Factbook

A Dynamic Compendium of Interesting Japanese Literary and Publishing Facts
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    Japan’s most expensive book was published in 1984 with a retail price of US$17,000[UPDATED: 11-5-2021]

    Japan’s most expensive book, an edited collection of manuscripts by Claudius Ptolemaeus (100-168), was published in two-volumes by the Japanese publisher Iwanami Shoten in 1984, just before Japan’s infamous economic bubble (1986-1991), with a retail price of 1,930,000 yen.

    Ptolemaeus’ astronomical treatise, an astronomy textbook and star catalogue, is generally referred to as the Almagest.

    Copies of the extremely expensive Japanese edition, Uchushi, Cosmography, a collection of reproductions of Ptolemaeus manuscripts, including analysis and commentary by Torataro Shimomura (1902-1995), a philosopher and a science historian and others, are available at the National Diet Library in Tokyo.

    One of the volumes that can be viewed at the National Diet Library, which consists mostly of maps, is numbered as the 239th of a limited edition.

    According to information contained within the book, which is large and heavy, the volume was printed in Germany in 1983 and is based on an original edition published in 1472. The publication of the 1984 Iwanami Shoten edition was arranged by Uni Agency Inc.

    Ptolemaeus, of Greek-Egyptian heritage, was one of the most influential ancient astronomers. He is famous for his mathematics and geography and his earth-centred cosmology.

    His cosmological theory (hypothesis) that the earth was the centre of the universe was held for 1,400 years; until it was refuted by Nicolas Copernicus (1473- 1543) in 1530. When Copernicus wrote De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium, On the Revolutions of the Celestial Spheres, in which he argued that the earth, in fact, rotated around the sun. The theory was published in 1543, the year of his death. Despite this local Japanese publishing milestone, one of the most expensive books ever bought was Leonardo da Vinci’s (1452-1519 ) Codex Leicester, a hand-drawn manuscript, which the founder of Microsoft Bill Gates purchased in 1994 for US$30.8 million.
    Japan’s most expensive book was published in 1984 with a retail price of US$17,000 Posted by Richard Nathan
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    The translation of ‘Lady Chatterley’s Lover’ triggered Japan’s first post-war obscenity trial, in 1951[UPDATED: 11-5-2021]

    After Japan signed the San Francisco Peace Treaty with Japan in 1951, full sovereignty returned to Japan bringing the Allied Occupation of Japan (1945-1952) to an end.

    Japan had a new constitution, originally drafted in English that it was putting into place in translation. Legal responsibility for its implementation and new rules and regulations transferred back to Japanese control. This included the regulation of the press, publishers and the media. 

    During the occupation various controls existed including General Headquarters (GCQ), for instance, determining which foreign books could or could not be published in Japanese translation.

    Despite this, Japan’s new constitution, drawn up by GCQ and ratified in 1947, prohibited all forms of censorship and guaranteed freedom of expression. This was a major change to the regulations that governed publishing in Japan, which had seen very limited development since major changes to these laws were implemented in a flurry of new regulations in Japan’s Meiji Era (1868-1912), when newspaper and magazine publishing started to flourish. 

    The post-war, liberal Western-influenced and controlled, atmosphere had a major impact on Japan, even on its publishing. This encouraged the setting up of thousands of new publishing houses and new waves of books arriving in Japan in Japanese translation, often for the first time. 

    In June 1950, a new self-regulation body was established. This became known as the Publishing Morals Committee, Shuppan Butsu Fuki Iinkai. And it was established shortly after the publication in spring of the same year, of Lady Chatterley’s Lover in Japanese translation for the first time.

    The book by D.H. Lawrence (1885-1930), which was first published in 1928, was translated into Japanese by Sei Ito (1905-1969) and published by Oyama Publishing. 

    The publication of Lady Chatterley’s Lover tested these new laws and a trial took place on the grounds of Lady Chatterley’s Lover’s content being obscene. A trial that went all the way to Japan’s supreme court, setting a legal precedent that lasted for decades.

    The Supreme Court decision, in this first post-war obscenity trial, defined obscenity as anything “unnecessarily sexually stimulating, (which) damages the normal sexual sense of shame of ordinary people, or is against good sexual moral principles”. 

