My mother-in-law hates me!

January 9, 2012 9:58 AM

Early international marriages between Japanese men and Western women in post-Meiji 1800s... where could I read about them?

The January 1st issue of the New York Seikatsu free newspaper has a nice little article about a Chemist from Japan who helped bring Cherry Trees to New York and DC. (you can read it online [Japanese only] at their website, page 5 of this week's issue) He fell in love with a lady named Caroline Hitch and married her in 1887. With the Meiji Restoration & the opening of Japan in 1868, I wonder about those early international marriages, and if anyone has written anything about them. I'd love to read memoirs from the Western women who married Japanese men, especially about their first trips to Japan.

I found a little bit about Caroline Hitch's time in Japan, but I'd love to read more about it, or stories from other women in that situation.

Has anyone read anything interesting about this, online or offline?

posted by chickencoop to human relations (3 answers total)

The only example I can think of off the top of my head would be "The Mirror In the Shrine", which includes a section on Lafcadio Hearn's marriage to a Japanese woman. Hearn's published letters and essays (as opposed to the more polished commercial work he is more famous for) is really interesting, but features little introspection about his married life.

Hearn's wife, Koizumi Setsu, is supposed to have published some memoirs about the marriage, but I have not had a chance to read them.
posted by KokuRyu at 5:31 PM on January 9, 2012

Whoops, I just realized you meant marriage from the other way around.
posted by KokuRyu at 5:31 PM on January 9, 2012

Here are a few names off the top of my head, plus a few I found after digging around a bit:

Inazo Nitobe married an American woman, Mary Patterson Elkinton, and is probably the most famous example around the time frame that you're asking about.

It doesn't say in the English Wikipedia page for some reason, but Hideyo Noguchi married an American woman (see their tombstone at the bottom of the page), Mary Loretta Dardis.

Organic chemist Nagayoshi Nagai, wife Therese.
The founder of Japan's whiskey industry, Masataka Taketsuru married a Scottish woman, Rita.
Daisetsu Suzuki (D. T. Suzuki), wife Beatrice Erskine Lane.

And a couple of sort-ofs:

The author Ougai Mori wasn't married to a German woman, but his famous short story The Dancing Girl is known to be based on his personal experiences while studying in Germany.

Isamu Noguchi is half Japanese and his parent's weren't married, but Leonie Gilmour, Isamu's mother, might be of interest to you.
posted by misozaki at 5:30 AM on January 10, 2012 [1 favorite]