Songs of the Righteous Spirit: "Men of High Purpose" and Their Chinese Poetry in Modern Japan

Abstract

Matthew Fraleigh examines how "men of high purpose" ( shishi ), a group of mid-nineteenth-century samurai who embraced nationalist causes, wrote poetry to fashion themselves in the image of heroes and statesmen of Chinese antiquity. Focusing in particular on their creative adaptation and re-envisioning of Wen Tianxiang's "Song of the Righteous Spirit," Fraleigh analyzes how Fujita T?ko, Yoshida Shōin, Takasugi Shinsaku, Saigō Takamori, and others reworked specific Chinese allusions and texts, which in turn circulated as an intertextual currency among the shishi . Through writings thus enriched by a selfreferential intertextuality, shishi forged important social and literary connections among themselves. The process of naturalization, argues Fraleigh, happened not through the de-sinification of the poetic form itself, but rather through the exploitation of an expanding discursive sphere that became increasingly contemporaneous and localized.