![[JAPAN-GUIDE BOOKS] AWOKI, T. and SUSUKA, J. [Bankoku Meisho Zue]. Illustrated Guide Book for Travellers around the World.](/sites/default/files/styles/auction_slider/public/images/lots/731/1503731.jpg?itok=CJILvyWA)
Lot Details
Lot 76
[JAPAN-GUIDE BOOKS] AWOKI, T. and SUSUKA, J. [Bankoku Meisho Zue]. Illustrated Guide Book for Travellers around the World.
Osaka: Awoki Szandow Osaka Bookselling, circa 1885. Eight volumes including the folding world map volume, publisher's pictorial boards, cloth spine. 6 x 4 inches (15.5 x 9.5 cm); unpaginated, illustrated with wood engravings. Some wear including some splitting to the delicate cloth spines, a couple of volumes shaken, some of the map folds separated. The volume on the Americas retains the vertical paper band.
Very rare complete with the map volume, which is usually lacking. Volume 1: America (and a few other locations); volume 2: England (this and the next volume contains a volvelle that serves as a universal clock); volume 3: The Arctic and Russia etc. volume 4: France, Holland and Germany; volume 5: Africa, including Egypt; volume 6: Middle East and India; volume 7: Asia, including Southeast Asia and Japan; volume 8: World Map.
Partially and somewhat inaccurately captioned in English, with the text entirely in Japanese, this fascinating work was probably intended for a newly mobile Japanese audience, travelling the world for the first time. It seems quite possible that many or most readers may have been "armchair travellers," but none the less, this is an extraordinary work, a Japanese Baedeker. The illustrations were probably mostly drawn from travel books, rather than personal experience. The sixth volume has a charming illustration of the publishers' establishment, with a street scene showing both Victorian and traditional Japanese clothes on the passers-by. This is, by any measure, a delightful and eccentric work.
C From the Collection of the late William Safire
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