FROM SHŌGUN TO GODZILLA

Brosterman charts the cultural, social, and political events of modern Japan against the evolution of sugoroku, a centuries-old traditional board game.

This collection features sugoroku boards published between the years 1870 and 1960, each elaborately illustrated along themes (from sports and exploration to folk tales and politics) that reflect its era. Alongside the colorful reprints, the author lists each game’s details (title, year, size, publisher, editor) and provides an in-depth explanation of the visuals. Discussing particularly elaborate boards that have multiple elements—such as “Developing Fortune for the Country,” a board that shows a “highly abbreviated political/military history of Japan in the Western-influenced era from 1858 until its printing in 1931”—Brosterman helpfully breaks them down into separate parts. (“Lower right corner—1858, Commodore Perry and a representative from the Japanese Shogunate sign the Harris treaty allowing commerce between the nations.”) Themes and rules vary wildly between boards, but they always relate to the events of the time. “Student’s Allowance,” for example, depicts a shopping street in Tokyo where players decide what to spend or save; it was published after the economic destruction wreaked by the Great Kantō Earthquake of 1923. The sugoroku prints are colorful, frenetic, and gorgeously detailed, with a constant sense of movement evoked by the colors and image placements. Brosterman’s explanatory text, despite a few typos, provides useful context that transforms the brilliant images into visual slices of history. A particularly compelling aspect of the book is the discovery that each era has its own unique style and emphasis—an 1899 sugoroku, for example, portrays the noble aim of the Japanese Red Cross, while a 1950s print features plenty of aliens, monsters, and spaceships representing a chaotic new world in the wake of Japan’s nuclear devastation. The interplay between art and functionality transforms these dazzling pictures into captivating cultural touchstones.

Lush pictures paired with fascinating facts make for a gorgeous and informative display of an enduring Japanese art form.