Musui's Story: The Autobiography of a Tokugawa Samurai

Hard to find book about a samurai who follows his own nontraditional path.

Musui is the Buddhist name Katsu took in his retirement from his life as a low ranking samurai during the late Edo period. the candid candid honesty of his endless exploits he says is to remind his descendants how not to live their lives. Katsu never gained official employment. To my surprise this was the case for 25% of samurai during Edo. So he made a living taking care of business in many shady areas of the city. He gained notoriety for his superlative swordsmanship and had a large following . He fought duels and practiced on corpses of the shogunate execution grounds. His trips to brothels were so frequent he ended up as a paid heavy to eject ruffians around the district. His text frequently reminds his family to live a more worthy life. Katsu obviously was at odds with the life expected of him. He ran away from Edo aged 14 and after being robbed and stripped of everything on the road, he spent many months as a beggar. He then developed a taste for pilgrimages to shrines that dotted the highways between Osaka and Edo. Throughout his favored life he seesawed between austerities and excess.

Very prompt service. Book is as described.

This book is a good way of seeing what life was like in Tokugawa Japan. Also gave an insight into what the daily life of a samurai was during that time period. A fantastic read and gives a glimpse into the culture of Japan during that time period.

Katsu Kokichi's autobiography shows the gritty, dark, realistic side of Tokugawa society. This samurai, who was always down on his luck, mostly because of his own rotten ideas and unethical actions, lied, cheated, stole and ran around with the riffraff of Edo. He ran away from home, twice, once at the age of 14 and once at the age of 21. The second time he was running away from his OWN household - his wife and his bills. He once lived as a begger, travelled a lot (well, ran away a lot) and learned a lot about how to get money without doing any real work.This book is important as a piece of first person history into the real lifes and people of the 19th Century Japan. It showed how many Samurai lived during the time of peace, trying to take odd jobs, make some money and still dress, act and give the impression of being warriors. A must for any history library.

I always feel weird reviewing schoolbooks, but since I think everything deserves some sort of opinion - here goes. This book was for my History of Korea and Japan class and was one of those "choose from a list" type of choices. I thought the book was decent. The book wasn't fascinating, but it did keep my interest. Whether or not I'd recommend it is really a personal choice. Did I think it was good for school? - Yes. Would I want it for a personal read? - Probably not. Does this mean its horrible writing? - I don't think so. It's just not to my taste.

Purchased for a college class. My son hated it. He hated everything about it, but he needed it for a college class and it arrived very quickly. I should probably mention, if you are looking at it for a bit of light trading, my son hated it and hated reading about the poor woman’s miserable life. It is apparently an intense look into the very restrictive, oppressive Asian societal norms of the past. I should mention that my college age son hated it. Did I mention that?

Sometimes we ask ourselves what life must have been like in other places and other times. This book is the most realistic examples of such an account I have ever read. The scenes are so comical and hilarious you feel sorry for the guy for all his misfortune but at the same time can't help laughing at the manner it which its presented. It reminds me a lot of Voltaire's Candide or in modern references a much older version of the Sopranos. If you get a chance read this book, you'll definitely find a lot of laughs and a plethora of timeless lessons of a hard life tucked beneath the surface.