ABSTRACT

The recent popularity of historical novels on pre-Meiji Japanese “scientists”—heroic men who strove to understand the natural world, before the word “scientist” or a Japanese equivalent had come into popular use—attests to public interest in the history of science in Japan. 1 Ubukata Tō’s 2009 Tenchi meisatsu, which retold the life of Shibukawa Shunkai (1639–1715) and his 1684 Jōkyō calendrical reform, won the 2010 Bookseller’s Award (Hon’ya taishō) and was adapted into a movie and a manga; more recently Ōedo kyōryūden by Yumemakura Baku and starring the historical figure Hiraga Gennai (1728–1780), known for his experiments with electricity, was serialized in a newspaper, then published in five volumes. 2 On the subject of science (or related fields) in early modern Japan, a number of recent notable works have appeared, covering the influence of optical instruments on the visual arts, the role of a tradition of “objective” natural illustration for the reception of photography, and the continuity between honzōgaku or “nature studies” in Edo-period Japan and the biological sciences after the Meiji Restoration. 3