Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
Such sensational reading-matter as this was on the lowest level. Fashions in writing
varied from time to time, but long tales of romantic devotion and loyalty were hardy per-
ennials, and satirical or salacious accounts of life in the entertainment districts were sure
of a wide public. A flourishing trade was done in playbooks (
92
), containing the certi-
fied texts of successful dramas, and in critical estimates of actors' abilities. For the more
serious-minded, Confucianists and their opponents, the pursuers of pure Japanese studies,
produced philosophical treatises. Moreover, almost every activity in the society of the time
was covered by some instructional manual. There were, for example, illustrated guide-
books, sometimes in the form of picaresque accounts of travels, to the great roads and pil-
grim routes. It was a society that was obsessed with moral and useful instruction—lectures
on how to lead a good life attracted large and avid audiences—and with observing and re-
cording how its members lived. All these topics penetrated far and wide, for not only were
they sold in bookshops, but there were also itinerant book-lenders.
A girl's upbringing could be thought of as a preparation for marriage for it taught her
howtofitinwiththenewhouseholdwhenshelefthome.Morenarrowly,instructioninher
new role as a wife was taught in manuals of sexual technique, aimed at ensuring that she
knew how to please her husband. The wife had many potential rivals in the entertainment
world, and it was good not only for the peace of the family, but also for its economic wel-
fare, that he should spend his nights at home.
Marriage in the towns did not differ from that in the country districts. Informal rela-
tionships developing into recognised marriages were probably less common, although at
the least affluent levels they certainly occurred, but financial and business considerations
weremorepowerfulmotives.Anewbride'splaceinthehouseholdwasasmuchdominated
by her mother-in-law as in the country but there was a greater potential of freedom in the
system whereby a son or apprentice would often be allowed to set up a branch of the main
business and take his wife with him. Although the normal town wife had to work hard,
life was more civilized than in the country, and many a young country girl must have been
overjoyed when a marriage was arranged with some family connection who had gone to
the town, even though she had never met her prospective partner. When they went to their
new homes, wives took with them a dowry and a trousseau of clothes, bedding and so on.
One of the many possibilities of financial ruin is said to have arisen when a family with
a marriageable son took to spending too much on lavish training in the social graces, and
on extensions and redecorations of the house, in the expectation of attracting a bride with a
greater dowry than would otherwise have been hoped for.
