【Research Article】

A Boundary of National Identity Discourse:
Karl Florenz’s Strategy for the Historical Writing of Japanese
Literature
Daisuke Baba
Abstract
This study represents an attempt to illuminate the intellectual influence of Japanese national literary studies (kokugaku) on the German Japanologist Karl Florenz (1865–1939) and his representative work, A History of Japanese
Literature (Geschichte der japanischen Litteratur, 1906).1 From 1889 to 1914, this lecturer of German literature at theTokyo Imperial University established close relationships with his Japanese students and colleagues, some of whom
cooperated on his studies of Japanese literature. Their knowledge about Japanese literature was based on the kokugaku tradition that manifested its policy as a modern discipline. After describing the development of the koku-gaku at
the Tokyo Imperial University during the modernizing Meiji era (1868–1912), the present study assesses both the
manifestation and the function of national literature studies. In these historical contexts, this brief study points out
Karl Florenz’s activity and limits of his study of Japanese literature in order to clarify his strategy of the historical
writing of national literature as a German oriental philologist, especially in contrast to William G. Aston’s (1841–1911)
A History of Japanese Literature (1899). The following textual analysis of Geschichte der japanischen Literaturdemonstrates how Florenz transformed his knowledge of Japanese literature from the koku-gaku into the German
historical writing of national literature. The conclusion of this study discusses Florenz’s philosophy of the nationalframes of German and Japanese literature and its boundary function in the context of national identity.
Keywords: German, Japanese, nation, civilization, culture

1. Introduction
Japan in the late 19th century marks its modernization as a nation state while rapidly adopting
civilization and cultures of European and American powers. In this process, one of the most urgent
problems that the Meiji-government had to deal with was the general education of the Japanesepeople. Japanese intellectuals were convinced of the need for establishing a national institution for
education. During this period, the first university in Japan, the University of Tokyo (Tokyo Daigaku),
was founded as the highest graded educational organization (Yamamoto 2014: 63-86).2 This university
represented a modern example of higher education based on European and American university
models. Political leaders primarily required academic education for Japan’s material enrichment. In
slight contrast to this movement, which was incredibly single-minded in its focus upon material
1 I appreciate the assistance of Professor Dr. Michael Heitkemper-Yates (Rikkyo University) for kindly proofreading this paper.
In this paper, the Japanese surname will be written first in all instances. The contents of sections 2 and 3 are partly included ina previous publication: Daisuke Baba. (2020). A Hybrid Origin of Modern Historical Writing of Japanese Literature. Karl Florenz’s“A History of Japanese Literature” and the German–Japanese Contact of Academic Cultures (Kindai Nihon Bungaku-shi Kijutsu no
Haiburiddo na ichi Kigen. Kāru Flōrentsu “Nihon Bungaku-shi” ni okeru Nichi-doku no Gakujutsu Bunka Sesshoku). Tokyo:
Sangensha.
2 Tokyo Daigaku was renamed “Imperial University” (Teikoku Daigaku) after the Decree for the Imperial University (Teikoku
Daigaku-rei) by the First Cabinet of Itō Hirofumi (1841-1909) in 1886. When, in 1897, another Imperial university was also
founded in Kyōto, the name of “Imperial University” in Tokyo was changed to “Tokyo Imperial University” (Tokyo Teikoku
Daigaku). This study will refer to Tokyo Daigaku in this period only as “Tokyo Imperial University.”3

