Literature of Japan and The Age of the Samurai

Literature of Japan

Japanese Literature, literature of Japan, in written form from at least the 8th century ad to the present. Japanese literature is one of the oldest and richest national literatures. Since the late 1800s, Japanese writings have become increasingly familiar abroad. Genres such as haiku verse, nō drama, and the Japanese novel have had a substantial impact on literature in many parts of the world.

The literary history of Japan, like the history of the country itself, has been marked by alternating periods of isolation from the outside world and engagement with it. During times of greater contact with foreign societies, Japanese literature absorbed new approaches, genres, and concepts.

Another consistent factor in Japanese literature over the centuries has been a tension between the generally traditionalist values of the elite members of society and the innovative impulses that have come from the culture of common people. Both camps influenced each other, and both contributed greatly to Japanese literary history.

Other distinctive qualities of Japanese literature include sensitivity to the place of nature in human life, an emphasis on sincerity of expression, and the uncommon prominence of female writers, as compared with the literary histories of most cultures.

Scholars customarily divide the general history of Japan into periods based on shifts in the location of the national capital and changes in governmental institutions, such as the Heian period (794-1185), the Muromachi period (1333-1603), and the Tokugawa period (1603-1868). The literary history of Japan can be broken down according to these same periods. The major dividing line between the traditional and modern periods of the country is conventionally set at the Meiji Restoration of 1868, which also signaled a new era of modernization and contact with the West.

The Age of the Samurai

Introduction

Edo Period or Tokugawa Period, period of Japanese history that lasted from 1603 to 1867, when the Tokugawa dynasty of shoguns (military dictators) ruled Japan. It is named after the Tokugawa capital of Edo (modern Tokyo) and is also known as the Tokugawa period.

Tokugawa supremacy began with the Battle of Sekigahara in 1600, in which Tokugawa Ieyasu defeated several rivals for power, and was formalized in 1603 by the emperor of Japan. The period ended in 1867, when the last Tokugawa leader resigned, and was followed by the Meiji Restoration, which restored the emperor to power. Following centuries of civil war, the Edo period brought more than 250 years of peace, prosperity, and progress to Japan. Throughout the period, however, Japan remained closed to outside contact and constricted by a rigid class hierarchy.

Foundation of the EDO Government

In the early 16th century Japan was divided among more than 250 warring daimyo (landholding military lords). Each daimyo maintained absolute control over a certain region, or domain, and thus Japan was administered locally rather than by central authority. One daimyo, Oda Nobunaga, began the process of unifying the country, gaining control of all of central Japan by 1580. Upon Nobunaga’s death in 1582, his former general Toyotomi Hideyoshi continued the process by expanding the unified realm westward and then eastward. Tokugawa Ieyasu, who had gained territory and power as an ally of Nobunaga, emerged as Hideyoshi’s most powerful vassal. Hideyoshi became wary of the potential rivalry and had Ieyasu relocated to the fishing village of Edo in 1590.

Before his death in 1598, Hideyoshi installed a regency comprising Ieyasu and four other daimyo to conduct affairs of state until his son Hideyori was old enough to rule. Ieyasu, the most powerful of the regents, began forming alliances and consolidating power. The others soon challenged his authority, but Ieyasu defeated them in the Battle of Sekigahara in 1600. He secured appointment as shogun, a title meaning “military dictator,” from the imperial court in 1603. Although the shogun was in theory the delegate of the emperor, Ieyasu and his successors made every effort to limit the political influence of the imperial court. The court maintained its existence in Kyōto throughout the Edo period, but nearly all authority over national and foreign affairs resided with the shogun.

