THE MAKING OF A JAPANESE NEWSPAPER 



By Dr. Thomas E. Green 



THE making of newspapers is an 

 art that, save in its most primitive 

 form, belongs exclusively to mod- 

 ern — indeed, to comparatively recent — 

 civilization. That Japan should, in the 

 very few years since her modern meta- 

 morphosis, have so speedily caught up 

 with the van of periodical publication is 

 less wonderful when one remembers that 

 the Orient is the birthplace of the "art 

 preservative," and that China possesses 

 the oldest newspaper in the world. 



There have been similar newspapers 

 from remote antiquity in Japan ; small 

 sheets roughly struck off from wooden 

 blocks detailing some great political fact, 

 or describing some crime or some gen- 

 erally interesting event. 



The first attempt at a modern journal 

 in Japan was in 1864, when the Kuaigai 

 Shimbun was undertaken by Joseph Hess, 

 a picturesque character, who in 1850 was 

 cast away in the wrecking of a junk, 

 rescued and carried to America. Here 

 he lived for a number of years, acquired 

 a speedy smattering of western ideas and 

 methods, and, when Japan was opened 

 after the visit of Commodore Perry, re- 

 turned to his native land as an interpreter. 



The first modern newspaper monthly 

 worthy of the name was founded by John 

 Black, an Englishman, one of the first 

 foreign residents of Yokohama. This was 

 in 1872. Since then Japanese journalism 

 has grown with wonderful rapidity, both 

 in volume and in character. There are 

 now some eight hundred newspapers and 

 magazines published in the empire, of 

 which more than two hundred are in 

 Tokyo. 



japax's best known newspaper is 

 only 38 years old 



Of the newspapers there are the 

 Knampo, which is the official gazette, 

 containing the government announce- 

 ments, such as laws, regulations, and ap- 

 pointments ; the Kokiimin, much quoted 

 in press dispatches from Tokyo, as giving 

 the government opinion of things inter- 

 national during the premiership of Prince 



Katsura, and the Nichi Nichi, as express- 

 ing popular sentiment of the better sort. 



Of magazines there are scores of every 

 sort and kind, — literary, artistic, legal, 

 medical, scientific — technical along all 

 lines of modern accomplishment and en- 

 deavor. 



The Jiji-Shimpo corresponds in a meas- 

 ure to our words "The Times." Jiji 

 means "timely events" or "daily events" 

 and bears a peculiar, though entirely 

 accidental, resemblance to the Greek 

 "ti-ti," the particle of interrogation. 

 "Shimpo" is the word for journal or 

 merely "paper." 



The Jiji-Shimpo is a monument, in a 

 way, to the memory of its founder; not 

 more a monument than a constant rein- 

 carnation of his spirit and influence. It 

 was founded 38 years ago by the late 

 Fukuzawa Yukichi, who was often called 

 the Japanese Gladstone. Xo account of 

 Japan, however brief, and particularly no 

 reference to its intellectual and literary 

 development, would be complete without 

 reference to the life and influence of this 

 remarkable man. 



Born in 1835 a Samurai — that is, one 

 of the military gentry, for in Japan every 

 gentleman was a soldier and every sol- 

 dier a gentleman — he was left a young 

 boy, orphaned and poor. Despite the 

 fanatical hatred at that time of all things 

 foreign, Fukuzawa undertook the study 

 of English and made such progress that 

 when the first envoy was sent abroad, in 

 i860, he was the interpreter and secre- 

 tary. 



On his return he detached himself 

 from all connection with official life and 

 devoted himself to the herculean task of 

 Americanizing Japan, for to him Amer- 

 ica was always the ideal among the na- 

 tions. 



Dropping his prerogative as a Samurai, 

 Fukuzawa became a commoner and the 

 preacher and teacher of a Jeffersonian 

 type of democracy. He introduced into 

 Japan public speaking and lecturing, for 

 which many of his most progressive con- 

 temporaries declared the Japanese lan- 



327 