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advancement, Fukuzawa Yukichi (1835–1901) published An Outline of Civilization Theory (Bun’mei-ron
no Gairyaku, 1875). Fukuzawa’s work discusses how Japan should go with European and American
civilization in order to obtain its own international independence, thereby explaining civilization fromthe perspective of not only material aspects but also with a recognition of the moral and intellectual
aspects of the nation (Fukuzawa 1959: 19, 85). In the early phase of Japanese modernization, the key
word “civilization” (bun’mei) already played an essential role in setting up the foundation of Japan’s
educational system and national identity.
At the Tokyo Imperial University, some intellectuals of Japanese language and literature studies
were employed as officials and teachers. In the early Meiji era, from 1870s to 1880s, they had alreadydeveloped the clear awareness that their koku-gaku tradition from the 17th and 18th centuries could not
be maintained during the modernizing process without the financial and institutional support of the
new government. One of these old-guard intellectuals, Konakamura Kiyonori (1822–1895), declaredon the basis of Fukuzawa’s theoretical treatise that the main purpose of Japanese studies as a modern
discipline should be to support the moral and intellectual development of the nation state (Fujita
2007: 210). The official intellectuals regarded these aspects as the “national body” (koku-tai)—theunique national harmony between the Japanese political state under the emperor and the spiritual
attitude of the Japanese people (Wachutka 2016: 65-82). In order to clarify these spiritual aspects ofnationality, early modern researchers of Japanese language and literature had attempted philologicalapproaches to ancient (and partly medieval) poetry and prose (Hisamatsu 1969: 139, 145). The
accumulation of those findings up to the Meiji era allowed the next generation to describe a historyof Japanese literature from the ancient to the early modern period. Indeed, Konakamura suggested
during a meeting in 1891 that the writing of a well-summarized history of Japanese literature basedon these philological findings aimed at presenting a panorama of the subjects of the modern kokugaku (1898: 22).
In 1889, Karl Florenz started his career as a lecturer of German language and literature at theTokyo Imperial University, while privately studying Japanese literature. From 1883 to 1886, he had
specialized in Sanskrit philology at the University of Leipzig to become better acquainted withJapanese students. Inoue Tetsujirō (1856–1944), a member of the scholarly elite who spoke Germanwell, not only regularly taught him Japanese language, literature, and history, before Florenz arrived
in Japan in 1888 (Inoue 1943: 218-20) but also recommended him to the government as a German
teacher for the new university (Kamimura 2001: 423). Florenz’s study of Japanese literature from1889 to 1914 was supported by his Japanese colleagues and students. Another colleague, Haga Yaichi(1867–1927), who specialized in Japanese literature from 1892 to 1895 under Konakamura’s
instruction, was interested in German theories and methods of language and literature study in orderto justify the koku-gaku tradition as a modern discipline in the abruptly westernizing Japanese
university system. In conceptualizing his history of Japanese literature, Haga made a close friendshipwith Florenz and privately lectured him on Japanese literature. Meanwhile, Florenz privately
requested Fujishiro Teisuke (1868–1927), a student in the newly formed department of German
literature, to assist in his own study of Japanese literature. After the graduation, Fujishiro attended
lectures of a koku-gaku scholar on Manyōshū, the oldest collection of Japanese poetry from the 8th
century, in order to regularly explain to Florenz the detailed contents of the lectures in German(Fujishiro 1927: 138-46). Furthermore, Fujishiro translated a large number of Japanese literaryworks into German for Florenz (Tobari 1970: 299-300). In his seminar for the German department,
moreover, Florenz gave all his students a task to write a thesis about Japanese literature in German(Tokyo Daigaku 1986: 768) in order to gain more precise knowledge of Japanese literature. The

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A Boundary of National Identity Discourse: Karl Florenzʼs Strategy for the Historical Writing of Japanese Literatureknowledge of the students about Japanese literature undoubtedly consisted of lectures of koku-gaku
scholars at the university. From this situation, it is highly evident that Florenz’s study of Japanese
literature and one of his major works, Geschichte der japanischen Litteratur, were strongly influenced
by the koku-gaku tradition through his collogues and students.
Previous studies of Karl Florenz have rarely focused on the process of academic exchange
between Germany and Japan itself, but have typically revolved around the assessment of Florenz andhis works in the present discourse concerning modern academic exchange.3 In contrast to theprevious studies, this study proposes that a hybrid process of German–Japanese academic contact
occurred during this period. The case for this proposal shall proceed by means of the following
questions: 1) what is the background of Florenz’s description of his history of Japanese literature; 2)for what reason did he transform the koku-gaku tradition through German methods of historical
writing; and as a result, 3) what kind of character did his history of Japanese literature obtain. These
historical perspectives on the academic modernization of language, literature, and education enable
this present study to contribute to a better understanding of contemporary Japanese language andeducation.

2. Historical writings of Japanese literature: Haga, Florenz, and Aston
Toward the end of the 19th century, Florenz began to draft his history of Japanese literature. The
historical writing of Japanese literature itself had started with Mikami Sanji’s (1865–1939) and
Takatsu Kuwasaburō’s (1864–1921) A History of Japanese Literature (Nihon Bungaku-shi, 1890) and A
Reading Book for Our National Literature (Koku-bungaku Toku-hon, 1890), edited by Tachibana
Senzaburō (1867–1901) and Haga Yaichi (Takatsu 1969: 10). Mikami’s and Takatsu’s representation
had already referred to English writing methods on the basis of civilization theory (Mikami and
Takatsu 1890). The civilization theory related to the historical writing of national literature
represented the concept that the national mind develops its literature and culture nearly parallel tothe material advancement. On this theoretical basis, a number of histories of Japanese literature were
published during the 1890s. In this context, it should be questioned how Florenz, who was certainly
not able to describe the history of Japanese literature by himself, adopted former representations. In
the foreword of his literary history, Florenz remarks that among the literary approaches, only a few
works were worthy of his reference:
As priceworthy exceptions I would like to firstly give Professor Yaichi Haga’s imaginative Ten
Lectures on a History of Our National Literature (Koku-bungaku-shi Jikkō), then Dr. S. Fujioka’s
A Textbook of a History of Japanese Literature (Nihon Bungaku-shi Kyōkasho) along with
supplement and Wada’s and Nagai’s A Short History of Our National Literature (Koku-bungaku
Shōshi). These books are also a moderate size and give more hinting outlines than detailed
descriptions rounded off in itself. But these books are often valuable tools and guides for myorientation in the chaotic amount of the stuff to be considered. Of course, I have also drawn
3 Representative works include the following: Satō Masako’s first extent biographical study (1995) argues that this German
philologist played an intermediate role in the modern development of Japanese literature studies as a result of his importationof German theories and methods. More recently, Kamimura Naoki (2001) published a research study concentrating on Florenzas the founder of German studies in Japan. Furthermore, Michael Wachutka’s first monograph, published in the same year,
investigates Florenz’s translation of The Chronicles of Japan (Nihon Shoki, approx. 720) and his religious interpretation of
Shintō. Additionally, Tsuji Tomoki’s doctoral thesis (2010) pays critical attention to Florenz’s “euro-centric” attitude as anorientalist who depicts Japan as a subject of the Western scientific system.

