Female Entertainer with a Koto

Signature: Painter’s signature: (center right) Ichiryūsai Utagawa Toyoharu ga 一龍齊歌川豊春画斎; painter’s seals (square relief, above) 一龍齊; (square intaglio, below) 豊春

Inscriber’s signature: (beneath third column of poem) Shokusanjin 蜀山人

Inscription: 琴の音に　みねの松葉や　かよふ神
いづれのお客　しらべそめけむ
蜀山人

Koto no ne ni
mine no Matsuba-ya
Kayou-kami
izure no okyaku
shirabe somekemu

Amid the sounds of a koto
like pine needles rustling on a peak,
a courtesan of Matsubaya brothel
wonders who the god of courtesans
will summon as her first client.
— Shokusanjin
(Trans. John T. Carpenter)

Commentary: The verse cleverly plays off a famous waka by the tenth-century poetess Saigū no Nyōgo: “The sound of the koto/ melds with the wind/ through the pines on the peak./ But from which string/ did the melody of love begin?” (Koto no ne ni/ mine no matsukaze/ kayou rashi/ izure no oyori/ shirabe somekemu). Shokusanjin has turned matsukaze (“wind through the pines”) into Matsubaya—literally, the House of Pine Needles, but also the name of an established brothel—and izure no oyori (“which string?”) into izure no okyaku (“which client?”). The wordplay is complex and erudite, requiring readers to be conversant in an entire poetic tradition, both classical and popular. It was at this sophisticated level that Shokusanjin and his confreres operated.

To fully grasp the wit of the poem, it is crucial to know that Kayou-kami refers to a Shinto “patron deity.” He was prayed to by, among others, courtesans of the licensed pleasure quarter, who inscribed the deity’s name at the end of their letters. Here, the young woman wonders who Kayou-kami will select as her first man.

Phrases in the poem also call to mind an episode from The Tale of the Heike, in which Nakakuni, a retainer at the court of Emperor Takakura, is summoned to find the whereabouts of Takakura’s beloved Lady Kogō. Nakakuni mounts a horse from the imperial stables to go searching for Kogō among residences and temple complexes in the Saga district. At one point, he pauses to listen, wondering if he is hearing the sound of a gale coursing through peaks, wind soughing through pines, or Kogō playing the koto. He discovers the lady in hiding and returns her to the palace. Shokusanjin embeds all of the amorous connotations in these ancient verses and tales in his poem.

[ Klaus F. Naumann , Tokyo, until December 2019; sold to Fishbein-Bender]; Estelle P. Bender , New York, 2019–20, donated to MMA

New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "The Poetry of Nature: Edo Paintings from the Fishbein-Bender Collection," February 27, 2018–January 21, 2019.

New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Japan: A History of Style," March 8, 2021–April 24, 2022.

Carpenter, John T. The Poetry of Nature: Edo Paintings from the Fishbein-Bender Collection. Exh. cat. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2018, pp. 198–99, cat. no. 41.