The China Lover

I finished reading William Boyd's The Blue Afternoon on Monday, the day I had my nose surgery. In fact, I read the last dozen or so pages while sitting in the waiting room of the Ear, Nose and Throat Outpatients Department (Otolaryngology) at Christchurch Hospital. It probably wasn't the best choice of reading material, given that much of the story is set in a hospital in Manila at the dawn of the 20th century, and that Boyd seemed to find great pleasure in describing some of the less sanitary medical practices in vogue at the time. Thankfully none of these were mentioned in the final pages, otherwise I would have been even more nervous than I already was.

I've now started reading The China Lover by Ian Buruma, which is one of the books I bought in Wellington when I was up there for the jazz festival. I often find it difficult switching between novels by different authors, but this hasn’t been the case this time. Perhaps it's because Buruma's writing style is quite "neutral", for want of a better word, especially compared to the more flambouyant style of Boyd. Which is not to say that I'm not enjoying The China Lover. Quite the contrary. The characters, setting, and narrative are all fascinating, and more than make up for the rather mundane prose.

Based on the life of Japanese film star Yamaguchi Yoshiko (a.k.a. Otaka Yoshiko, Ri Koran, Shirley Yamaguchi), The China Lover is described by the author as "a work of fiction based on historical events". Many of the characters in the book are based on real people. The story begins in the 1930s in Japanese-occupied Manchuria, and I'd barely read twenty pages or so before a character I'm quite familiar with made an appearance.

I'm talking of Amakasu Masahiko, who was one of the military police officers responsible for the murder in 1923 of Osugi Sake, Ito Noe, and Sakae's nephew, an event I've touched on previously. Amakasu was convicted of this crime and sentenced to 10 years imprisonment. However, he was released after just three years and, after a period of study in France, joined the Japanese occupying forces in Manchuria, where he was responsible for managing the Japanese Army's involvement in the opium trade among other things. He later became the head of the Manchukuo Film Association, a company set up by the Japanese to make propaganda films to boost support for their occupation, and as such played a prominent role in the earlier career of The China Lover's main character, Yamaguchi Yoshiko. Some of you may also remember him from the movie The Last Emperor, in which he was played by Sakamoto Ryuichi. In fact many characters from that movie appear in the first part of The China Lover, including Emperor Pu Yi himself, who was a Charlie Chaplin fan, apparently.

Distance walked today: 0km
Total distance walked since Tokaido training began: 149.5km
Days left until departure: 37

A grave obsession

Just a few years before the Hayama Incident, another scandal arose involving a number of prominent Japanese anarchists, among them Kotoku Shusui and his partner Kanno Suga. This incident, however, had far more serious consequences. The High Treason Incident ultimately resulted in the execution by hanging of 12 people, and the imprisonment of a further 14. Osugi Sakae himself might have become a victim of this government witch-hunt had it not been for the fact that he was already serving a prison sentence for an unrelated offence.

Kotoku Shusui and Kanno Suga

The incident centered on an alleged plot to assassinate the Japanese Emperor Meiji. The real facts of the matter are not entirely clear, and while some of the accused had tested a crude bomb, it's generally accepted that most of those convicted had no connection to any conspiracy and that at most five or six people were involved (a plea for a retrial was submitted after the Second World War but eventually rejected by the Supreme Court). The main aim of the authorities appears to have been to crush the Japanese anarchist movement once and for all.

One of those who became embroiled in the High Treason Incident was Uchiyama Gudo, a Soto Zen priest who wrote and published anti-government propaganda using a printing press hidden at the Rinsen-ji temple in Hakone of which he was in charge. As a result of the incident, Gudo was deprived of his status as a Zen priest and excommunicated. In 1992, however, a submission was presented to the then head priest at Rinsen-ji requesting that Gudo's name be formally reentered on the registry of priests, and the following year Gudo's status was posthumously restored. His grave at Rinsen-ji, which previously took the form of a simple stone with no mention of Gudo's name, was subsequently upgraded to include a full headstone.

