Yoshimasa and the Silver Pavilion: The Creation of the Soul of Japan / Edition 1

by Donald Keene

Overview

Yoshimasa may have been the worst shogun ever to rule Japan. He was a failure as a soldier, incompetent at dealing with state business, and dominated by his wife. But his influence on the cultural life of Japan was unparalleled. According to Donald Keene, Yoshimasa was the only shogun to leave a lasting heritage for the entire Japanese people.

Today Yoshimasa is remembered primarily as the builder of the Temple of the Silver Pavilion and as the ruler at the time of the Onin War (1467–1477), after which the authority of the shogun all but disappeared. Unable to control the daimyos—provincial military governors—he abandoned politics and devoted himself to the quest for beauty. It was then, after Yoshimasa resigned as shogun and made his home in the mountain retreat now known as the Silver Pavilion, that his aesthetic taste came to define that of the Japanese: the no theater flourished, Japanese gardens were developed, and the tea ceremony had its origins in a small room at the Silver Pavilion. Flower arrangement, ink painting, and shoin-zukuri architecture began or became of major importance under Yoshimasa. Poets introduced their often barely literate warlord-hosts to the literary masterpieces of the past and taught them how to compose poetry. Even the most barbarous warlord came to want the trappings of culture that would enable him to feel like a civilized man.

Yoshimasa and the Silver Pavilion gives this long-neglected but critical period in Japanese history the thorough treatment it deserves.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780231130578
Publisher:	Columbia University Press
Publication date:	01/11/2006
Series:	Asia Perspectives: History, Society, and Culture
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	224
Sales rank:	854,458
Product dimensions:	5.34(w) x 8.10(h) x 0.51(d)
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Donald Keene is Shincho Professor of Japanese Literature and University Professor Emeritus at Columbia University. He is the author of more than thirty books, most recently Emperor of Japan: Meiji and His World.
Donald Keene is Shincho Professor of Japanese Literature and University Professor Emeritus at Columbia University, and has been hailed in the NYTBR as "the century's leading expert on Japanese literature."

Table of Contents

Chronology
Shoguns of the Ashikaga Family
Introduction
Yoshimasa and the Silver Pavilion
Notes
Bibliography
Index

What People are Saying About This

Thomas Keirstead

Replete with murder, mayhem, political and sexual intrigue, and a devastating war, Japan's fifteenth century seems the stuff of Jacobean drama. And like those dramas, the story can at times be devilishly difficult to follow. Yoshimasa and the Silver Pavilion offers a engaging narrative of this tumultuous, but also incredibly fertile, period in Japanese cultural history. Keene deftly unravels the complex politics of the era and offers a masterful account of the cultural developments that came together in the Higashiyama epoch. A highly readable and exceptionally accessible book, Yoshimasa is the place to start for anyone interested in the political and cultural life of late medieval Kyoto.

— Thomas Keirstead, Indiana University

Editorial Reviews

Keene, the prominent scholar of Japan, brings together a masterful account.

Pacific Citizen - Yumi Sakugawa

With such admirable industry did then Yoshimasa create "the soul of Japan." And his assiduity has been matched by that of Keene, who in this short and elegant book contributes a popular account of the man and his times.

The Japan Times - Donald Richie

Keene has crafted a small gem that provides a fresh and penetrating study of 15th-century Kyoto and the role of the shogun Ashikaga Yoshimasa.... Keene is a master at placing Yoshimasa in his time and drawing out the cultural influences flowing from the Silver Pavilion. A well-written and accessible essay. Highly recommended [for] readers at all levels interested in Japanese history and culture.

Choice

Keene has outdone himself with this exceptional book, which is based on the idea that the modern Japanese aesthetic was the creation of an exceptionally incompetent fifteenth-century shogun.

Colorado Springs Independent

This is a book not only for all students of Japanese history but also for all who want to understand what Keen calls "the soul of Japan.— Hugh Cortazzi

The Royal Society for Asian Affairs

With such admirable industry did then Yoshimasa create "the soul of Japan." And his assiduity has been matched by that of Keene, who in this short and elegant book contributes a popular account of the man and his times.

— Donald Richie

The Japan Times

This enterprising account by the doyen of Japan studies demonstrates that the quintessential Japanese aesthetic—which characterizes Noh drama, sand gardens, monochrome ink painting, shoji panels, tatami floors, and the tea ceremony—was the creation of a staggeringly incompetent fifteenth-century shogun, Ashikaga Yoshimasa. His military record was dismal and his domestic life a shambles: his domineering wife abandoned him, his nanny (who probably doubled as his mistress) may have intrigued against him, and a favorite concubine took up with his dissolute son. While warfare destroyed Kyoto and the corpses of famine victims clogged the Kamo River, Yoshimasa squandered his treasury, bringing obsessive perfectionism to such matters as perfume blending. He ultimately abdicated to become a Buddhist priest, devoting himself to the development of the restrained, Zen-influenced style exemplified in his famous Silver Pavilion. Keene’s multifarious learning and engaging manner illuminate the improbable story of the fastidious aesthete whose taste has been so important in forming the look of the modern world.

The New Yorker

This is a book not only for all students of Japanese history but also for all who want to understand what Keen calls "the soul of Japan."

The Royal Society for Asian Affairs - Hugh Cortazzi

Keene's multifarious learning and engaging manner illuminate the improbable story of the fastidious aesthete whose taste has been so important in forming the look of the modern world.

The New Yorker

[An] elegant, incisive new biography... Yoshimasa and the Silver Pavilion is a dense little book, packed almost to overflowing with information, and one that richly rewards the careful reader. Keene is a graceful, entertaining companion, writing with a refreshing lack of pomposity.... Yet the book is always authoritative and lucid. Anyone curious about the development of the legendary style of Japan will find it an invaluable and charming guide.

TIME Magazine

Yoshimasa and the Silver Pavilion gives this long-neglected but critical period in Japanese history the thorough treatment it deserves.

Sushi and Tofu

[An] elegant, incisive new biography... Yoshimasa and the Silver Pavilion is a dense little book, packed almost to overflowing with information, and one that richly rewards the careful reader. Keene is a graceful, entertaining companion, writing with a refreshing lack of pomposity.... Yet the book is always authoritative and lucid. Anyone curious about the development of the legendary style of Japan will find it an invaluable and charming guide.

Time Magazine