This print shows a scene from a Japanese legend about a man who was drowned in a swamp by his wife and her lover. Kohada Koheiji was a kabuki actor for the Morita-za theater; as he couldn’t get any good role, he was cast as a yurei, and could only get yurei roles from there on out. His wife Otsuka was ashamed of him, and together with her lover (another actor called Adachi Sakuro), she murdered Kohada and threw his body into a swamp. He returns to haunt them in revenge. The work depicts a skeletal ghost with flames around him who has returned to scare the couple while they are in bed together under a mosquito net.
First Appearance Bizarre Tale of Revenge at Asaka Marsh by Santō Kyōden (Fukushû kidan Asaka-numa, 1803)
First Publisher ○
Appearance List Novel: Bizarre Tale of Revenge at Asaka Marsh by Santō Kyōden (Fukushû kidan Asaka-numa, 1803). Prints: Kabuki actor Arashi Rikaku ll as Ghost Koheiji by Kohishi Hirosada (c. 1840), The Ghost of Kohada Koheiji by Katsushika Hokusai (1830), Specter frightening a young woman by Utagawa Yoshiiku (1890).
Sample Read ○
Description This print shows a scene from a Japanese legend about a man who was drowned in a swamp by his wife and her lover. Kohada Koheiji was a kabuki actor for the Morita-za theater; as he couldn’t get any good role, he was cast as a yurei, and could only get yurei roles from there on out. His wife Otsuka was ashamed of him, and together with her lover (another actor called Adachi Sakuro), she murdered Kohada and threw his body into a swamp. He returns to haunt them in revenge. The work depicts a skeletal ghost with flames around him who has returned to scare the couple while they are in bed together under a mosquito net.