    According to Kristen Cather in The Art of Censorship in Postwar Japan,“ The Chatterley trial staged a very public struggle to define literary, cultural, and legal identity, engaging a far-reaching debate over the relationship of domestic Japanese and imported Western traditions”.  

    The Japanese Supreme Court concluded that parts of the book, consisting of about 80 pages, were obscene and banned those sections from publication and fined the translator and publisher in a landmark decision that concluded that the sex in Lady Chatterley’s Lover was not normal and was against good sexual moral principles. 

    Despite Japan’s long history of erotic publishing of woodblock prints including Shunpon and shunga in the Edo Period (1603-1688), erotic guidebooks and tales of man-eating demon women, this imported fictional prose about Lady Chatterley and the day-to-day life of her English gamekeeper, that in addition to their intimate adulterous relationship includes “peripheral” passages on pheasant raising and managing a shooting estate, was deemed obscene. 

    A subsequent trial relating to an abridged translation by Tatsuhiko Shibusawa (1928-1987) of a version of Histoire de Juliette by the Marquis de Sade (1740-1814) also led to a successful conviction.

    Interestingly Shibusawa, a relative of Eiichi Shibusawa (1840-1931) one of Japan’s most influential early industrialists who helped found many companies including the first Western-style paper mill in Japan in 1875, had written his graduation thesis on the Marquis de Sade.

    The lengthy nine year trial dragged in several famous Japanese authors as witnesses including Shusaku Endo (1923-1996), Shohei Ooka (1909-1988) and the Nobel Prize-winner Kenzaburo Oe helping increase Shibusawa’s public profile.

    For some Japanese critics, even today, pornography and the publication of materials that are on the periphery of falling within scope of Japan’s official definition of the obscene is seen as a subversive tool through which to resist the authorities and assert a type of cultural national independence.

    That said, Lady Chatterley’s Lover, however, was not just controversial in Japan. It was banned in the United Kingdom until Penguin books won a landmark obscenity trial in 1960 allowing its full publication in English. This decision had a profound cultural and social impact in Britain.

    It was only in 1996 that the full book was finally published in Japan in Japanese, which allowed newspapers in Britain and America to report on this publishing breakthrough with such headlines as: Japanese to see more of ‘Lady Chatterley’ and ’Chatterley’ to bare all in Japan.  

    As academic interest in historically ‘obscene books’, many of which seem unremarkable in today’s light, increases, libraries like the British Library are starting to digitise their online collections and are making them available to researchers worldwide through collections like the Gale’s Archives of Sexuality and Gender.

    These books are no longer concealed in special sections in libraries and are just a click away for some subscribers and library users.

    The translation of ‘Lady Chatterley’s Lover’ triggered Japan’s first post-war obscenity trial, in 1951 Posted by Richard Nathan
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    The first Western-style paper mill opened in 1875 in Japan[UPDATED: 10-4-2021]

    As Japan rapidly modernised in its Meiji era (1868-1912), after more than 250 years of isolation, there was a huge demand for paper to meet many types of new and emerging needs including: the printing of public bonds and paper money; newly launched magazines and newspapers; as well as paper certificates for new regulations for the registering of land and property ownership. 

    Despite Japan’s long and distinguished history of papermaking that stretched as far back as 610, when Chinese papermaking technologies first arrived in Japan through Korea, traditional handmade paper manufacturing could not keep up with the massive demand that modernisation created. 

    Imports of Western machine-manufactured paper that could be mass-produced by employing paper pulp, increased massively while production of traditional Japanese paper, Washi, declined as Japan urbanised and modernised.

    Historically, during Japan’s feudal periods most feudal lords, daimyo, considered papermaking of strategic importance, as paper was even in their eras an indispensable and highly valued commodity. So they developed secure local supplies to meet the needs of their given territories.

    In a similar manner, some farsighted Meiji era pioneers, like the daimyo before them, thought modern Japan also needed its own local machine-made paper capabilities.

    In 1873, Eiichi Shibusawa (1840-1931) set up Shoshi Kaisha, subsequently renamed Oji Paper Company, and Japan’s first Western-style machine paper mill was officially opened two years later on the 16 December 1875. With the help of a 26 year-old British expert, Frank Cheethmen, the company imported equipment. Shibusawa image will appear on new 10,000 yen Japanese banknotes that will be introduced in 2024.

