Hybrid event! Check back for registration link to attend in person or remotely. 
Lecture followed by a reception.
This lecture will not be recorded. 

Join us on a journey exploring how knowledge of the Hyakunin Isshu (One Hundred Poets, One Poem Each) collection spread among the commoner class in Japan’s early modern Edo period (1600-1868) to become the foundation of popular literary literacy through the booming print culture, especially by means of illustrated commentaries in books and popular prints. A distinctly vernacular interpretative tradition will be revealed, one that heavily influenced the earliest English translations of these poems.

Joshua Mostow is Professor in the Department of Asian Studies at the University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada. He has written widely on premodern Japanese literature and its relations to visual arts. His most recent publication is Hyakunin’shu: Reading the Hundred Poets in Late Edo Japan (University of Hawai‘i Press, 2024).