the Sonezaki
pleasure quarter, to an unwed mother by the name of
Matsuo Osaki.
• When Akinari was four years old he became the adopted
son of Ueda Mosuke.
• Shortly before death he said, "Born in Naniwa [Osaka] I
have been a guest in the Capital for sixteen years. I had
no father; I do not know the reason why. When I was
four years old my mother also cast me away.
Fortunately I was taken in by Mr. Ueda.”
• 1776: Tales of Moonlight and Rain
• Died August 8, 1809, age 76.
“Bewitched”
The actual title “Jasei no in” has been
translated as (“Lust of the White Serpent” also
“The Serpent's Lust”)
Screen shots from the 1953 film version of Ugetsu
monogatari -- Tales of the Moon and Rain
Some Literary Western Gothic Features
• Ancient prophecy, especially mysterious, obscure,
or hard to understand.
• Mystery and suspense.
• Sex and Death: Fainting, frightened,
screaming, near-naked women. Women
threatened by powerful, impetuous male.
• High emotion, sentimentalism, but also
pronounced anger, surprise, and especially terror.
• Supernatural events (e.g. a giant, a sighing
portrait, ghosts or their apparent presence,
a skeleton).
• Omens, portents, dream visions.
• Ancient spaces and places: castles, etc.
• The metonymy (part for the whole)
of
gloom and horror
• (wind, rain, doors grating on rusty
hinges, howls in the distance, distant sighs,
footsteps approaching, lights in abandoned
rooms, gusts of wind blowing out lights or
blowing suddenly, characters trapped in
rooms or imprisoned).
• The vocabulary of the gothic (use of words
indicating fear, mystery, etc: apparition,
devil, ghost, haunted, terror, fright).
Japanese Gothic Features
• The universe is governed by
rules.
• The rules of the universe are
beyond human understanding.
• Society offers no protection
from spirits and ghosts.
• Perseverance in the face of utter
destruction.
• Dank, confined spaces are most
conducive to the appearance of
ghostly spirits.
.
• Yuurei: ghosts or spirits stranded on this
world because they have unfinished
business or died in the throes of intense
emotion
Fear Depends on Cultural Belief Systems
• Shinto is Kannagara (Kami no
michi: “The way of the kami”)
– Not a revealed religion with a
divinely inspired scripture
– Tradition and the family, physical
cleanliness, Matsuri festivals to
worship the kami (spirits).
– Love of nature
– Little emphasis on death or
afterlife.
– Obake undermine the certainties
of life as we usually understand it.
An Obake (shape-shifter)
• Buddhism
– Independent sense of self creates
alienation & suffering
– Six Realms of Existence: Skandhas,
not soul, reincarnate (think Avatar and
Yang’s series of chakras.)
– Ambivalence about immortality (not
about reincarnation)
– Concept of non-attachment
– Characterization & Radical nondualism
– Uncanny Beings: not-natural
“Bewitched” and its Gothic Elements
• Mythic / dreamlike qualities
• Subversion of religious &
social norms
• Ancient spaces
• Obsession with sex and
death
• Presence of the supernatural
or unknown (uncanny)
• Reflection of “unspeakable”
social issues
What actions make Toyo-o a man?
• If Managa is desire
incarnate (made physical),
what is the (physical)
nature of desire?
• Significance of serpent?
• How does Tomiko
compare to Managa?
• What does the dead snake
indicate about Toyo-o’s
conquest of desire?
Cited Sited
• Grove, Richard ”Tales of Moonlight and Rain” Booklad
http://booklad.blogspot.com/2011/03/tales-of-moonlight-andrain-by-uyeda.html 8 March 2012
• "Ihara Saikaku" Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ihara_Saikaku 11 March 2010
• Matsuo Basho's "Narrow Road to the Deep North“
http://darkwing.uoregon.edu/~kohl/basho/index.html6 March
2007.
• “Matsuo Bashō” Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matsuo_Bash%C5%8D 6 March
2007.
• Norton Anthology of World Literature
http://www.wwnorton.com/college/english/
worldlit2e/short/ch/17/summaries.aspx6 5
March 2011
• "Ueda Akinari” Wikipedia, the Free
Encyclopedia. 11 March 2010.
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ueda_Akinari
• The Wizard and the White Snake Video
Trailer http://youtu.be/eova0lSmxGw
• HAIKUS: BASHO & ISSA
<http://www.wisdomportal.com/RobertBly/
Bly-Haikus.html>