Doin Hoshi

The fourth print of the year is, as usual, a priest, this time the monk Doin. I find that my preconceptions of what religious people are supposed to be like usually conflicts with what I find in the poetry:

Although I am not involved with any religion at all, I suppose it is because our Western image of religious men as cool, unemotional celibates is so common that I find these poems so surprising. When I dug a bit deeper into the history books though, things seemed to come together a bit more sensibly. It turns out that Fujiwara no Atsuyori (as he used to be known) was indeed a passionate lover ... of poetry. He 'retired from the world' and became a monk only after he had reached his eighties, when perhaps his interest in 'earthly' matters was subsiding somewhat. Can we assume he wrote this poem when he was still young and 'full of fire'?

It is quite unusual for Ukiyo-e designers to pose their subjects 'straight on' like this, as it is difficult to deliniate noses from this angle, and as a result, we see a standard 'hook-shaped' nose in nearly all woodblock prints. Shunsho is experimenting here, giving us a 'front view' nose, and both ears visible, but I think it came out all right. The expression looks quite natural, and the character is quite believable. He tries this only a couple more times in the set of 100. The design for Kiyohara no Motosuke (in my first set) was perhaps not so successful, and when you get your print of Murasaki Shikibu a couple of years from now, you'll see how he managed a female face this way. (How would he handle a nose like mine, I wonder .....?)

Please enjoy this print. Coming next month, Kiyohara no Fukayabu.

June 1992