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*Victorian Women in Meiji Japan*
the West being 'rational, developed, humane, superior, vs the Orient which is abberrant, undeveloped, inferior, with the exception of Japan - which was viewed as a closed, medieval society, picturesque and unthreatening. In the early 17th century, Japanese were very active in foreign trade.
Before 1853 Japanese prints and paintings were not as well known as laquerware, Englebert Kamempfer wrote The History of Japan with a Description of the Kingdom of Siam 1690-1692 which became the European byword for Japan for the next two hundred years, into the 19th century. Kamenmpfer thought the Japanese superior to the Chinese, and impression which lasted.
Sir Hans Sloane was a great collector of Japanese art.
the Enlightenment traveller was sober, analytical and philosophical, whereas the Romantic traveller sought experiences which were intense, unique and always for the first time, a sense of Japan being unsullied, retaining a child like innocence appealed to the Victorians, Japanese according to Henry Morely have original and thinking minds, a dash of Asiactic fierceness and are generous, joyous, sympathetic.
Japanese were portrayed as possessing values which mirrored the Victorian, factual accuracy was sacrificed in the interest of safe fantasies. At the 1862 International Exhibition in London the Japanese display was seen by visiting Japanese as ' a jumble sale' (Fuchinobe Tokuzo) The 1867 exhibition in Paris was of greater quality.
The most popular attraction of the Paris exhibition were three Japanese ladies set up in a model teahouse, Kane, Misu and Sato. featured in the Illustrated London News. In 1872 Thomas Cooks added Yokohoma to its world tour, in 1873 a Japanese language newspaper was distributed in London, The Taisei Shumbun, The Great Western News.
The Japanese style became part of fashion and art in the 1860s' with fans, screens and parasols, every society lady had her salon Japanoise and every department store a Japanese section. By the 1880s the sense of familiarity with things Japanese was so great, a sense of ownership brought the permission to ridicule, so that in 1890 a Canadian could write 'we are too late for Japan! the idea that a New Japan was rising, taking on the industrialization of the West to the detriment of it's own culture.
Mrs C Pemberton Hodgson, Mrs Hugh Frazer, the Baroness Albert d'Anethan wrote memories as diplomatic wives, but usually published after their husband, or father, had died.
Japan in these times was a difficult place to live, remote, with the fear of assassination and disease, including nervous breakdowns. Kobe, Nagasaki, Niigata and Yokohama were designated unhealthy posts.
the West being 'rational, developed, humane, superior, vs the Orient which is abberrant, undeveloped, inferior, with the exception of Japan - which was viewed as a closed, medieval society, picturesque and unthreatening. In the early 17th century, Japanese were very active in foreign trade.
Before 1853 Japanese prints and paintings were not as well known as laquerware, Englebert Kamempfer wrote The History of Japan with a Description of the Kingdom of Siam 1690-1692 which became the European byword for Japan for the next two hundred years, into the 19th century. Kamenmpfer thought the Japanese superior to the Chinese, and impression which lasted.
Sir Hans Sloane was a great collector of Japanese art.
the Enlightenment traveller was sober, analytical and philosophical, whereas the Romantic traveller sought experiences which were intense, unique and always for the first time, a sense of Japan being unsullied, retaining a child like innocence appealed to the Victorians, Japanese according to Henry Morely have original and thinking minds, a dash of Asiactic fierceness and are generous, joyous, sympathetic.
Japanese were portrayed as possessing values which mirrored the Victorian, factual accuracy was sacrificed in the interest of safe fantasies. At the 1862 International Exhibition in London the Japanese display was seen by visiting Japanese as ' a jumble sale' (Fuchinobe Tokuzo) The 1867 exhibition in Paris was of greater quality.
The most popular attraction of the Paris exhibition were three Japanese ladies set up in a model teahouse, Kane, Misu and Sato. featured in the Illustrated London News. In 1872 Thomas Cooks added Yokohoma to its world tour, in 1873 a Japanese language newspaper was distributed in London, The Taisei Shumbun, The Great Western News.
The Japanese style became part of fashion and art in the 1860s' with fans, screens and parasols, every society lady had her salon Japanoise and every department store a Japanese section. By the 1880s the sense of familiarity with things Japanese was so great, a sense of ownership brought the permission to ridicule, so that in 1890 a Canadian could write 'we are too late for Japan! the idea that a New Japan was rising, taking on the industrialization of the West to the detriment of it's own culture.
Mrs C Pemberton Hodgson, Mrs Hugh Frazer, the Baroness Albert d'Anethan wrote memories as diplomatic wives, but usually published after their husband, or father, had died.
Japan in these times was a difficult place to live, remote, with the fear of assassination and disease, including nervous breakdowns. Kobe, Nagasaki, Niigata and Yokohama were designated unhealthy posts.
