Yamamoto G.S. [Tadashi]. The Conversations for Officers and Merchants, of the Japanese and English. [Eiwa Bunsho Kaiwahen]. Osaka, S.H. Okajima 1887. Small octavo (16x12cm) publisher's roan backed decorated boards (rubbed); [10],173,[1],[2 colophon]pp. Title page printed in red and black within a gold frame. Rear endpaper removed, rather good and fresh inside. Au$600
A pleasing little book with the usual amount of baffling and useless conversational gambits plus an emphasis on social niceties - dinners, drinking, dancing and so forth - and business. Worldcat finds only the NDL copy and so can I.
Suzuki Kinjiro. Meig. Dokufuden - [Shinpen Meiji Dokufuden]. Tokyo, Kinsendo 1887 [Meiji 20]. 18x13cm publisher's cloth backed illustrated boards (edges worn); one single page and several double page illustrations. Inner front hinge separated, inner back hinge cracked; maybe missing the front endpaper and the first two leaves (illustrations) are creased; two leaves sprung. A read copy I'm sorry to say, but for one of these flimsy board books made to be read to pieces, still acceptable. Au$150
Second edition? But how many were there? First published in December 1886 this copy is dated November 1887 but is a different book from the copy of the same date illustrated by the NDL. Starting at the front: the cover has been redrawn, the contents are a different printing with different pagination, in a different order and the illustrations are not all the same. The pagination is a nightmare; it starts, stops, jumps forward and back and nowhere meets the NDL November 1887 copy until we get to the last page.
One the prizes of the dokufu craze of the early Meiji. dokufu - poisonous women - are nothing new of course but the happy conjunction at the advent of mass circulation newspapers of a beautifully timed series of murders by unvirtuous young women set the sensation mongers and their readers all of a fever. Newspaper to book, lurid print to kabuki and back again, dokufu were all the rage for a couple of decades. Along the way crime fiction was born and, in a way, modern Japanese literature.
This went to press too soon for Hanai Oume - 1887's murderess of choice - but I don't doubt her case sparked this new edition; she was sentenced in November. Takahashi Oden, Yoarashi Okinu, Torioi Omatsu, Gonsai Otatsu, Ibaraki Otaki and Raijin Oshin provide plenty to go on with.
Worldcat finds no copies of any but a modern reprint outside the NDL and it was some consolation to see that this copy is a lot better than one reproduced online by the NDL.
Hanai Oume. Shuyotei Sofu. [or ] [Hanai Oume Suigetsu Kibun]. Tokyo, Ishikawa Denkichi December 1887 (Meiji 20). Two volumes stitched together 18x12cm, colour wood covers by Utagawa Kunimatsu (the first a bit used with a small hole); two double page, two single illustrations at the front, four large illustrations through the text. Browning of the preliminary pages of volume one, a stain in the gutter at the bottom, still rather good. Au$350
One of the prizes of the dokufu craze of the early Meiji. dokufu - poisonous women - are nothing new of course but the happy conjunction at the advent of mass circulation newspapers of a beautifully timed series of murders by unvirtuous young women set the sensation mongers and their readers all of a fever. Newspaper to book, lurid print to kabuki and back again, dokufu were all the rage for a couple of decades. Along the way crime fiction was born and, in a way, modern Japanese literature.
Hanai Oume earned her place as one on the trinity of great dokufu for the murder of her employee for helping her sponging father muscle her out of her business - the teahouse Suigetsu. The famous umbrella was part of her defence.
Of course nothing about cheap popular trash like this is going to be straightforward. The colophon here tells us this is a reprint but lists the first as November 1887 which must be a newspaper appearance. Keio university's copy which uses the same covers is a different printing from a different publisher (Mizuno Ikutaro) with a colophon listing nothing before December while Yamanashi University's copy, published by Yamazaki Matasaburo and dated the same day as Keio's, is yet another different printing with a different cover. None of this is helped by the book being titled by both variants in the same copy.
Baido Kunimasa [Utagawa Kunimasa IV]. [Meiji Kiken Kagami]. Tokyo, Hoeidi 1888 (Meiji 21). 12x9cm publisher's wrapper with title label (ink inscription on the back cover); 15 double folded leaves giving one single page, one gatefold quadruple page, and 15 double page woodcuts. Actually all but a couple of leaves are quadruple folded - the printed leaves around double folded leaves of heavier paper making the book tougher, made to be handled often. Au$300
A nifty little book, a portrait gallery of eminent figures of the Meiji. But captured in action, not the studio poses of so many 'Eminent Men' galleries. These are woodcuts but they are, with true modernity, cut to resemble engravings. Worldcat finds only the NDL copy.
