The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter
Mount Fuji is a popular subject for Japanese art due to its cultural and religious significance. This belief can be traced to "The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter", where a goddess deposits the elixir of life on the peak. As the historian Henry Smith explains, "Thus from an early time, Mt. Fuji was seen as the source of the secret of immortality, a tradition that was at the heart of Hokusai's own obsession with the mountain."