Warning, this episode will talk extensively about Prostitution and other themes of a sexual nature.

The story of the Edo/Tokyo’s main Red Light District from 1617 to 1958, its history, influence on art and the lives of the women who lived there.

Episode Icon: A courtesan promenading under cherry trees of the Yoshiwara, accompanied by her child attendant. Colour woodcut by Yoshitora, 1859. Iconographic Collections Keywords: Yoshitora, Wikimedia Commons, Public Domain.

Links to photos associated with the episode...

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Recommended further reading…

• ​De Becker, J.E. The Sexual Life of Japan, Being an Exhaustive Study of the Nightless City or “History of the Yoshiwara Yukwaku” (First published in 1899 and revised in the 1900s).

• ​Longstreet, Ethel and Stephen, ‘Geishas and the Floating World, Inside Tokyo’s Yoshiwara Pleasure District, (North Clarendon, Vermont, 2020).

• ​Ryōko, Matsuba, ‘Shunga and the Floating World: The Yoshiwara Pleasure Quarter’ in Clark, Timothy, Gerstle, C. Andrew, Ishigami, Aki, Yano, Akiko, (eds.), ‘Shunga: Sex and Pleasure in Japanese Art’, (London, 2013).

Break Music: Sakura, Sakura by Steffen Schmidt on PremiumBeat by Shutterstock, https://www.premiumbeat.com (Purchased with license on the 23/04/2025)

Beginning and closing theme, ‘Classical Orchestral Dvorak Serenade Waltz Strings Music, provided by mrqwertz on https://www.pond5.com (Purchased with license on the 01/06/2024)