Man'yo shu and the Imperial Imagination in Early Japan

In Man'yoshu and the Imperial Imagination in Early Japan, Torquil Duthie examines the literary representation of the late seventh-century Yamato court as a realm of all under heaven. Through close readings of the early volumes of the poetic anthology Man'yoshu (c. eighth century) and the last volumes of the official history Nihon shoki (c. 720), Duthie shows how competing political interests and different styles of representation produced not a unified ideology, but rather a bundle of disparate imperial imaginaries collected around the figure of the imperial sovereign. Central to this process was the creation of a tradition of vernacular poetry in which Yamato courtiers could participate and recognize themselves as the cultured officials of the new imperial realm.