The grave of Kotoku Shusui

Visiting the graves of Japanese anarchists is a minor obsession of mine. I've visited the grave of Osugi Sakae in Shizuoka twice (in 1994 and 1996), and in 2003 I traveled to the town of Nakamura on the southern tip of the island of Shikoku to visit the grave of Kotoku Shusui, who was executed along with Gudo in 1911. Rinsen-ji is not on the Tokaido, but it's not far from Hakone-Yumoto, where I'll probably be staying on day 21 of my walk. If I get up early the following morning, I should have time to visit Uchiyama Gudo's grave before continuing on to Oiso.

Hayama

Last October during a brief trip to Japan, I traveled to the town of Hayama on the Miura Peninsula just south of Tokyo. I was there to see a friend, but I'd always wanted to visit Hayama because of its association with the Japanese anarchist Osugi Sakae.

Many Japanese people haven't heard of Osugi Sakae. Some of those who have know of him because of what's commonly referred to as the Hayama Incident. This incident, which took place in 1916 and was centered on a teahouse in Hayama called the Hikage Chaya (and is therefore also sometimes referred to as the Hikage Chaya Incident), marked the climax of a bizarre experiment in "free love".

Free love was something Osugi had been reading and writing about for many years. As an anarchist, he blamed capitalism for perverting love and marriage and thought that true free love could only become a reality once capitalism was abolished. But Osugi couldn't wait that long. He decided it was time to put his ideas into practice.

In December 1915, Osugi, who'd been married to Hori Yasuko since 1906, began an affair with Kamichika Ichiko, a newspaper reporter and member of the feminist group Seito-sha (Bluestocking Society). Then in February 1916, he began another affair, with Ito Noe, also a member of Seito-sha and the wife of Dadaist musician and writer Tsuji Jun.

Kamichika Ichiko

Osugi set out three conditions on which the four-way relationship would be based: first, each individual in the relationship would be financially independent; second, each would live in their own dwelling; and third, each would allow the others complete freedom of action.

It seems that Osugi's enthusiasm wasn't matched by the three women involved. The relationship soon became bogged down in jealousy and financial difficulties. In November 1916 Osugi traveled to Hayama and took a room at the Hikage Chaya to work on a translation. He told Kamichika that he'd be alone. But when Kamichika arrived to check on him she found Ito in his room. Ito returned to Tokyo the following day. Kamichika stayed behind with Osugi. The two argued, and in the middle of the following night, Kamichika stabbed Osugi in the throat.

Osugi spent ten days recovering in a hospital in the neighbouring town of Zushi. The Hayama Incident caused quite a scandal and those involved were ostracized by many of their peers. Kamichika was tried and eventually sentenced to two years in prison. She later became a member of the Japanese House of Representatives. Hori ended her marriage with Osugi. However, Osugi and Ito continued their relationship and went on to have four children together.

On 16 September 1923, amidst the chaos that reigned in Tokyo in the aftermath of the Great Kanto Earthquake, a squad of military police detained Osugi, Ito, and Osugi's six-year-old nephew. All three were beaten to death and their bodies thrown into a well.

Osugi Sakae, Ito Noe, and daughter Mako

Today the Hikage Chaya operates as an upscale Japanese restaurant. Apparently we weren’t the first customers to enquire about its links with Osugi Sakae, because when we did so the cashier produced a copy of an old magazine with a lengthy article about the Hayama Incident. Unfortunately the room where the stabbing took place no longer exists (or so we were told), so I had to make do with a few photos of the building's exterior.

Speaking of connections...

I'm not very good with names. It's only just dawned on me that Tom Stanley of Walk Japan Ltd., who co-created the previously clunky but now beautiful Nakasendo Way website, parts of which I printed off and used as a guide when we walked the Nakasendo in 2007, is Dr. Thomas A. Stanley, author of Osugi Sakae, Anarchist in Taisho Japan: The Creativity of the Ego.

I should explain that when I went to Tokyo in 1996 it was to do research on Osugi Sakae for a possible M.A. (Things didn't quite go to plan. I blogged about that year here and here.) Japanese anarchism in the Taisho period is a very specialized field, and although my efforts to contribute to it have been pathetic compared to those of Dr. Stanley, it seems remarkable that we're both interested in Osugi Sakae and the Nakasendo. I wonder if he likes Keith Jarrett?