The imperial museums of Meiji Japan : architecture and the art of the nation
Tseng, Alice Yu-Ting
Seattle : University of Washington Press, c2008

Women writers of Meiji and Taishō Japan : their lives, works, and critical reception, 1868-1926
Tanaka, Yukiko, 1940-
Jefferson, N.C. : McFarland & Co., c2000

French policy towards the Bakufu and Meiji Japan 1854-95
Sims, Richard
Richmond, Surrey : Japan Library, 1998

State, class, and underdevelopment in Nigeria and early Meiji Japan
Mahmud, Sakah Saidu
New York : St. Martin's Press, 1996

Women and millenarian protest in Meiji Japan : Deguchi Nao and Ōmotokyō
Ooms, Emily Groszos
Ithaca, N.Y. : East Asia Program, Cornell University, c1993

Historians and Meiji statesmen
Chang, Richard T
Gainesville, University of Florida Press, 1970

The making of the Meiji Constitution; the oligarchs and the constitutional development of Japan, 1868-1891. Beckmann, Geroge M Lawrence, University of Kansas Press, 1957

http://tech.yahoo.com/news/ap/20090502/ap_on_hi_te/as_japan_google_dark_secrets

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/05/02/old-japanese-maps-on-goog_n_195277.html

Fascinating stuff.

The Mikado Project was based on Gilbert & Sullivan's operetta and performed by the Lodestone Company. Currently, TMP is transforming into a feature film and stars some well-known Asian American actors such as Tamlyn Tomita.  Like the original MIKADO, TMP will be flavored with spectacular dance numbers but now choreographed by Kaba Modern and Jabbawokeez which set America's Best Dance Crew on fire as well as youtube.  Basically TMP would like to add some modern social commentary.

The Mikado is interesting for the following reasons:

The March song featured has 1868 origins, I used to post this topic on edo_meiji but don't have time to search for it.  Gilbert had consulted with one of his countrymen who was one of the "old hands" in Japan---his name escapes me this moment, a diplomat.

Most importantly as many times I've read of this nonsense about how Gilbert had -not- intended the operetta to really be about Japan (his excuse was it was satire on British society), another scholar found some very interesting documentation based on Gilbert's OWN WORDS suggesting otherwise and he  merely flipped flopped to save himself from social harassment.  I read this in a book which was part of an extensive collection at a university library (a professor at this univ. is considered to be an authority of G&S works).  It annoys me greatly to find many webpages stating incorrect information, without citation.  At one point even I repeated this false notion because it seemed logical.  Simply, The Mikado was written and performed in an era when ideas of race and political correctness simply did not exist.  The work is a relic of old attitudes and there is no need to "apologize" for its original intent.  The music in the original work is beautiful but the content is what it is.

Atleast The Mikado is a work of "fantasy" featuring no real historical figures or places although Titipu may have been based on the town of Chichibu made famous by the shocking 1884 CHICHIBU INCIDENT.

Long footnote:
The Chichibu Rebellion and Fukushima Rebellion are the two major post Seinan War (Satsuma Rebellion) conflicts which were sparked by civilians, agricultural class rather than men from the samurai class.  Unfortunately, peasants do not possess the romantic aura of samurai and therefore you don't really hear about these rebellions in popular fiction.  These two rebellions are often swept under the carpet by new students of the Meiji Era who uphold the illusion that it was an era of peace and freedom for all.  Just like the Satsuma Rebellion, city dwellers in Japan feared these rebellions would turn into a civil war but by the 1880s many newspapers tried to downplay matters for fear that the government would be viewed as unstable.

Many of the government policies devastated the farmers who were no longer under the yoke of their local daimyo but were now asked to pay poorly conceived taxes (or contribute labor) developed by the modern government which consisted entirely of former samurai/aristocrats.  Worst still peasants didn't have to fear samurai---they faced modern fire power from the often dispatched Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department and Imperial Army both of which were drawn from different areas of the country and its members lacked any sympathy for the rebelling peasants.

 

I am trying to answer the question of why Japanese art found a place in the west from the latter half of the nineteenth century onwards. ( Read more... )

A translation of the entry on Naoe Kanetsugu (1560-1620), famed karo of the Uesugi clan of Echigo (and later Yonezawa) as it appeared in Rekishi to tabi 11, November 1977 (Showa 51), on p. 155 (the part titled "Tokubetsu Kikaku: Shohan Mei karo hyakusen," edited by Soda Koichi). Those of you watching this year's Taiga-dorama may be interested. (cross-posted from my blog)
( Read more... )

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/16/world/asia/16outcasts.html

Japan’s Outcasts Still Wait for Society’s Embrace

Relates a tale of buraku -- fascinating story regarding various classes that existed 1000 years ago, before the Edo era, and whose descendents are largely discriminated against still...

"Moe Yo Ken" -- the samurai epic chronicling the life of Hijikata Toshizou, the Vice-Captain of the Shinsengumi in the last days of the Tokugawa Period.

This book is full of romance, epic duels, and lots of history concerning the Bakumatsu, so if any of that is of interest to you, I'm sure you'll enjoy it. Also, this book does not pull its punches, so be prepared for a darker, grittier Japan than you might be used to. Here's a sample from the first chapter:


    As he made his way out of the main town, an acquaintance called out to him from the fields.
    "Hey, Toshi, where are you going?"
    He didn't answer, though.
    It's not like he could say that he was going to rape a woman.
    Tonight was the Rokusha Myoujin Ceremony. In more colloquial terms, it was known as the Darkness Festival.
    Toshizou's mission tonight was to take advantage of the darkness during the festival and sneak in. There, he would strip off the kimono of one of the girls visiting the shrine, push her down, and violate her. Then, he would take off his own yukata and lay it across the grass, moist with evening dew, to keep the woman from getting wet as she slept. The reason he was wearing a judo gi was for preparation in case a fight broke out between any male companions.
    Toshizou wasn't the only criminal.
    That was the nature of the festival.


The story is located here: "http://moeyoken.blogspot.com."

Hope you enjoy the story. Please leave a comment and let me know what you think.

I'm not sure why this showed up only now, but when I logged out of my email account, this was one of the featured news articles from AP.  The event was held last November.  The article itself only consists of 8 really wonderful images, but I thought they might be of interest to others here (and might be inspirational to some of the artists, graphic and verbal, among us).

Samurai archery, an ancient sport, still thrives at festival

Tokyo the Last Megalopolis (novel turned into an anime and then into a live-action film).

What I've seen so far scares me but it's interesting because the cast consists of historical figures. It's sort of like a "Gintama" but for the Meiji, Taisho and Showa eras with touches of horror and the anime has some *adult elements.  Tons of metaphors and commentary on the rise of militarism etc etc etc.

The animation itself is good but the content can be very intense.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0096240/