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instruction about quite many subjects thankfully from W. G. Aston’s 1899 published A History ofJapanese Literature, the first history of Japanese literature, which was described by a European
and is worthy of its high commendation (Florenz 1906: IV-V).
In this way, Haga’s and Aston’s histories of Japanese literature belong to the main reference books
for Florenz’s historical description.4 This section attempts to answer the question of how and for what
reasons the German philologist included Haga’s knowledge and Aston’s English translation ofliterary works into Geschichte der japanischen Litteratur.
Undoubtedly, Florenz and Haga were constantly cooperating with each other on their study ofJapanese literature. Florenz, who lectured at the department of German studies about the history ofGerman literature (Tobari 1965: 35), had surely gained exact knowledge about historical writing
methods widespread in the German speaking areas up to the end of the 19th century. Haga, to whom
Florenz not only taught German but also allowed to use the German books of his collection, provided
in his 1895 published essay a concept of a historical writing of Japanese literature, therebysummarizing the names of prominent historians of German literature such as Georg Gottfried
Gervinus (1805–1871) (Kaikawa [Haga] 1895: 188-98). Meanwhile, in 1891, Haga composed a review
of Florenz’s translation and comments of The Chronicles of Japan that consisted of Fujishiro’stranslated original manuscripts (Haga 1992: 6). In his first lecture on national literature in thesummer of 1898, Haga made a short comment that Florenz had already started writing down his
history of Japanese literature (Haga 1983: 187), certainly with Haga’s aid. The relationship between
these relatively young intellectuals led to a content framework for Florenz’s historical description ofJapanese literature based on Haga’s knowledge.
During the summer vacation time of 1898, Haga Yaichi delivered at the Education Association ofTokyo Imperial University (Teikoku Daigaku Kyōiku-kai) Ten Lectures on a History of our National
Literature to students of Japanese studies and teachers of Japanese language (koku-go). In thefollowing years, a supplemental book version of these lectures was put together with a short foreword
and contained these 10 lectures in 267 pages as well as an index for the names of authors and works
and terminologies (Haga 1903). It is Haga’s detailed knowledge in regard to periodization, content
constitution, and objects of description in these lectures that Florenz seems to have articulated in his
historical writing, certainly not by reading this work directly, but by getting Haga’s explanations.
As for periodization, Haga (1983: 194-8) categorizes his history of national literature into fiveblocks of time according to the changes of the political system. The oldest period (approx. the 6th
century to 794), which Haga called “above-old” (jō-ko), extends from the ancient time respectively
before the reception of Chinese culture and Buddhism up to the movement of the capital from Nara
to Heian-kyō (contemporary Kyōto). The second “middle-old” (chū-ko) period (794–1192) marks thearistocratic institution and culture in Heian-kyō until the establishment of the feudal military
government in Kamakura. Afterward, during the third “near-old” (kin-ko) period (1192–1601), themilitary regime moved its capital from Kamakura to Kyōto by the Muromachi (or Ashikaga)
shogunate. In the next “near-world” (kin-sei) period (1601–1868), or the early modern Edo period ofJapanese history (Shirane, Suzuki, and Lurie 2016: viii), the country was under the rule of theTokugawa shogunate in Edo (contemporary Tokyo). The Meiji Restoration in 1868 marks the end of
the feudal society, when Japan was isolated from other countries at the beginning of the 5th period.
4 Florenz seems to have referred to Fujioka’s A Textbook for a History of Our National Literature (1901) and Wada’s and Nagai’s
A Short History of Our National Literature (1899) only for the extract of a poetry in Kojiki or Record of Ancient Matters (Baba
2020: 67-8).

