Customer Reviews

Women of the Mito Domain: Recollections of Samurai Family Life

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This is a very realistic and engaging account of samurai life just before the Meji restoration. Samurais are not idealised in this book, but instead their every day life is described. The focus is on women, as it retells history mainly from the view of the author's mother, but as women were completely dependent on men at the time, a lot of the account deals with how men as well as women lived. Topics such as school, dress, dwellings, amusments, family, marriage and divorce are covered, and at the same time the unrest in Mito domain before the restoration. The grandfather of the author had his own school and worked at the Office of Japanese History. He was one of the lower class samurai, but was recognized by the daimyo for his great learning and taught even his children at some point.
If you want to understand Japanese society in the 19th century up to the Restoration, this is an extremly interesting book. Highly recommended!