“Reading” of the Chinese classics and the history of thought in the Edo period

The Chinese classics, such as The Analects (論語), Records of the Grand Historian (史記), and the poetry of Du Fu (杜甫; 712–20) and Li Bai (李白; 701–62), have been part of compulsory education for Japanese people since early times. Of these, the Japanese have been consistently fond of reading The Analects throughout their long history. Even today, many kinds of paperback editions are published that can be obtained easily; simple guides written by everyone from scholars to businessmen continue to be published, one after another.