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A Boundary of National Identity Discourse: Karl Florenzʼs Strategy for the Historical Writing of Japanese Literature

Haga designates this as “present time” (gen-dai) in which the political system under the emperor
ruled the Japanese people with a distinctly Western influence. These periodizations of political
history, as we will see below, constitute the contents of Florenz’s historical writing. Aston’s history ofJapanese literature, meanwhile, is divided into seven periods: 1) Archaic period (before A.D. 700); 2)
Nara period (8th century); 3) Heian or classical period (800-1186); 4) Kamakura period (1186–1332);
5) Nanboku-chō and Muromachi periods (1332–1603); 6) Yedo period (1603–1867); 7) Tokio period(1868–1900).
Haga’s lectures also show parallels with Florenz’s literary history in descriptive constitution. In
the introduction to the first lecture, Haga restricts his use of the term “literature” (bungaku) on thebasis of the European general definition of all pieces of writing determined to be “artworks such as
poetry and prose” (Haga 1983: 188–9). In the beginning of the explanations about each period, hesummarizes its major historical process including political events and its influences on Japaneseculture. Furthermore, he sketches out the main development of literature as a characteristic productof Japanese collective mind in each period. After the general description of literary characters andgenres, Haga explains representative authors and works along with the secondary literature ofJapanese literary studies for self-study. In the same way, Florenz and Aston introduce—instead ofcomments on the secondary materials—their translation of passages from various literary works,
adding to their summaries of the context. Meanwhile, the notion of Japanese people (koku-min) as
the subjects of the emperors from the ancient to the current period, especially within the Imperial
state during the Meiji era, obviously plays a central role in Haga’s descriptive constitution. According
to his understanding, Japanese literature is a mirror of the collective mind of the Japanese people
whose literary development matches their process of civilization (bun’mei), especially in comparison
with the ancient influence of China and during the late 19th century influence of Western powers(Haga 1983: 188-9). This triad of the Japanese people, literature, and civilization functions
characteristically as a component of Haga’s lectures on national literature.
Haga’s and Florenz’s writings of Japanese literature seem to be also nearly matching each otherin literary genres, authors, works, and the main objects of historical description. Haga features
literature in the ancient Nara period as writings of the oldest thoughts through purely Japanesewords (Haga 1983: 195) including Records of Ancient Matters (Kojiki), The Chronicle of Japan (Nihon
Shoki), and Collection of Ten Thousand Leaves (Manyōshū). As the foundation of Heian literature in
the next period, Haga depicts the reception of Chinese literature and Buddhism and the invention of
the Japanese kana syllabary. He calls this writing system “national letters” (koku-ji) and sentences
written using the kana syllabary “national prose” (koku-bun) (ibid.: 196). In addition, he characterizes
the Heian period as “an effeminate period” (ibid.: 222) and its literature as “extremely elegant inperspective of both form and content” (ibid.: 252). Haga situates Murasaki Shikibu’s The Tale of Genji(Genji Monogatari) and Sei Shōnagon’s The Pillow Book (Makura no Sōshi) at the top of Japanesenational literature (ibid.: 246). He also evaluates the prose works of both female authors as “theorigins of our national literature” or “classical literature” (mohan bungaku), to which Japanese
authors in the following periods referred for their own prose writing (ibid.: 196). In the next
Kamakura and Muromachi periods, studying and writing were no longer active through repeatedwars (ibid.: 267). In contrast to court women, who were representative of Heian literature, Haga
highlights male warriors and Buddhist monks, the major authors during the Kamakura period,
whose works reflect the depressive feelings of Buddhist pessimism ruling at the time (ibid.: 252). In
addition, he points out the development of the new Sino–Japanese writing style mixed with theJapanese kana syllabary (wakan-konkō-bun) and the emergence of the following genres: the military7

