The weekly Thibodaux sentinel and journal of the 8th Senatorial District. [volume] (Thibodaux, Lna. [i.e. La.]) 1875-1898, 1896-11-28
OURNALISIIsJAPAN
THE FIRST NEWSPAPER FOUNDED BY
A FOREIGNER.

NoAns,oSAAoAo Al Jaw w AACCP
of I-.c thousand Ideosraphs-Erowth
of the Publishing Industry.
In L OF my conversations with the
primo minister be observed to me: "It is
unfortunate fer Us that we have no pa
per like your leading morning journals.
and what is even more unfortunate is
that we have no public opinion in con-
trolling our press as you have. But if
wish to write upon the journalism of
Japan you should go and see my friend
Captain Er;nkiey, the editor Of The
Japan Daily Mail. No one can give you
better information on the subject than
he can"
To Captain Brinkley, therefore, I
went. As he is entering upon his thir-
tieth year of residence in Japan, in
which country he began as a teacher Of
strategy and mathematics in the Naval
college. which he quit, after ten years
of hard work, to become the editor of
the important semiofficial English paper
which he conducts with great ability
and on original lines, and as he is init
mately connected in many ways with
the land of his adoption, he, better than
any one else, was qualified to give me
the information I sought.
"The increase in japanese journal
ism," he said, lis marvellous, but l
fear the improvement is rather in guam
tity than in quality. When I first came
here, 80 years age, there were not more
than 20 papers in the whole country
and they Of the most wretched descrip-
ticn. Now we have 500 newspapers and
magazines, with a total yearly circula-
ton of 27S, 157,4 21 copies. Here in To-
kyo alone we have % dailies, with an
annual circulation of 1874. 804. 729, and
56 magazines, issuing d., 500, 500 copies
yearly. The chief dailies are the Nichi
Nichi Shimbun-i. e., The Daily News
which ought to interest you special
". he added with a smile, and the Jill
Shimpo, which is edited by Fukuzawa,
u of the finest men in Japan today.
He also keeps a large school, in which
have been educated many of Cur lead
ing statesmen. These two papers have a
daily circulation Of 40, 900 each and are
very influential.
"The history Of modern japanese
journalism is as follows: An English
man of the name of Black first started
journalism in Japan III 1867, and his
paper, printed in Japanese in Yokohama,
was called The Japan Daily News. At
that period, when feudalism was still
powerful, anything like our journalistic
criticism was very shocking to the JAP
anese, and. indeed, it was actually dan
gerous to indulge in it. His paper, there
fore. came as a revelation to the SUBJ
missive natives. But when they became
awakened By it to what a power a paper
might attain, they saw how unwise it
would be to allow a foreigner to have
such control of the vernacular press as
Black possessed. Then a very singular
thing happened. They had DO power to
interfere, owing to the extraterritorial
jurisdiction under which Englishmen
existed in those days; So they went 10 |
our then minister, Sir Harry Parkes, a
most resolute upholder Of British rights
IN Japan. But he was a just man, aud
he saw how unfair a power of interfer-
ing in the domestic affairs of japan
Black possessed, and SO he in turn en-
ployed a curious power, which our min
listers can employ in tine Of emergency,
and he issued an ordinance having the
effect of law, in which he forbade ny
foreigner to publish a paper in japanese.
There was a tremendous foreign outcry
against this, and Black became a martyr
for a brief time.
Then was published the first paper
japanese control, which is now
thel leading paper in Japan, the Nichi
Nichi Shimbun. 1t was extraordinary
to note the rapidity with which the
japanese took to newspaper reading.
They We're just emerging from their in
tellectual prison, i'll which the Tokugawa
regents, or tycoons, had striven to stide
all enterprise, a tyranny during which
for 800 years tEay had been forbidden to
build ships Or to read certain books. and
n which much liberty of thought and
action had been denied them. But after
he restoration in 1857 came the great
reaction, and as D o as this paper had
succeeded numbers Of Others appeared.
st first they We're oolorless, being sim
,ly q reflection of the old literary IN
of the country, which had been
borrowed from China. They We're ridio-
llously didactic and stilted. There was
|reat use OF metaphor, discussion of ab-
eEnct questions, They Were classical