In the Margins: The Absence of Japanese Commoners
Madoka Matsumoto, The University of Tokyo (Spring 2009)
The act of drawing sorts things out into two groups — what is depicted and not depicted. What we see in drawings is not completely what took place in the real world. Things that appear in drawings are what the artist saw, or to be accurate, what he/she desired to see. Accordingly, one way to investigate the things that really happened or existed is by comparing what more than one artist recorded and the ways in which they depicted them. In this essay, I compare what the Japanese artist of this scroll and Wilhelm Heine, who accompanied Perry to Japan as the official artist, depicted and did not depict in their respective drawings. By comparing and contrasting the works of these two artists, I want to discuss the significance of the absence of the "commoners" in the Japanese scroll. The lack will show the gap between the classes within the Japanese society at the time of the second visit of commodore Perry. Also, it will imply what elite Japanese people felt about it.
First, I would like to illustrate how the Japanese scroll lacks reference to the commoners. Let us take a look at Heine's "Landing of Commodore Perry, officers and men of the squadron" (Heine 1856). In the near distance of the drawing, we can find some people who are neither the American sailors nor the Japanese officers. They do not have swords and their clothes are plain. We can find a woman who shoulders a baby, and men with fish in their hands. Clearly, they are the commoners of Japan. Their detailed facial expressions and patterns of kimonos suggest that Heine depicted them with a considerable interest. In contrast, are there Japanese commoners in the Japanese scroll? Some of the settings of the drawings are indoors and some divided by curtains or fences. These are exclusive places, and it is not surprising no commoners are found there. But even in some drawings that depict places that are comparatively open, the Japanese who appear there have swords, which mean that they are samurais, rather than commoners. Actually, almost nowhere can we find commoners in the Japanese scroll.1
Why does the Japanese scroll lack commoners in political scenes? I believe that there are two possible reasons. One is that commoners were literally not at the scenes, and the other is that they were there but were not depicted. I think the second is more significant. True, it is possible that there were in fact no commoners around, when the artist depicted the drawings. As I have written already, such scenes depicted in "The gastronomical production" and the "The telegraph" show events that occurred indoors or inside a fence. Similarly, it seems the Japanese presented "Sumo" to the Americans inside a screen that had a striped pattern of pale blue and white. It must have been impossible for the commoners to enter these places. Surely, some of the events depicted in the scroll did not include any commoners. How about, however, other places? Actually, the commoners do not appear in the drawings that depicted the places that were not so closed either. In the drawing of "Rice," for example, sumo wrestlers are carrying some two hundred sacks of rice on a spacious beach. The sight must have been fascinating for the Japanese commoners too. However, even in this drawing, there are no commoners surrounding the curious sight.
This absence is strange because the commoners must have been interested in those foreign visitors as well as sumo wrestlers. Heine depicted the commoners in the near distance in one of his drawings, "Landing of Commodore Perry, officers and men of the squadron." Although there were no commoners around Perry and the officers, they surrounded the scene at a distance. Heine did not fail to notice those people and depicted them with interest. Also, there are some other evidences that the Japanese commoners were interested in foreigners. When the Black Ships appeared near the city of Uraga, the city was highly disturbed. One kyoka, comic tanka poem, reads "Jokisen tatta shihai de yoru mo nemurezu," meaning that the people in the city could not sleep at night because of the fear for Black Ships. This tanka figuratively tells us the confused situation of Japanese people when the foreign ships appeared in the peaceful waters of Japan. The tanka also describes the Japanese commoners' significant interest in foreigners. Moreover, S. Wells Williams, who accompanied Perry on his trip to Japan, made an intriguing description of the Japanese commoners that he saw on April 20th in 1854 (Williams 1973, p.167). When he walked around the town of Shimoda in his free time, he was followed after by the people of the town. The commoners watched Williams and he, too, watched those people and wrote about them in detail in his diary. Obviously, the Japanese commoners were not at all indifferent toward the foreign visitors. I believe that commoners must have been in some scenes depicted in the scroll. Why, then, are there no commoners in the Japanese scroll?
To this question, there is one answer which seems to be very simple and natural at first sight, but has a significant implication about the position of the commoners in Japan in those days. I believe that the Japanese commoners were not depicted in the Japanese scroll because they had no important significance for the scenes that are depicted in the scroll. They could not have played any important roles in those events not only because they were non-government-people but also were not regarded important as citizens. The government's attitude toward the citizens in those days was distinct from modern one. Today, our government considers public opinion to some extent when it governs our nation. Over any subjects such as diplomacy, taxation, environmental problems, the government cannot completely neglect its citizens. Similarly, our media today investigate public opinions in various ways such as reporting the opinion poll, doing telephone surveys and interviewing on the street. When the television stations report on the Olympic games, they televise the excited auditorium as well as the athletes in the center of the field. Today, what we citizens feel is considered as something significant, especially when the subject concerns us greatly.