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chronicle (gunki) in the Kamakura period, the textual part of the traditional Nō theater (yōkyoku),
comic theater (kyōgen) and the Muromachi tale (otogi zōshi), and linked verse (renga) in the next
Muromachi period. In the Tokugawa period, and afterward, Japanese literature was no longer
dependent on the authority of the Imperial court, Buddhist temples, or military lords. Because of thegovernment promotion of education and the spread of print capitalism, especially urban townspeople
accepted and created literary works. As most representative poets and authors of the “folk literature”(heimin bungaku) (ibid.: 197), Haga recognizes Matsuo Bashō (1644–1694) in popular linked verse(haikai), Chikamatsu Monzaemon (1653–1725) in the writing of puppet-theater plays (jōruri), andIhara Saikaku (1642–1693) and Kyokutei Bakin (Takizawa, 1767–1848) in novels and book-length
prose (yomi-hon) (ibid.: 287–310). According to Haga’s last lecture, Japanese people who havecreated their own literature since the reception of Chinese culture and civilization in the ancientperiod will finally “harmonize the civilizations of East and West” in the Meiji period to give birth to
new forms of literature (ibid.: 317).
While Haga sees the development of Japanese literature in the civilizing process of the Japanesepeople and their culture, Florenz describes the literary development from the perspective much lessof civilization than of culture. Florenz’s literary history is divided into five periods: 1) the oldest time(älteste Zeit, until 794); 2) Heian period (Heian-Periode, 794–1186); 3) Kamakura and Muromachi
period (Kamakura und Muromachi-Periode, 1186–1601); 4) Tokugawa period (Tokugawa-Periode,1602–1868); and 5) Meiji era (Meiji-Ära, since 1868) (Florenz 1906: VII-X). In this history, “the mindof the Japanese people” (der japanische Volksgeist, ibid.: III) fundamentally functions as a subject
developing itself repeatedly with prosperity or decay. According to this theoretical framework,
attitudes of the collective mind typical of the period are reflected in representative works of Japanese
literature. The expression of “the people” (Volk) in the German historical context of the late 19th
century meant not a nation belonging to a state, rather a large group of people with the samelanguage and culture (Grimm and Grimm 1984a: 425). Furthermore, Florenz depicts the appropriate
way the Japanese people have repeatedly attempted to adapt forms of Chinese literature since their
reception of Buddhism and Chinese culture in the 7th century in order to refine their own literature.
According to Florenz, the development of Japanese literature reached its highest point in thewomen’s court literature during the 11th century—what Florenz commends as a literary harmony of“form” adapted from Chinese literature and “content” reflected in the minds of the Japanese people(Florenz 1906: 208). Florenz argues that in the 12th century, the collective mind experienced adeclining process as a result of repeated wars, when male warriors and monks became therepresentative authors during the Kamakura period (ibid.: 255). In the 15th century, the reception offorms of the Chinese drama led to the development of the Nō theater as a type of Japanese drama(ibid.: 387). Up to the late 19th century, Japan remained peaceful under the rule of the Tokugawa
centralist government. At the time, intellectuals were engaged not only in the research for ancient
Chinese literature, but some of them also labored nationalistically for a new conception of Japanese
literature in order to counter the authority of Chinese studies (ibid.: 416). Florenz indicates that inthe “renaissance” of the Tokugawa period, a literary “reform” occurred as a result of Matsuo Bashō’s
Haikai-poetry and caused a small and short flourishing time of literature (ibid.: 446). Nevertheless,in his short report on Meiji literature, Florenz comes to the conclusion that the Japanese mind isconfronted with the difficult situation of the decline because of its one-sided reception of European
literature and culture, despite its tradition of Japanese literature (ibid.: 612). For that reason, Florenz
constitutes his Japanese literary history based on the German scheme of the cultural development of
the collective mind, which barely appears in Haga’s lectures of national literature.

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A Boundary of National Identity Discourse: Karl Florenzʼs Strategy for the Historical Writing of Japanese Literature

Considering Florenz’s knowledge of German historical writing and the instruction in Japanese
literature provided by his colleagues and students, it is assumed that he did not necessarily refer toWilliam G. Aston’s history of Japanese literature in order to better write his own literary history. In
December 1900, however, Haga sent his comments on Aston’s literary history to Florenz (Haga 1992:
173). The key point to understand in Florenz’s reference to Aston’s book seems to be the self-obvious
fact that Florenz’s book was written for German intellectual readers such as his colleagues of oriental
studies in Germany. Most of those German readers who understood English well were likely toperuse the first history of Japanese literature by a European. As Florenz mentions in his text, Aston’sEnglish work had earned a high reputation until the German literary work was published. Therefore,
it is clearly suspected that Florenz was urged to produce a better history of Japanese literature thanthat of his English colleague.
To compare Florenz’s with Aston’s work from this point of view, it is evident that Florenz
intentionally not only translated almost the same passages from the Japanese original texts as Aston
had done but also added context to his descriptions of these passages.5 As we have seen above,
Florenz’s study of Japanese literature was dependent on his student’s translations from the original
texts into German. Taking these situations into account, it seems plausible that Florenz requested
that Fujishiro translate the passages of representative works, which had been introduced in Aston’sliterary history in order to demonstrate to German readers that Geschichte der japanischen Litteratur
details more translations and explanations of representative works than Aston’s A History of Japanese
Literature.
Almost all the historical writings of Japanese literature in the Meiji era took the framework ofnation, state, and civilization for granted. From this perspective, literature was considered a productof the national mind in both the advancement of its civilization and the development of its culture. In
fact, the historical writings based on the English understanding of literature as all written artwork of
poetry and prose, as an excellent result of civilization and culture of the nation, describe a paralleldevelopment of civilization and culture (Shinada 2012: 11-2). Fukuzawa Yukichi’s work had introduced
this civilization theory for the first time in regard to François Guizot’s (1787–1874) Histoire de la
Civilization en Europe (1828) and Henry Thomas Buckle’s (1821–1862) History of Civilization in
England (1857) (Matsuzawa 1995: 368-9). In contrast to Aston, who seems to have been well awareof the English writing method for European readers, Haga, the heir of Konakamura’s concept of kokugaku, certainly made use of the civilization theory for his lectures on national literature in order toinvent the consciousness where all of the people in Japan might be seen as belonging to the Imperial
state. According to Haga’s historical writing, Japanese literature represents a cultural heritage of thenation state, which seems to have been constant from the ancient times to the Meiji era. This attitude
also claims that the tradition of Japanese literary studies is worthy of Meiji Japan and a necessarymodern discipline for the Tokyo Imperial University.

