A Pioneer Of Chinese Literati Style In Osaka During Edo Era

This thesis took Kimura Kenkado as the research object,and analyzed his biographies,diaries,paintings,notes to provide a new view about the Chinese literati style in Osaka during edo era,thus grasping the cultural exchanges between China and Japan in the 18 th century.Kimura Kenkado(1736-1802)was a literati painter and naturalist in Osaka in the 18 th century.He studied herbalism,Chinese paintings,and Chinese poetry since childhood,and dedicated himself to collecting rare and novel books and products of Japan,China and the western world throughout his life.There were lots of scholars or educated persons who visited him to see his great collection or exchange information,thus a “cultural salon” coming into being.However,for a long time,scholars have focused on his painting,studies of natural history and his interaction with Japanese intellectual group,but have paid little attention to his influence on overseas cultural exchanges.Therefore,this thesis tried to analyze Kenkado‘s interest and knowledge about Chinese culture,his methods of getting the information and collections from China,and his influence on the spread of Chinese culture in Japan,making it clear that Kenkado had played a positive role in the cultural exchanges between Japan and China in the 18 th century.This thesis is divided into four chapters.The first chapter analyzed the cultural environment of Nagasaki and Osaka under the Closed-cloorism policy of Tokugawa shogunate in the 18 th century.The second chapter is based on the various biographies about Kenkado,analyzing the enlightenment of his interest about Chinese culture,the range of his collection of Chinese goods,his travel to Nagasaki,his interaction with monks,town scholars,Chinese merchants and the translators in the trade of Nagasaki.The third chapter emphasized the role he played on the spread of Chinese paintings and poems in Japan,by investigating the inscribe of his literati paintings,and analyzing his Chinese poems.The fourth chapter,examined his knowledge about Chinese herbal science and chinese geography,emphasizing his contribution of giving an idea about the publishment of Chinese geographic atlas in Japan.