Suikoden (水滸傳) (genre )

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Biography:

"The Suikoden is the fourteenth century Shuihu Zhuan (The Water Margins), the story of 108 outlaws of the Song period who band together to fight corrupt officials and save poor peasants. Part of it was edited to be read as Japanese and published in 1728; from 1757 to 1790 it was published in whole as Tsūzoku chūgi suikoden (The Faithful and Just Men of the Water Margin for Everyman)—with illustrations. It created a boom of its own. The Yamato kotoba suikoden (The Tales of the Water Margin in Japanese Words) was staged in Osaka in 1776. Stories about Japanese modeled on them began to appear in the titles of Kōdan and novels and illustration books about contemporary outlaws or dropouts of one sort or the other—especially toward the end of the Tokugawa period and into the Meiji period: Tenpō suikoden (1820–1834?) of 1844, Kaiei suikoden (1850–¡854), Shunketsu shintō suikoden (1828–¡882), Keisei suikoden (The Beauties of the Water Margin, by Kyokutei Bakin; 1825–¡835), Kinsei suikoden (Modern Tales of the Water Margin; 1861), and Suikoden jigoku mawari (Tales of Wandering through the Hell of the Water Margin; 1864). However, it was a series of woodblock prints that fired the craze, Utagawa Kuniyoshi's c. 1827 illustrations of the original Japanese edition. Other illustration series included the Tsūzoku suikoden goketsu hyakuhachinin no hitori—Rorihakucho Chōjun (1820s) of Utagawa Kuniyoshi and the Tosei suikoden (1851) and Kinsei suikoden (1861) of Kunisada Toyokuni III."

Quoted from: The Japanese Period Film: A Critical Analysis by S.A. Thornton, p. 98.

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The history of the Suikoden in Japan

John Fiorillo has written on pages 122 and 126 in Hokuei: Master of Osaka Kabuki Prints that: "In Japan, curiosity about the exploits of heroic historical figures increased dramatically with the publication of serialized illustrated novels (yomihon), which were readily accessible in urban centers through direct sales and from lending libraries (kashihon'ya). The Suikoden was known in Japan by at least the early eighteenth century, and it gained widespread popularity during the last quarter. Okajima Kanzan (1674-1728) translated the first ten parts into vernacular Chinese (published in Kyoto in 1728), while also adding syntactic markers (kaeriten) and declension kana (okurigana) for readers who had no knowledge of spoken Chinese. The remaining chapters appeared between 1757 and 1790."

"The saga truly became a hit when it was adapted by the dream duo - the writer Takizawa Bakin and the artist Katsushika Hokusai. They worked together on the first ten of the yomihon, New Illustrated Edition of the Suikoden (Shinpen suikogaden), from 1805 to 1807, when arguments over the details of the designs (e.g., they were too lavish and took attention away from the text) and the fees asked by Hokusai compelled the publisher to fire Bakin. The project lay dormant until it was resumed in 1828, with the less gifted writer Takai Razan (1762-1838) composing the last eighty parts. He collaborated first with Hokusai and then with Hokusai's pupil Katsushika Taitō II (act. ca. 1818-54) until its completion in 1838. The continuation of the New Illustrated Edition of the Suikoden" was prompted not only by a prevailing widespread interest in Chinese vernacular novels but also by a renewed craze for the Suikoden saga following a groundbreaking and popular series of prints in 1827 by the Edo artist Utagawa Kuniyoshi titled 108 Heroes of the Popular Suikoden - All Told (Suikoden gōketsu hyakuhachinin no hitori).

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In the abstract to 'Beefy Outlaws: Beef Consumption in Water Margin and Its Song-Yuan Antecedents' it says:

"Water Margin, also known as Outlaws of the Marsh, is a vernacular novel from the Ming dynasty [1368–1644] based on the historical rebellion led by Song Jiang 宋江 against the Song government. The oldest extant edition of the novel was published in 1589, but most scholars believe it to be based on an earlier version, published in the 1520s, if not earlier. Also in question is its authorship, which is commonly attributed to Shi Nai’an 施耐庵 [1296–1372]; this is highly unlikely because of the novel’s many references to cultural and historical events that postdate the Jiajing 嘉靖 [1522–1566] era."

As for the title of this article, 'Beefy Outlaws: Beef Consumption in Water Margin and Its Song-Yuan Antecedents', it is important to know that the eating of beef was proscribed during the Song dynasty period (宋朝: 960-1279). Therefore, anyone blatantly eating beef was by inference a person living on the margins of society, at the least.