    The Oji paper mill was located in Oji in Tokyo close to the Otonashi River for logistical reasons. Recycled undergarments were used initially to make the first paper produced at the mill.

    Four years later Japan’s first wood pulp mill was opened. The Oji Group, a pulp, paper and packaging business still exists today.

    Despite paper being invented in China, and only arriving in Europe centuries later, in the 11thcentury, modern machine-made paper was actually first created in France in 1798, according to Kiyofusa Narita (1884-1979) Director of the Paper Museum in Tokyo and a former executive at Oji Paper. Production in Japan of this type of paper only began about 76 years later.

    Nonetheless, despite the delays, Japanese paper today in all its forms is considered some of the best produced in the world. And as is often the case in Japan its paper has its own unique standard sizes, quality scales and types including Tengujo, the world’s thinnest paper.

    Today Tengujo is a machine-manufactured paper produced by Hidaka Washi a factory in Kochi Japan. It is still, however, made using the bark of Kozo (paper mulberry) trees just like Washi, traditional Japanese paper, was in the 7th Century. Despite machine-manufactured paper being a delayed Western import Japan is a strategic player in the international paper industry, Tengujo, for example, plays a critical role in the conservation of paper manuscripts around the world at the Louvre, the British Museum and Library of Congress, and Japan can today also proudly claim to have produced the world’s smallest printed book, as well as the world’s thinnest paper, something that would please Shibusawa and his peers who brought modern printing to Japan.
    The first Western-style paper mill opened in 1875 in Japan Posted by Richard Nathan
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    The world’s bestselling comic book series by a single author is ‘One Piece’ a Japanese manga[UPDATED: 6-3-2021]

    According to The Guinness Book of Records, Eiichiro Oda’s One Piece sold 320,866,000 units worldwide between its launch in 1997 and 2015 when it was first listed by Guinness as a record breaking series.

    One Piece, which is an on-going series that still tops the bestseller lists in Japan, was initially launched by the Japanese publisher Shueisha in its weekly magazine Shonen Jump in July 1997.

    Since its magazine launch One Piece, now the world’s bestselling manga, has also been published in book format in more than 92 tanko-bon single hardback volumes.

    The pirate adventure, One Piece, which features a young pirate Monkey D. Luffy fighting the World Government, is now what industry observers call an international media franchise, and includes anime spin-offs and much more.

    One Piece has also had a huge cultural impact in Japan and outside the nation that has led, for instance, to some of Japan’s most interesting authors, such as Fuminori Nakamura, penning essays about the series and its cultural impact, as well as academic papers such as Pirates, Justice and Global Order in the Anime One Piece.

    The world’s bestselling comic book series by a single author is ‘One Piece’ a Japanese manga Posted by Richard Nathan
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    Manga magazines and books generate more than half of all publishing revenues in Japan[UPDATED: 6-2-2021]

    According to The All Japan Magazine and Book Publisher’s and Editor’s Association (AJPEA) manga magazines and books generate more than half of all publishing revenues, which are estimated at 1.4 trillion yen (US$14 billion), in Japan.

    Manga magazines and books generate more than half of all publishing revenues in Japan Posted by Richard Nathan
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    Two of Japan’s most famous authors Ryunosuke Akutagawa and Yukio Mishima translated ‘Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland’ into Japanese[UPDATED: 3-8-2021]

    Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, published in English in 1865, has been translated into Japanese more times than any other language, and two of Japan’s most famous authors; Ryunosuke Akutagawa (1892-1927), after whom one of Japan’s most prestigious literary prizes is named; and Japan’s most notorious author Yukio Mishima (1925-1970), have translated the story into Japanese.

    Akutagawa’s translation of Lewis’s story was published in 1927. It was a collaborative effort with others and had the Japanese title Arisu Monogatari; and Mishima’s translation was published in 1952, with illustrations by Goro Kumada  (1911-2009), with the title Fushiginokuni Arisu. 

