I read Ryutaro Iwase's “Robinson of the End of Edo Era; Drafts in Pacific Oceans Before and After Opening Japan”. This book is continuation of the same author's "Robinson in Edo Era; Stories of Seven Drafts".
He wrote about drifters in the end of Edo era when western countries forced Japan to have diplomacy with them in this book. In the previous book he wrote about the stories of drifters from Japan, and some of them could return to Japan and some of them couldn't. In this book he wrote about the stories not of accidental drifters from Japan, but drifters from foreign countries to Japan and "intentional" drifters to foreign countries.
Every story in this book is an interested as ones in previous book, and I am especially interested in the story of Shoin Yoshida's smuggling.
Recently I have read books about the time when Japan was becoming a nation state between Edo era and Meiji era. Shoin Yoshida is the person who represents contradictions of that time, and I am going to read carefully books about him.
Shoin Yoshida grew up with conservative Confucianism and traditional Japanese military science "Yamaga-ryu". But once he knew the strong armed forces of Western countries, he became an apprentice for Shozan Sakuma, who was a Confucian but very interested in Western military science. Shoin tried to smuggle by Perry's fleet and to learn Western knowledge on Shozan's suggestion. By the other hand he had a thought of an antiforeigner royalist "Sonno joi", and he brought most of main members in Choshu Domain who overthrew of the Tokugawa government. Although they had been antiforeigner royalists, they change their attitude and tried to learn Western knowledge like Shoin after overthrow of Tokugawa government.
I am very interested in his admiration and repulsive Western countries, beginning of nationalism, his energy and eccentric behavior.
"Robinson of the End of Edo Era" is focused on the his smuggling by Perry's fleet. I thought of his smuggling as eccentric and impossible trial, and I wondered why he thought such a thing and do it.
But I can understand that his trial was reckless and unplanned, but was not eccentric through this book. At that time many drifters were rescued by American whale catcher boats, and some of them, for example John Mung, returned to Japan. There were people who tried to smuggle to foreign countries, and some of them succeeded it. When international interactions between Japan and Western countries began, his trial was not isolated; even so his choice of Perry's fleet was a big mistake.
In an afterword of this book a suppressing story of the author Ryutaro Iwase himself, and I will not write about it. It makes this book more impressing.