In Japan around the time of Perry's visit, however, commoners such as the audience in the sports stadium today were far less respected by their government and the painter, whom I consider to have been equivalent of today's media. Although the opening of the country was such a great event for Japan, it seems that what the common Japanese people felt about it was not much important for their government. Similarly, the artist did not hesitate to ignore the commoners, since the way in which commoners of Japan were involved in the events was not important.
This does not mean that the artist slighted the commoners. I believe that it was the historical events in Japan itself that undervalued the commoners. The lack of the commoners suggests a gap that existed between the classes within the Japanese society. As I have written above, the commoners do not appear in the Japanese scroll because they were not important for those scenes. This means two things. One is that the commoners were outsiders to the Japanese politics. The other is that such perception, that the commoners did not play any important role in those events, was natural for the people of those days, including the Japanese artist. Williams gave descriptions of the Japanese commoners many times in other parts of his diary. One of those descriptions was made on the day Williams visited a house of the chief of the village in Kanagawa with some Japanese interpreters on April 6th in 1854. They rested there when they walked around the village, and Williams was surprised at the behavior of the Japanese interpreters. He wrote, "It was instructive to see how utterly regardless of the man and his family Yenoske and his fellows all acted, sitting on the mats smoking and laughing among themselves. I suspect the lower ranks of life in Japan are kept from rising by an iron hand; and yet how totally unprepared they are for asserting their rights is too plain to everyone" (Williams 1973, p.159). On another day, Williams complained that it was unpleasant for him to see the commoners grovel as often as statesmen pass by them. While in Japan, Williams did not overlook the Japanese commoners, the people who were disregarded and exploited by the samurai-class people of Japan. In the Japanese scroll, on the other hand, the commoners do not appear. I believe that it was because the slighted position of the commoners was considered natural in those days in Japan. Williams made another description about what he saw on the day he was followed after by the commoners. According to Williams, "A people that will tamely submit to it must have been schooled a long time by their rulers and given up at last in despair."
While in Japan, Heine depicted Japanese scenery and commoners for many times. Although most of those drawings were not used in the official report of Perry's trip to Japan, he depicted the Japanese streets, public bath house, mountains and commoners (Heine 1856). In his drawings, the Japanese commoners appear vividly. In the Japanese scroll, in contrast to Heine's lithographs, those people are erased from the scenes in which they must have existed, as if Japan at that time was a country without commoners. Around the time of Perry's second visit, the Japanese commoners were on the fringe of the political scenes and that is why they were not depicted in the Japanese scroll. Only in the margin of the scroll do the commoners appear, since they were slighted by their rulers and alienated from the heart of the politics.
- It is true that there is one commoner found in the "First contact," but this drawing differs from other drawings in two points. First, while other drawings constitute an ordered story of Perry's visit and departure to/from Japan, "First contact" strays from that story. Second, while the commoners found in Heine's lithographs are spectators of political events that actually happened in Japan, such as Perry's landing, the commoner in "First contact" appears as a central person of this event, not as an onlooker. This first encounter could not have occurred if either of two people depicted in this drawing had not been there. Thus, if the"First contact" was a historical fact, depicting the commoner must have been essential because the event itself could not have taken place without him. Moreover, I believe it makes no difference whether the person in the drawing was a commoner or a samurai because in my opinion this drawing simply shows that the first encounter of two countries was far from amicable. This event might have been what the artist barely knew about the American people before the Kurofune's visit to Japan. What I consider to be important is that the artist chose not to depict commoners in the scenes which could have included the commoners that appeared as onlookers. In those scenes commoners that could have existed were not the principal characters but might have been surrounding the event. What I intend to discuss is the context, mindset and social background in those days that erased those commoners, the watchers of the political events.
References
- S. Wells Williams. A Journal of the Perry Expedition to Japan(1853-1854). Wilmington: Scholarly Resources, inc, 1973.
- William Heine. Graphic Scenes of the Japan Expedition by Wm Heine, Artist of the Expedition. New York: P. Putnam & Company, 1856. (http://www.baxleystamps.com/litho/ry_litho_heine_1856.shtml 13, June 2009)