Takahide Mitsui - 1

I wrote my graduate thesis on
the works of Takahide Mitsui.

Takahide was the heir of the Mitsui-South family.
Mitsui families managed the projenitor of Mitsui & Co., Ltd.
which is one of the largest trading company in Japan.

He was born in Kyoto in 1767.
In 1781 he leave for Edo (now Tokyo) to study management.
In 1784 he began to work as the chief of his family firm.
His base was in Kyoto,
and 4 times he stayed at Edo for business, for about a year each.

In 1796 the government punished him for something. (I do not know the datail.)
After that, He never visited Edo,
and worked among Kyoto, Osaka, and Kishu (now Wakayama).
His life style seemed to change,
because his works became less harder than before.

His father Takanari was a well-known poet of Kyoka (funny poetry on daily life).
And some of his family also created Kyoka.
So he was brought up with being surrounded by cultural persons.

He learned to create Haiku in Tenmei years(1781-1788).
His teacher in Haiku was Ranko, the leader of Haiku in those day's Kyoto.
We can see the name Kakiku (Takahide used this name in Haiku)
in some collections of Haiku related with Ranko.

After 1976, we miss the name Kakiku.
Instead of Kakiku, we can find a new comer, Koraku.

We know Takahide created rylics of Jiuta,
which is Japanese traditional songs accompanied with Shamisen.
When creating them, he used the name Koraku-en.

I concluded Koraku was Kakiku (Takahide).
At the same time, I reached the fact that
Takahide's creation of Jiuta rylics began sometime after that year.

The year 1976 was the turning point of his whole life.