Muneaki Mihara. [Jizai Kyoikuho Kuzai]. The Teaching by Pictures the Way of Impraving Freely am Easely the Natural Constitution of Man [sic]. Ritsuma Akiko, 1888 (Meiji 21). Broadside 70x53cm, woodblock printed, folding into publisher's limp cloth covers 17x13cm with printed label. Covers browned with a splodge on the back; a nice copy Au$450
An enchanting and self evident exposition on the value of pictures in learning. Seemingly as simple as a phrenology chart but judging by the amount of text worked into all those different parts of the brain perhaps a lot more complex. From the little, as an illiterate, I can glean on brain function as outlined here this might sit somewhere between phrenology and neurophysics. The open area at the very centre of the brain is labelled 未詳 - unknown.
Kobayashi Ikuhide. ... [Tokyo Meisho no Uchi Ashumabashi ... Tokyo 1888 (Meiji 21). Colour woodcut 36x24cm. A couple of tiny holes, a nice bright copy. Au$175
Every artist and publisher in Tokyo had a go at the newly opened Azumabashi - the pioneer iron bridge opened in December 1887. Kobayashi produced more than one. Here the focus is not the bridge but the bustle of people; it's clear that near everyone in Tokyo wanted to look, to cross it.
Hanai Oume. Shuyotei Sofu. [or ] [Hanai Oume Suigetsu Kibun]. Tokyo, Mori Senkichi 1888 (Meiji 21). 18x13cm, publisher's cloth backed illustrated boards; one double page and two full page illustrations; 72pp. The cheap paper browned; a rather good copy of a book made to be read to death. Au$250
One of the prizes of the dokufu craze of the early Meiji. dokufu - poisonous women - are nothing new of course but the happy conjunction at the advent of mass circulation newspapers of a beautifully timed series of murders by unvirtuous young women set the sensation mongers and their readers all of a fever. Newspaper to book, lurid print to kabuki and back again, dokufu were all the rage for a couple of decades. Along the way crime fiction was born and, in a way, modern Japanese literature.
Hanai earned her place as one on the trinity of great dokufu for the murder of her employee for helping her sponging father muscle her out of her business - the teahouse Suigetsu. The famous umbrella was part of her defence.
Of course nothing about cheap popular trash like this is going to be straightforward. The Strange Story of Hanai Oume at Suigetsu was first published in December 1887, just after her murder trial in November, in two volumes. Our edition appeared in December 1888 and who knows how many came in between. NDL records the December 1887 and a November 1888 printing and nothing else and I can't find anything elsewhere.
KAUTSKY, Karl. Die Klassengegensatze von 1789, zum hundertjahrigen gedenktag der grotzen revolution. Stuttgart, Dietz 1889. Octavo printed wrapper (back wrapper gone); 79pp. With a couple of contemporary stamps of the Melbourne Socialistischer Verein Vorwa[?]. Au$30
THOMPSON, Sir H. Modern Cremation. Its history and practice .. recently improved arrangements made by the Cremation Society of England. Second edition revised and greatly enlarged. London, Kegan Paul 1891. Octavo publisher's cloth; xii,163pp and publisher's catalogue; frontispiece and 11 illustrations (five being full page plans or elevations). A nice copy. Au$225
By the funereal reformer, founder and president of the Society. Cremation, for the modern westerner, is a materialistic, utilitarian question. Public health is the main spur for the cremationist and the spiritual barely touched upon - the body is being desanctified; which may or may not explain why Italy was the pioneer of modern cremation. There the subject was first raised in the 1860's and by the mid 1880's several hundred people had been burnt. In England Thompson caused the first storm with an article in the Contemporary Review in 1874, the year his Society was founded. His improvements to this edition include reprinting this 1874 paper and a subsequent answer to the critics.
