Bob Newman's Reviews > The Japanese Discovery of Europe, 1720-1830: Revised Edition

Japan Goes Dutch

When we were in high school, we learned that Admiral Perry “opened” Japan in 1853 and Japan began to change rapidly as they feared some powerful nation of the world might try to take over. When I studied Japanese history in college, I did read about the 1639 banning of contacts and trade with foreigners, especially the Catholic nations of Portugal and Spain due to their scary success---from the Japanese rulers’ point of view---in converting ordinary people to Catholicism. Japan became a closed country. No one could leave and return. No one could visit. This long period was called “sakoku jidai” or “the closed country era”. Outside trade was limited to China, and on one extremely tiny island in Nagasaki harbor (Deshima) with Holland. This situation lasted till the 19th century. The Dutch traded with the Japanese and once a year sent a few emissaries to pay homage to the shogun’s government in Edo (Tokyo). If you have an average history background, you will probably have gleaned this knowledge somewhere along the way.

However, what you will learn through this volume is the extent to which Japanese curiosity about the rest of the world led numerous scholars, doctors, political figures, and proto-scientists to gravitate to that tiny island in Nagasaki harbor over the 18th and early 19th centuries. You will read about what they wanted to know, how they managed to communicate with the Dutch, what kind of Dutch people could be found at Deshima, what influence their newly-acquired knowledge played in Japan, and how they digested or didn’t digest the knowledge they received. Navigation, ship-building, medicine, and geography are only a few of the subjects the Japanese found useful. There are also sections on relations with Russia at the time because unlike the western nations who approached Japan by sea, Russian expansionism came across Siberia and had begun to infiltrate Kamchatka, the Kuril islands, Sakhalin and even Hokkaido. In those days, Japanese sovereignty over Hokkaido and the other northern areas was anything but sure. They thought these areas mentioned should be part of Japan as well, but had hardly any presence there. There are some interesting short biographies of two figures of the time, Honda Toshiaki and Mamiya Rinzō. Both were connected to the spread of European knowledge during Tokugawa times, and both had something to do with the exploration of the northern lands beyond Honshu. They represent to us the broader desire of many Japanese to either open Japan to the world or at least to open it to new ideas and technologies. The choice of these two men is apt because the different attitudes of Japan towards the West in later years is already reflected in them. Honda wanted contacts and was open to any new ideas, feeling that Japan had a lot to learn, while Mamiya comes across as a super-patriot absolutely sure that Japan was superior to any other country. He wanted to take technology, but nothing else. An appendix contains a longer excerpt from the writings of Honda Toshiaki.
In summary, this is a well-written, jargon-free story of an interesting period in Japanese history which introduces little-known people and events. The way in which the Dutch language and Dutch takes on general Western culture influenced Japan before its formal opening is a fascinating story. If it was only a molehill compared to the mountain that grew after 1853, the book shows that Japanese already knew something about the West and Perry would have been seen as a great chance for many who wished to know more.