5 This includes the following: Manyōshū (Aston 1899: 36-48; Florenz 1906: 94-126), Collection of Ancient and Modern Poems(Kokinshū) (Aston: 60-2; Florenz: 138-53), Tosa Diary (Tosa Nikki) ( Aston: 68-76; Flroenz: 192-7), The Pillow Book (Makura no
Sōshi) (Aston: 106-16; Florenz: 224-8), The Record of the Rise and Fall of the Genji and Heike (Genpei Jōsui-ki) (Aston: 137-9;
Florenz: 304-7), The Tales of the Heike (Heike Monogatari) (Aston: 141-2; Florenz: 304-7), The Ten-Foot Square Hut (Hōjō-ki)(Aston: 146-56; Florenz: 325-9), Chronicle of Great Peace (Taihei-ki) (Aston: 175-8; Florenz: 311-5), Essays in Idleness (Tsurezuregusa) (Aston: 189-96; Florenz: 331-8), and Battle of Coxinga (Kokusen’ya Kassen) (Aston: 280-7; Florenz: 596-8). Especially, it is a
striking feature of Florenz’s strategy against Aston’s literary history that Florenz translates just the same passages of the 2nd
chapter “The Broom-Tree” (Hahaki-gi) and the 5th “Young Murasaki” (Waka Murasaki) of The Tale of Genji, one of the longest
novels of Japanese literature (Aston: 98-103; Florenz: 215-8).

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3. From the advancement of civilization into the development of culture
In the context of former literary histories, Karl Florenz reformulated Haga’s knowledge ofJapanese literature through German methods of literary history. In other words, it is necessary to
discuss how Florenz wrote the civilization theory into the scheme of cultural development that had
been fundamental to the historical thinking of national literature in the German speaking areas of the
19th century. One point that must be addressed is his foreword in which Florenz explains the aim of
his literary history and distinguishes “civilization” (Zivilisation) from “culture” (Kultur). Anotherpoint worthy of attention is his evaluation of The Tale of Genji and The Pillow Book by female authors
in Heian period, both of which can be, according to the civilization theory, assessed as an excellent
result of civilization and culture of the Japanese people or their most sophisticated prose through theJapanese original kana syllabary.
The foreword of Geschichte der japanischen Litteratur begins with the claim that since the Meiji
Restoration in 1868, Japan has increasingly accepted European and American civilization andcultures.6 In this passage, Florenz emphasizes that Japan is the only advanced country equal toEuropean powers among the non-European countries. He indeed contrasts the words “civilization”
and “culture” without definition, but from the passage, it is clearly understood that the “advancement”(Fortschritte) of Japan means less of its cultural development of the collective mind than its progress
toward material development. In addition, after remarking that more and more Europeans andAmericans have become interested in Japanese culture, Florenz insists that even before the European
influence, Japan already possessed a “highly developed” (hochentwickelt) culture (Florenz 1906: III).
This passage, therefore, represents Florenz’s clear distinction between the advancement ofcivilization and the development of culture.
In this contrast, Florenz, referring to the recent influence from Japanese on European culture—hinting at the Japonism in the late 19th century—addresses the notion of literature as follows:
Very much less than the visual arts, we have been knowing of another expression of thecollective mind of the Japanese people, literature, although in this literature, the fineness ofJapanese taste expresses itself not less sharply than in the visual arts. (Florenz 1906: III)
Florenz sets up the collective “mind of the people” (Volksgeist) that functions as a subject developing
itself in his historical writing of Japanese literature from the ancient to the latest period. In thisframework, the historical subject has created a variety of literary works reflecting circumstances ineach period. It is remarkable that Florenz distinguishes between people of European and American
powers as a “nation” (Nation) and the Japanese people as a “people” (Volk), although he does notdefine these terms specifically. Both Nation and Volk were synonymous as “language communities”
in the 19th century. Nation in German impressed an image of the entire people in the German
speaking areas after the emergence of civil society as a single community (Grimm and Grimm 1984a:
425). The term Volk, meanwhile, also meant a group or cultural community in ancient times (Grimm
6 “It has not passed half a century yet since the Japanese people (Volk) have inclined to come out of their own closure from theother nations (Nationen) in the world and appropriate the material advantages of our modern civilization (Zivilisation) first of
all with interest in their self-preservation. Then, the not less blessed result that was not intended at first is that Japan
increasingly transformed itself in harmony with the mental and moral ideal of Western culture (Kultur). With lively
participation, we have observed from all the points of view the surprising advancement (Fortschritte) of the East Asian people(Volk). They are the only people until now who have succeeded in owning an equal position of the European and American
nations (Nationen)” (Florenz 1906: III).