The first human cremations to occur in England, and test the law, were private affairs in privately built crematoria and this book was first published two years earlier as laws and codes were being formulated. This edition includes instructions for arranging cremation at the Society's crematorium (the only one in use in England) near Woking and descriptions of the crematorium, the furnace, and offers suggestions for cinerary urns. The frontispiece is the architect's rendering of their chapel and crematoria, a fine bit of 13th century English church architecture, unremarkable in any tasteful parish - except for the 13th century industrial chimney sprouting from the middle of the building.
[LANE, William]. The Workingman's Paradise: an Australian Labour Novel. By John Miller. Sydney, printed by Edwards Dunlop for the Worker Board of Trustees 1892. Octavo publisher's red cloth blocked in blind. Title browned by the endpaper as usual; there was no half title or blank between them. A rather good copy. Au$850
First edition of this influental if fairly impenetrable socialist anarchist novel by the Messiah of the working class. The 1948 edition was on the shelf of every thoughtful Australian in the second half of the 20th century but I've only ever met one person who insisted he read the whole thing. He made many improbable claims. I think an earlier generation were more thorough: copies of this in good shape have always been hard to find.
Lane's preface admits that it's a bit of an unresolved mess but those who want a happy end - like his wife - and those who want Nellie dead of a broken heart - like an unnamed friend - will have to wait for the next book. I dozed off so I'm not sure when the action switched from Nellie to Ned alone and don't know where we left her.
MURPHY, G. [George] Read. Beyond the Ice. Being a story of the newly discovered region round the north pole. Edited from Dr. Frank Farleigh's diary. London, Sampson Low & Melbourne, Hutchinson [1894]. Octavo publisher's illustrated blue cloth (two small blobs of wax on the front cover, marks on the back). Somewhat canted, not a bad copy of a book guaranteed to respond badly to handling. A signed presentation, dated March 1894, from Murphy to Geelong lawyer Aurel Just, "gentleman, Dremanist and possessor of other titles," with a quote from his character Vernon Dreman. Au$950
Only edition of this polar utopia and dystopia which Geelong author Murphy - I suspect simple perversity - took to the opposite end of the world in defiance of the usual Australian practice of heading south. Heaps of scientific advances and flying machines as expected but reform and enlightened progress can only go so far: adult women are enfranchised until they marry, then the possible conflict between husband and wife is not worth the candle.
"The chief characters seem to spend a deal of unnecessary time in consuming oysters and brown bread" warned the North Melbourne Courier and West Melbourne Advertiser in an otherwise warm review while suggesting it would be commercially more canny to set the book in central Australia.
Exhibition, Kyoto 1895. Yoshiwara Takeo. [Daiyonkai Kangyo Hakurankai Taikyoku Zenzu?]. Kyoto, Ide Shozo 1895 (Meiji 28) Lithograph 42x56, folded. A scattering of small wormholes and signs of use; not bad. Au$125
A bird's-eye view of the 4th National Industrial Exhibition held in Kyoto from April to the end of July 1895. Five of these national exhibitions were held between 1877 and 1903; the first three in Tokyo and, after some provincial agitation, this in Kyoto and the fifth in Osaka. Each was bigger, better and more crowded than their predecessor.
JENNINGS, J. Ellis. Color-Vision and Color-Blindness. A practical manual for railroad surgeons. Philadelphia, F.A. Davis 1896. Octavo, excellent in publisher's cloth; x,115pp and publisher's list, colour frontispiece and 21 illustrations through the text. Au$185
First edition and pretty much the ideal copy as it belonged to a railway surgeon who wrote on colour blindness: D. Emmett Welsh - then formulating tests for workers at the Grand Rapids and Indiana Rail Road. Jennings' intent here is to effect universal reform and adoption of testing - it is astonishing that by 1896 railway companies and other industries where colour blindness could and did cause disaster still ignored the problem - by offering a system of simple and efficient measures.
Banking. : [Kabushikigaisha Shimabara Chokinginko : Shiten Kaigyo Kokoku]. n.p. [c1898] Colour lithograph 26x39cm. A nice copy. Au$300
This gentle, charming advertisement - hikifuda - announcing branch openings of the Shimabara Savings Bank is illustrated by two reassuring stories of rags to riches - or solid comfort at least. The Shimabara Bank was founded in 1891 and the Shimabara Savings Bank in 1897 but didn't live long thanks to some investment decisions by the Nakayama family - three Nakayamas including president Fumiko are listed among the directors.
