Jippensha Ikku

Japanese writer

Jippensha Ikku (十返舎 一九) was the pen name of Shigeta Sadakazu (重田 貞一), a Japanese writer active during the late Edo period of Japan. He was among the most prolific yellow backed novel (黄表紙) writers of the late Edo period — between 1795 and 1801 he wrote a minimum of twenty novels a year. He mainly wrote (洒落本), (滑稽本) and over 360 illustrated stories, (gōkan, 合巻 ). He also helped create kokkeibon as a genre. Ikku was one of the most prolific writers of his time, and shaped the literary history that came after him.

Jippensha Ikuu was born in 1765 in the Suruga Province. Ikku's life story is hard to define, because most of what we know about him comes from his own literary works, and hearsay from his peers. What we do know about his actual upbringing is: that he was born into the high middle class, his father being a samurai for the magistrate of Fuchu. He lived and worked in Suruga for the daimyo until he was fired. He also worked in Osaka briefly until he was fired again. These stories help us see into his writing process, and a little bit into his life, but everything he wrote about himself must be taken with a grain of salt, due to his enjoyment of embellishment and irony. The following anecdotes are told about him (most likely by him). He accepted poverty with good humor and, having no furniture, hung his bare walls with paintings of the furniture he might have had. On holidays he sacrificed to the gods with pictures of excellent offerings. Being presented with a bathtub in the common interest, he carried it home inverted on his head, and overthrew with ready wit the pedestrians who fell his way. When his publisher came to see him, Jippensha invited him to take a bath. While his invitation was being accepted he decked himself in the publisher's clothes and paid his New Year's Day calls in proper ceremonial costume. Although Ikku is often painted to be this charismatic welcoming person, these anecdotes are now widely regarded as apocryphal. His ashes were buried in Asakusa in Tokyo at the Zenryu temple. This fact needs verification as his grave is marked on Japanese maps as being located in Kachidoki, Chuo ku, Tokyo at 35°39'25.6"N 139°46'29.1"E.