Author:
Title: [Shinsen Shoka no Fukiyose].
Description: n.p. n.d. [c1880?] 18x12cm publisher's colour woodcut wrapper; 10 double leaves (20pp); b/w woodcut illustrations throughout. Rather good. ¶ A rare and charming songbook, apparently for children, which has a look of long tradition. But if these are proper shoka then it is a form of school song that began with Meiji reformation of education. The subjects are in any case thoroughly up to date: balloons, steamships and photographs.None of these songbooks are going to be common. I found an entry for what might be the same book in the Ryukyu University catalogue; nothing else.

Keywords: literature music songbooks c19th Japan modernism meiji