Shimabara is in the Nagasaki prefecture and the two branches advertised are Arie - a town that was engulfed by Minamitakaki City - and Taira - which I can only trace as a railway station in a desolate looking area of Unzen, Nagasaki. Dates for month and day have been left blank.
Hikifuda. [Goto Shokai]. n.p. [c1900] 26x38cm colour woodcut. Small knick from a top corner; a nice copy. Au$135
Bustling modern Japan is celebrated in this advertisement for the Japanese and western liquor merchants Goto Shokai. I presume it's the trademarks of the brands they handle that are displayed.
These hikifuda - small posters or handbills - were usually produced with the text panel blank. The customer, usually a retailer, had their own details over printed, so the same image might sell fine silk or soy sauce.
Exhibition - Osaka 1903. [Daigokai naikoku kangyo hakurankai mesaizu]. Osaka, Azuma Shintaro 1903 [Meiji 36]. Colour lithograph 40x54cm. Au$150
A robustly coloured if roughly printed bird's-eye view. The Fifth National Industrial Exhibition in Osaka in 1903, while the last of the series begun in 1877 was the largest and included a lot of firsts. It was the first with a court for foreign countries - quite a few exhibited their wares. It was the first held at night - electricity and illumination was a great feature - and the Japanese public was introduced to wireless telegraphy, American automobiles, x-rays and cinema. A sixth exhibition scheduled for 1907 was to be an international exhibition but that plan fizzled. The Tokyo exhibition of 1907 was pretty grand but not what was hoped for after 1903. It was 1970 before Japan held a true international exhibition.
Exhibition - Osaka 1903. [Daigokai naikoku kangyo hakurankai jonai jitchi shukuzu]. Fifth National Industrial Exhibition ... Osaka. Osaka 1903 (Meiji 36). Colour lithograph 55x79cm; folded as issued. A couple of smudges and spots; a rather good copy with its original colour illustrated outer wrapper, Au$300
A pretty good bird's-eye view. The Fifth National Industrial Exhibition in Osaka in 1903, while the last of the series begun in 1877 was the largest and included a lot of firsts. It was the first with a court for foreign countries - quite a few exhibited their wares. It was the first held at night - electricity and illumination was a great feature - and the Japanese public was introduced to wireless telegraphy, American automobiles, x-rays and cinema. A sixth exhibition scheduled for 1907 was to be an international exhibition but that plan fizzled. The Tokyo exhibition of 1907 was pretty grand but not what was hoped for after 1903. It was 1970 before Japan held an international exhibition.
FURNIVAL, William James. Leadless Decorative Tiles, Faience, and Mosaic .. history, materials, manufacture and use of ornamental flooring tiles, .. recipes for tile-bodies, and for leadless glaze and art-tile enamels. Staffordshire, the author 1904. Large thick octavo publisher's cloth with inset illustration; xxiv,852pp; 37 plates (18 colour), numerous illustrations. Mild signs of use but an uncommonly good copy. Au$450
Probably the definitive work on 19th century tile manufacture, this is an enormous compendium on the history and manufacture of decorative tiles. And, more importantly perhaps, this contains the results of years of research into ridding the industry of lead-poisoning. Furnival notes that almost 600 women and girls working in the manufacture of earthernware and china had died of lead poisoning between 1895 and 1898.
With added contributions on tiles in China (by Bushell), in India (by Clarke and Marshall), and on designing (by Ambrose Wood).
Palace of Peace. International Competition of the Carnegie Foundation. The Palace of Peace at The Hague. The 6 premiated and 40 other designs chosen by the society of architecture ... London, Jack 1907. Folio (49x38cm); eight parts loose as issued in publisher's printed wrappers and cloth portfolio (the portfolio a bit marked and bumped); 76 plates (eight colour) - elevations and plans. An excellent set. Au$600
A luxurious production. According to the report judging took several days, votes were close and there was some argument before Cordonnier's baroque wedding cake was given first prize, largely, the report suggests, due to its sympathy with surrounding buildings. Of the now revered competitors, Otto Wagner got fourth prize and Berlage and Saarinen were further down the lists. Despite stylish aspects of their designs and the idiosyncratic splendour of Debat's Indo-Mayan stupa - which looks to me like it could have inspired Burley Griffin's parliament house for Canberra - it does seem, from this distance, that the judges got it right. I'm sure they'll all sleep easier in their graves knowing that.