    Rendering and adapting Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland into brilliant and readable Japanese, that reflects the nuances of the original story, is a rabbit hole of a challenge that many have tried and continue to try, since at least 1895, not just these two famous and highly regarded authors.

    Two of Japan’s most famous authors Ryunosuke Akutagawa and Yukio Mishima translated ‘Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland’ into Japanese Posted by Richard Nathan
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    In Meiji Japan books were the ultimate ‘must-clutch’ fashion accessories for young women and schoolgirls[UPDATED: 10-28-2020]

    In Meiji era (1868-1912) Japan, when the nation was experiencing a period of rapid modernisation and opening up to the West, books and often Western imported ones were a ‘must-clutch’ fashion accessory for young women.

    An example of this can be seen in the 1897 woodblock print series, True Beauties, by Toyohara Chikanobu (1838-1912) at the Ota Museum in Tokyo.  In one of the images in this series a schoolgirl is depicted holding a western-style umbrella, dressed in traditional Japanese clothing and holding a foreign book in her left hand with a ring on her finger.

    It is probably not too far of a stretch to say that the brown leather covered book with its crest looks somewhat similar to an early Louise Vuitton bag. Another example of an image of a young Japanese woman reading a Western novel in a woodblock print is Mirror of Enlightenment Feelings by Kunichika Utagawa (1838-1900).

    Images of women reading has been an important motif in Japanese art for a long time, so much so that research and books on the topic such as: The Female as Subject: Reading and Writing In Early Modern Japan have been published.

    Historically, reading was the preserve of Japanese aristocrats and thus women readers projected an image of high social rank especially those who read the classics and poetry, but as Japan modernised what was being read, how the book was held, and the environment within which the reading women was depicted all became important.

    In Meiji Japan being educated, open-minded while still holding onto one’s local obligations was considered important. Clutching an impressive Western-looking book as one walked around in a traditional kimono was an aspiration getup or the must-have look for some.

    In Meiji Japan books were the ultimate ‘must-clutch’ fashion accessories for young women and schoolgirls Posted by Richard Nathan
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    Two influential books from the 1700s helped shape Japan as a Robot Nation[UPDATED: 8-21-2020]

    Japan is sometimes referred to as the Robot Kingdom due to its large number of robots and its openness to new technologies including robotics.

    Japan has more industrial robots than most countries; and more Artificial Intelligence (AI) patents than any other, according to some OECD measures. The government even has a written strategy that articulates the steps the nation will take towards becoming Japan as a Robotics Superpower.

    Two books published in 1730 and 1796 played a very important role in Japan’s development into the so-called Robot Nation it is today. 

    Both books were about mechanical Japanese toys known as Karakiri Ningyo. These two Karakuri books helped increase the popularity of these intricately designed mechanical Japanese automata, and position robots as fun and unthreatening devices in most Japanese people’s minds.

    The 1796 book by Hosokawa Honzo Yorinao (1741-1796), Karakuri zui, sometimes described as Japan’s first mechanical engineering textbook, has been particularly influential.

    It provided detailed diagrams and descriptions of how to make Karakiri Ningyo, which are still used today by hobbyists and craftsmen to repair and reproduce this early form of home-entertainment robots.

    Even though Japan’s Karakuri roots go back much further with some believing as far as AD 697, the influence of these books, like the automata themselves, has had long-term and significant impact on Japan, its industry; and even the wider world. Japanese engineers at firms such as Toyota have referred to them and copied some of their design concepts in their products.

    And The British Museum has a woodblock print of Hosokawa’s book, titled Compendium of Clever Machines, in its famous collection.

    These two books and Japan’s rich and creative history of robot books in general, which includes both fiction and non-fiction, continues to influence and inspire robot engineers and researchers, as well as writers in Japan.

    Some of Japan’s most renowned contemporary storytellers such as Kazufumi Shiraishi and Soji Shimada have, for example, joined many other talented writers penning robot and cyborg tales.

    Works such as their respective Stand-in Companion and One Love Chigusa, generating a virtuous circle of creativity that seems to be providing perpetual momentum to this trend and the evolution of robot books, robot technology and its literature in Japan, and perhaps even robots themselves.

    Two influential books from the 1700s helped shape Japan as a Robot Nation Posted by Richard Nathan