10

A Boundary of National Identity Discourse: Karl Florenzʼs Strategy for the Historical Writing of Japanese Literatureand Grimm 1984b: 454). Considering the general meanings and Florenz’s use of these terms, it isreasonable to think that he calls the group of European and American people (who would be moreclosely related to his German readers) as Nation and the group of non-European people as Volk.
It is through these synonyms in German, nation and people, that Florenz reconstituted Haga’s
civilization framework of national literature as an understandable type of a literary history for his
German readers, focusing on the cultural development of the collective mind of the Japanese people.
German literary historians in the 19th century, on the one hand, did not clearly distinguished between
Volk and Nation. These terms were used mostly as synonyms in the meaning of one language
community of the German speaking people. On the other hand, Haga Yaichi, as we have seen in
section 2, regarded the Japanese “nation” (koku-min) as the one language unit of the subject
belonging to the Imperial state. Taking these differences between the German and the Japanese
understanding of language community into account, Florenz probably starts the foreword of his
literary history with the perspective of the civilization theory and sets up the Japanese people only in
the German meaning of one language community in contrast to the European and American nations
related to their modern state. Florenz seems to restrict the aspect of his historical writing to thedevelopment of Japanese literature regardless of civilization. The contrasting use of nation andpeople, indeed, is limited to the brief passage in the foreword. In the main text, Florenz describes thehistorical process mostly from a cultural point of view.
As for Florenz’s view of the literary history, it is remarkable that he once uses the term “culturaladvance” (kulturelle Fortschritte) in order to explain Japan’s reception of Chinese culture and its
result. He emphasizes Buddhism and education coming from China in the 7th century as a main
factor of cultural advance in Japan (Florenz 1906: 48). This expression includes the assumption of the“self-forming of the mind” (geistige Bildung), which argues that the Japanese people still in
uncultivated conditions of life devoted themselves to learning the “highly developed” Chinese culture
painstakingly in order to create their own literature (ibid.: 48-9). In other words, this perspective
reveals that Florenz does not recognize Japan before the first reception of Chinese culture as acultural at all. Without reasoning his viewpoint, Florenz additionally paraphrases in comparison witha foreign factor of Chinese culture an original factor of Japanese people as things “indigenously
Japanese” (einheimsch-japanisch) (ibid.: 51). From this context, Florenz apparently assumes that the
mixture of indigenously Japanese and Chinese factors through Japan’s adoption of Chinese culture
enabled the Japanese people to make dramatic progress and develop their own national literature.
Over his literary history, furthermore, Florenz draws the reader’s attention to Japanese people
repeatedly receiving Chinese culture and improving their own culture such as the Nō drama in the
Muromachi period and the style of novel in the Tokugawa period (ibid.: 287, 375, 517-8). For thesereasons, Florenz’s use of the expression “cultural advance” seems to be caused by his thinking of thefirst reception of Chinese culture as a crucial opportunity for Japanese people in uncultivatedconditions to rapidly develop their own culture.
The description of culture in both aspects of advancement and development was unusual in thecontext of German historical writing in the 19th century. In German speaking areas, the historical
process was described almost only from the perspective of the development of the national mind. As
for the expressions of “advance” (Fortschritt) and “development” (Entwicklung), Leopold von Ranke(1795-1886) determined a comparative use in the context of Historicism. In the introduction of his
About the Epochs of Recent History (Über die Epochen der neueren Geschichte, 1854), Ranke declares
the historical idea that all of humankind has advanced constantly to be unproven. Instead of this idea
(typical of the Enlightenment period), he insists on historical research to illuminate the force of the11外国語教育研究ジャーナル 第 3 巻（JOURNAL OF FOREIGN LANGUAGE EDUCATION AND RESEARCH, VOL. 3）

national mind in a process of development, whereby his image of development represents a model ofprosperity and decay (Ranke 1954: 5-7). This German standard historical view in the 19th century
barely corresponds to Florenz’s expression of cultural advance.
To sum up, Florenz seems to have used the notions of nation and people on the one side, and ofadvancement and self-development on the other side, in order to transform Haga’s knowledge ofJapanese literary history on the basis of civilization theory into a model of cultural development of
the national mind through German historical writing methods. In the foreword, Florenz regards theEuropean and American nations as communities of a modern confederated state or the resulting
societies of high civilization. In contrast to this concept of national status, the Japanese people,
according to the German general understanding of the literary history, means only a community oflanguage and culture—regardless of modern national status. The notion of people matches betterwith the German theory of the development of the national mind than the notion of nation (as it was
self-applied at the time). In the main text concerning the cultural development of the Japanesepeople, Florenz sets up the phases of both the advancement through the adoption of Chinese culture
and the following self-formation. This notion of advancement, nevertheless, seems to be less familiar
with the German historical model of prosperity and decay than with the civilization theory. The
manipulation of cultural advancement and self-development is probably caused by the situation
related to the historical writing of Japanese literature discussed in section 2. In this situation, Florenz
had to describe Japan’s relation to China to a certain extent from the perspective of civilization. As aresult, he introduced his original use of the expressions of cultural advance and self-development ora hybrid point of view influenced by both Japanese and German discourses on national representation.
The theory of self-formation in literary development, especially in relation to a highly developed
foreign culture, played a major role in the German speaking areas to define their cultural identification.
Georg Gottfried Gervinus claims that within the European countries, only German people haveappropriated classical literature and wisdom to such a high level as the ancient Greeks and Romans(Gervinus 1840: 11-2). The German philologist Wilhelm Scherer (1841–1886) insists in his
assessment of the development of German literature that German people in the primitive conditionsof their literature, repeatedly learned the literature of foreign countries to refine their own literature(Scherer 1883: 19, 21). In an earlier article about his concept of historical writing published in 1879,
Scherer describes the cultural character of the German people as “the greatest possible increase inclassical education” (möglichste Steigerung der classischen Bildung) (Scherer 1975: 397). Gervinus’sand Scherer’s works are recognized as the bestsellers of the history of German literature in the 19th
century (Rosenberg 1989: 109), representing an academically approved self-image of German
cultural features widespread in the civil society. Florenz, who studied in Leipzig and Berlin from 1883
to 1888, provided lectures on German literary history at the Tokyo Imperial University. Undoubtedly,
he also shared the discursive type of German national self-understanding through the historical
writings surrounding German literature—especially the German high receptivity of foreign cultures.
This probably allowed his connection between German and Japanese cultural development to show
German readers the self-forming process of the Japanese mind through Chinese literature andeducation.
In this view of cultural advancement and self-development, Florenz describes the Heian courtly
literature of the 11th century, or the prose works by Murasaki Shikibu and Sei Shōnagon, not as aliterary production of national civilization and culture, but as the most sophisticated harvest ofJapan’s reception of Chinese literature and the self-forming of its own literature. Florenz’s following
evaluation about both women’s works that were, according to his comments, written nearly during