Cordonnier's building has a joyous optimism that matches the crusading zeal for world peace of patron Carnegie and any number of seemingly sensible exponents of world unity at the time. Wagner's building is an opulent museum or theatre, Saarinen's ideal for a mausoleum, Berlage's a Byzantine basilica, and most of the others studied lumps of classical monumentalism. Cordonnier's building did suffer paring down to meet budget and lost some of its airy charm but still ended up closer to the original design than many winners of other competitions.
Nakazawa Hiromitsu, Kobayashi Shokichi & Okano Sakae. [Toyo Mirai Sugoroku]. Tokyo, Hakubunkan 1907 (Meiji 40). Colour printed broadside, 55x78cm. Minor flaws and signs of use, some ink splodges on the back. Au$650
A view, or a panoply of views, of a future Asia. Some of these vignettes of what's to come are obvious enough - schoolgirls at rifle drill and sumo wrestlers in striped bathers - but a few seem fairly recondite to me. I'm not sure how much is optimistic, how much is dire warning and how much is wearily stoic.
Nakazawa, Kobayashi and Okano, still young, had been fellow students at the Tokyo School of Fine Arts, and of Kuroda Seiki, and collaborated on the five volume Nihon Meisho Shasei Kiko, issued over several years.
Kameda Yoshiro (or Kichirobei). [Wayo Kenchiku Shin Hinagata]. Osaka, Seikado 1907 (Meiji 40). Six volumes 22x15cm, publisher's wrappers with title labels; illustrated throughout with plans, elevations, measured drawings etc. Wrappers with some surface rubbing or insect grazing; a pretty good set. Au$850
I'm not sure whether this should be described as Japanese principles applied to western design or the other way round. I think both, if it matters. An excellent builder's pattern book that was certainly put to wide use.
There is a 2008 learned paper by Yanigasawa and Mizoguchi that shows how Kameda introduced Japanese carpentry and the modular system into western design but all except the precis of their paper is in Japanese so I have no idea how they go about proving their point. They do tell us that Kameda was a master carpenter in Fukuoka.
Nakazawa Hiromitsu, Kobayashi Shokichi & Okano Sakae. [Toyo Mirai Sugoroku]. Tokyo, Hakubunkan 1907 (Meiji 40). Colour printed broadside, 55x78cm. Edges nibbled, a small ink splodge, a bit browned; quite good. Au$425
A view, or a panoply of views, of a future Asia. Some of these vignettes of what's to come are obvious enough - schoolgirls at rifle drill and sumo wrestlers in striped bathers - but a few seem fairly recondite to me. I'm not sure how much is optimistic, how much is dire warning and how much is wearily stoic.
Nakazawa, Kobayashi and Okano, still young, had been fellow students at the Tokyo School of Fine Arts, and of Kuroda Seiki, and collaborated on the five volume Nihon Meisho Shasei Kiko, issued over several years.
Exhibition - Nagoya 1910. [Daijikkai Kansai fuken rengen kyoshinkai zenzu]. Nagoya Yodatsu Goshigaisha 1910 (Meiji 43]. Colour lithograph 54x78cm with b/w map and photos of Nagoya on the back. Rather good with illustrated outer wrapper. Au$200
A handsome large birds-eye view. The 10th Kansai Prefectural Union Exhibition was a big jump from previous shows, held every three years since 1883. This was meant to put Nagoya on the map and so it did. Apparently more than two and a half million visitors went through.
Hikifuda. ... ... [Takahashiya ... Taromaru ...]. n.p. [c1910?]. 26x38cm colour woodcut. Margins browned. Au$125
I don't know what Takahashiya sold, I'm sorry, but I can tell you that Taromaru is in Toyama and that this patriotic hikifuda celebrates the royal family who in turn celebrate Japan taking to the air. That's the crown prince, soon to be emperor Taisho and some family: wife and presumably his oldest child, Hirohito.
These hikifuda - small posters or handbills - were usually produced with the text panel blank. The customer, usually a retailer, had their own details over printed, so the same image might sell fine silk or soy sauce.
Fire safety poster. : [Kasai Yobo De : Hinoyojin]. Kyotofu Shobosho [191-?] Colour lithograph poster 53x38cm mounted on canvas a little larger. A couple of closed tears. Au$750
An almost celebratory poster for Fire Prevention Day in Kyoto with more than a touch of circus poster about it.
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