A collection of 118 printed broadsides, ranging from 308 x 450 mm. to 156 x....
An important and remarkable survival. “In general, the chonin, the bourgeois citizens of Edo and Osaka particularly, enjoyed literature that was light and entertaining: stories of love and intrigue, often with fantastic or occult elements; and verse that was very much on the surface, relying greatly for its appeal on word-plays that the nature of the language, with it innumerable homophones, encourages…from the beginning of the Temmei period in 1781, kyoka verse became a major leisure activity of the chonin and of some samurai…
“The Temmei vogue for kyoka — literally, ‘crazy verses’ —was a revival. The form had originated... More