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A Boundary of National Identity Discourse: Karl Florenzʼs Strategy for the Historical Writing of Japanese Literature

the same time round 1000 surely suggested to German readers an analogy with the development ofGerman literature:
To choose a round number, the year 1000 represents the highest point of literary production of
the ancient Japan (Florenz 1906: 229).
Wilhelm Scherer’s standard history of German literature sketches a regular development withprosperity around the years 600, 1200, and 1800, as well as with decay around the years 300, 900, and1500 (Scherer 1883: 18). The second period of prosperity during the Medieval age is marked by the
Chivalric romance or courtly poetry, particularly that of Gottfried von Strassburg and Wolfram vonEschenbach. Florenz, meanwhile, not only lists the Heian period as the “Medieval age” (Mittelalter)but also regards a characteristic point in the development of Japanese literature in comparison with
European literatures as “early ripening” (frühes Reifen) (Florenz 1906: 229). His German readers who
were familiar with Scherer’s literary history were able to easily imagine that the courtly literature in
the “Medieval age” in Japan reached the highest point of historical development 200 year earlier thanin German speaking areas; not in poetry but in prose, and not written by men but by women. This
type of analogous thinking functions as a discursive tie between German and Japanese literature inorder for his intellectual readers to increase their interest in Japanese culture.

4. Conclusion
In this way of historical writing, Karl Florenz included Haga’s knowledge of national literaturefrom the koku-gaku tradition in the German context of the 19th century. Whereas Florenz, a specialist
in ancient Japanese literature, had not been well aware of Heian courtly literature, his Geschiche derjapanischen Litteratur, discussed above, evaluates both women’s works, The Tale of Genji and The
Pillow Book, as the classic prose of Japanese literature—differently from the previous histories ofJapanese literature established by the civilization theory related to Japanese national identity
discourse. In this reformulation of the literary knowledge, we can see the German Japanologist on aboundary between Japanese and German academic contexts in the late 19th century. On the Japaneseside, intellectual leaders of the koku-gaku had set their academic policy on the basis of Fukuzawa
Yukichi’s civilization theory for the assimilation of the modern university system. On the Germanside, the growing interest in Japanese culture mainly within German people living in Japan (Schütte
2004: 62) and highly theorized historical methods for national literature enabled the German lecturer
at the Tokyo Imperial University to describe his history of Japanese literature through the knowledge
and assistance of his collogues and students.
The boundary on which Florenz stood while writing his literary history should be understood in
the dynamic process between Japanese and German contexts. His historical writing was dependent
on his situations as a German oriental philologist, an early German Japanologist, and a teacher within
the department of German literary studies in a modernizing Japan. Under the influence from bothacademic contexts, Florenz’s use of cultural advancement and self-development for historical writing
led to his analogous thinking about the reception of highly developed foreign culture as a common
similarity between German and Japanese national literature. With regard to this entire process, his
understanding of Japanese literature distanced itself on the aspect of German historical writing to acertain extent from the Japanese discourse. At the same time, he had to follow the high evaluation of
the Heian representative prose, which the previous literary historians had estimated very positively

13外国語教育研究ジャーナル 第 3 巻（JOURNAL OF FOREIGN LANGUAGE EDUCATION AND RESEARCH, VOL. 3）

on the basis of civilization theory and with which Florenz himself was probably not acquainted. The
academic boundary about national identity included conflicts and comparability between German
and Japanese literature studies in the modern period.

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