Ieyasu began fortifying the town of Edo as the headquarters of his bakufu (military government), often referred to in English as a shogunate. By confiscating territory from defeated daimyo throughout Japan and from Hideyoshi’s family, Ieyasu and his followers secured about one-quarter of Japan’s cultivable land. He left many existing daimyo in place, relocated others, and created many more from among his followers, giving them considerable power and autonomy. He appointed his son Tokugawa Hidetada shogun in 1605, establishing the precedent of transmitting the title of shogun through Tokugawa descendants. However, Ieyasu retained actual authority until his death in 1616.

During the early 17th century Ieyasu gradually strengthened Tokugawa rule. By 1612 all surviving daimyo were forced to swear loyalty to Ieyasu. Central authority evolved into the bakuhan system, a combination of the bakufu, which functioned as the central government, and the han, feudal domains under the control of the daimyo. The shogun had direct control over only about one-quarter of Japan’s productive land. The rest was dominated by the daimyo, who maintained their own governments, castle towns, warrior armies, tax and land systems, and courts. Some daimyo domains were holdovers from the period prior to military unification; others were newly created and granted by Ieyasu and his heirs. Imperial mandate gave the shogun the legal authority to dispossess daimyo from their land for rebellion, for misconduct, for failure to produce an heir, or simply to maintain Tokugawa supremacy—a power the shogunate used often in its first century of rule. Other laws issued in 1615 forbade daimyo from building fortifications, sheltering fugitives, or marrying without permission.

To further cement authority, Ieyasu established three categories of daimyo: shimpan (those related to the Tokugawa), fudai (“hereditary vassals”; those allied with the Tokugawa before 1600 or created after that time by the shogunate), and tozama (“outside lords”; those independent since before 1600). The shimpan enjoyed great prestige and held strategic territory near Edo but had no decision-making power in national affairs. The fudai, who had the least independent power, were given the most political authority. The tozama were seen as the worst threat, and many were destroyed or relocated to outer areas of Japan. Although they controlled vast realms and had considerable autonomy in their local affairs, the tozama were excluded from national affairs. In addition, the shogun often placed fudai in neighboring domains to keep the tozama in check and to prevent alliances among them.

Tokugawa supremacy was completed by Hidetada’s son and successor, Tokugawa Iemitsu, who became shogun when his father abdicated in 1623. Tokugawa vassals formed a permanent standing military force in Edo, and hundreds of thousands of client samurai (warriors retained by daimyo) increased the shogunate’s military strength. The shogunate assumed authority over justice, foreign contact, public highways, and religion.

Iemitsu introduced the system of sankin kōtai (alternate attendance) in 1635. This system forced the daimyo to spend half their time in Edo in attendance to the shogun and to leave their wives and children there all the time. Besides securing loyalty, the system drained the daimyo financially; each had to maintain at least two expensive mansions in Edo (one for his heir and one for himself during his stay) in addition to the one castle he was allowed in his domain. The daimyo also had to contribute to vast construction projects in Edo. The system spurred the city’s growth into a national capital and center of commerce.

Despite demands and restrictions from the shogun, the daimyo settled quickly into the centralized feudal system. Tokugawa rule kept daimyo from threatening one another’s holdings, thereby protecting them from one another. They remained virtually supreme within their domains and were not taxed directly. Most owed their status to Tokugawa favor: By the 1650s the majority of daimyo were Tokugawa creations. With no tradition of autonomous action, they had no incentive to challenge Tokugawa supremacy. Most followed shogunal precedents in administering their domains. Because of this, laws and institutions remained remarkably consistent across Japan, especially considering that about 75 percent of the country was effectively ruled by the largely autonomous daimyo.

The shogunate was never strong enough by itself to defeat any large daimyo alliance, but due to fudai daimyo support and mutual daimyo mistrust such an alliance never developed. The fudai, who acted as the shogunate’s senior counselors and other high officials, had every incentive to use the system for their own advantage against the tozama. By the time of Iemitsu’s death in 1651, the bakuhan system had stabilized; daimyo advisers who ruled for Iemitsu’s ten-year-old son, Tokugawa Ietsuna, never seriously threatened Tokugawa dominance.