NIWA, Tōkei 丹羽桃渓 & SUGA, Shōhō 菅松峰, illustrators; SHI’ONDŌ, Hitoku 思恩堂非得, author.

Ehon michi no tebiki 画本道のてびき [Guide to the Way of Picture Books].

Title in Vol. 1 & frontis. in Vol. 2 printed in color. 55 double-page woodcut illus. 29.5; 29.5 folding leaves. Two vols. 8vo, orig. semi-stiff wrappers, title-slips, new stitching. Osaka, Edo, & Kyoto: Yamatoya Shirōsaburō 大和屋四郎三郎 et al., 1823.

First edition of this beautifully illustrated guide to making ehon 画本, or picture books. It is rare, especially outside Japan, and no copy is found in WorldCat. The work opens onto early modern printing culture, book distribution, and the popular pleasures of reading and consumption.

As its title suggests, it is a handbook (tebiki 手引き) for producing ehon 画本, or “picture books.” Ehon covers any book in which illustration plays an important role, from fine-art portfolios to illustrated fiction, poetry collections, travel guides, and popular books such as kusazōshi. Together with the rise of commerce and urban life and a popular fervor for pleasure reading, ehon became one of the most influential forms of printed content.

The illustrations are alive with humor. The subjects include cheeky scenes of everyday life, “behind the scenes” bribery between merchants and politicians, armies sojourning across the countryside, and festivals. There are also fictional scenes from the classics, such as the sage conversing with fish for wisdom, along with depictions of nature, the changing seasons, and personified animals such as traveling frogs. Housewives, blacksmiths, and Edo contractors are shown at their crafts. Each page carries a short prose text, some in the lyrical structure of tanka. The result is an invitation into the imaginative world of early modern Japan, carefully portrayed to highlight its essence.

The illustrators are of particular interest. The first volume was illustrated by Niwa Tōkei (1760-1822), a prolific Osaka-based painter whose artistic range extended from landscape and refined painting to comic and satirical drawings. He died in the winter of 1822, and his pupil Suga Shōhō (1790-1851) completed the second volume.

On the colophon leaf in the second volume, we learn the name of the carver: Juryōken 壽良軒.

Very good copy. Unimportant mostly marginal worming, carefully repaired.