| Samurai Movies (18) |
February 3, 2022
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| [Literacy] In the movie of 'Yaji Kita dochu Teresko', the protagonist Yaji couldn't read. He would often ask other people to read signs or notices for him. He was illiterate. This movie seemed to follow the original story, so Yaji in the original book must have been illiterate. He checked on the internet. The original stories were written from 1802 to 1814, they were a best-selling series of the time. Another website gave information that the literacy rate at the end of the Edo Period was about 80 percent, it was one of the highest in the world. He didn't know whether the information was correct, but he could assume that all of the samurai and their families' literacy rate must have been 100%. Maybe the merchants and their families' literacy rate was as high as the samurai class because they needed to keep financial records and make various documents like receipts. He had read that there were about 20,000 private schools for children called 'terakoya' in the late Edo Period. There were 200 schools in his han/domain. Children started to study at the age of 6 or 7 until 12 or 13 years old for boys, and 14 or 15 for girls. If farmers had their 2nd or 3rd sons, they couldn't afford to let them work on the same land because lands was limited. The majority of them had to work as apprentices of merchants and craftsmen, it was called 'houkou'. They lived in the same  house of the employer and learned various things during the work. Now it is called OJT (On the Job Training). Different from now, they didn't receive regular salary until they became adults, although their meals and dormitory were guaranteed. They would become independent after a certain period of gaining knowledge and skills, it is called 'noren-wake', 'noren' means a shop name banner, 'wake' means to give as a branch. Their apprenticeship would start when they were 10 to 12 years of age, so their parents, mainly farmers, might have thought that giving an education to their kids before the apprenticeship could give them an advantage. Originally, farmers were said to be good at calculating. They grew and sold various types of plants, not only rice and other crops and vegetables, but also silk from silkworms, cotton, hemp, oil from rapeseeds, indigo, wax and lacquer from trees, etc. They needed mathematics to make good negotiations and maybe some of them could read and write in order to make documents for a guaranty or other contracts. He had read that publishing books was a good business in the Edo Period. There were two major genres in publishing: One : Textbooks and other academic books, like mathematical quiz books, Confucian texts, etc.; Two : Novels. Reading novels were one of people's pastimes. Basically, the Edo Period was peaceful. There were some famines, but not always. So they had a certain amount of free time. Regardless of gender and their occupations, they enjoyed romance, mysteries, war stories, and even the occult. There were a lot of writers and publishers in Edo, Kyoto and Osaka. Publishers contracted with writers for stories, calligraphers for nice block lettering, ukiyoe and other painters for illustrations, engravers to carve those illustrations and lettering, and woodblock printers who, sheet by sheet, stamped each piece of paper, and then compiled them to create a book. As publishing books would spend a lot of time and manpower, so publishers printed them by small units, for example 200 books, in order to reduce risks. If the book sold well, they reprinted. As books were very expensive, renting books was common place. In Edo there were about 800 rental book shops and clerks visited customers to renew their books. According to one website a new book's rental fee was 24 mon, and an old book's rental fee was 16 mon. If they became blockbusters, they earned huge amount of money. The sequels of 'Tokai-dochu Hizakurige' stories of Yaji and Kita traveling on different courses from 'Tokai-do', started in 1810 and lasting until 1822. In any era, in any country, business people will pursue the chance of a second big hit. (To be continued ...) |
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No. 464
*literacy :読み書き能力
*illiterate :文盲の
*assume :憶測する
*can't afford to :〜する金銭的余裕がない
*apprentice :見習い
*guarantee :保証する
*hemp :麻
*rapeseed :菜種
*Confucian :儒教の
*calligrapher :書道家
*block lettering: 版画文字
*engraver :彫師
*woodblock :版画
*compile :綴じる
*blockbuster :大ヒット
*sequel :続編