A Young Woman and Man Playing Shōgi (Japanese Chess); Chūnagon Kanesuke, from a series alluding to the Thirty-Six Poetic Immortals (Sanjūrokkasen)
Suzuki Harunobu Japanese
Not on view
A young woman watches her male companion make the final moves in a game of shōgi (Japanese chess) next to an andon floor lamp signaling nighttime and a fan indicating summer. The series to which this print belongs links classical poems by thirty-six of the most famous poets of ancient and medieval times with up-to-date images of young men and women in fashionable garb. The ancient poem by Fujiwara no Kanesuke (877–933)—better known by his court title Chūnagon (Middle Captain)—complements the languorous mood of the image:
Mijika yo no
fukeyuku mama ni
Takasago no
mine no matsukaze
fuku ka to zo kiku
As this short night
deepens, is that
the soughing of the wind
through pines on the slopes
of Mount Tagasago we hear?
—Trans. John T. Carpenter
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