“A solid work of refreshingly jargon-free scholarship that fills various lacunae in our understanding of the intellectual and artistic life of eighteenth-century Japan. A model of interdisciplinary research. . . . The many reproductions (some duplicated in full color in an appendix) alone are well worth the price of this volume, especially since many of the originals are now found only in a private collection and are rarely reproduced or exhibited. The plates in this volume provide the only opportunity most scholars could reasonably expect to have to view these works, and Marceau’s contribution in making them accessible and providing insightful commentary on them is thus noteworthy.”
Roger K. Thomas in the Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies

“This book is one of the best English language studies yet published on the topic of the early modern bunjin consciousness. A book with an irrefutable authority, a veritable encyclopedia in which the patient reader will certainly discover a trove of information on eighteenth century bunjin life.”
--W. Puck Brecher in Japanese Studies

Takebe Ayatari (1719-74), a contemporary of Yosa Buson and Ike no Taiga, was born into a powerful military household, but rejected his martial background and devoted his prodigious talents to the arts. By his death on the road at the age of fifty-six, Ayatari had succeeded in pioneering fresh approaches to a variety of aesthetic activities, including haikai and waka poetry, prose fiction, travel literature, and especially painting. Not content with his writings and ink drawings, Ayatari made special efforts to publish his and his disciples' works, thereby single-handedly breaking new ground in the woodblock publishing industry.

While Ayatari's life provides fascinating reading in its own right, this study goes on to provide a detailed background to the cultural and intellectual world of the bohemian in eighteenth-century Japan. The author draws upon a wealth of details to bring the reader a rich view of life for the individualist thriving in a conformist-oriented society. The large number of illustrations of Ayatari's beautiful landscape and bird-and-flower paintings and woodblock painting manuals, many of which are shown for the first time anywhere, enhances the visual quality of the book for the generalist and specialist alike.