Aditya Banerjee Section AD8 Musui s story is that of the autobiography of a low samurai and his reflections upon

his life. The book opens up with a prologue, in which Musui gives some advice on living the right kind of life. He mentions things like filial piety, moderation and frugality. He asks men to be strong of heart and mind, and women to be devoted. The next section of the story is Musui s childhood. Musui explains how he was a naughty child and that his mother always covered up for him and his father was unaware. Musui also marks his fight, when he smashed another child s face with a rock for destroying his kite. When Musui reached the age of seven, he was adopted into the Katsu family. After that he gets into another kite related tussle, and ends up fighting 20 or 30 kids, or so he claims. Musui s fighting spirit must ve impressed his attackers, because Musui brags right afterward about how those kids became his followers. Musui also has troubles with his new grandmother, who is apparently unreasonable strict, and loses no opportunity to yell at Kokichi, which is Musui s name for the time being. Musui then beat up more kids with his gang, took judo lessons and riding lessons. His father attempted to send Musui to school, and Musui ended up just staying at home, but having to do almost everything by himself, not to mention his grandmother. When Musui became 14 years old, he decided to run away from home. He went to Kyoto, and befriended a couple of merchants headed in the same direction. But the merchants took off with Musui s belongings. After that, Musui was instructed by the innkeeper to become a beggar, and so that he becomes. And Musui also went on pilgrimages, and was well fed every now and then by kind men, and spent most of his time asleep in a shrine. Musui also showed up a bunch of horse riders the real way to ride a horse and one of them took Musui in for a few days and bought into all of Musui s lies. Then Musui sneaked off with some cash, befriended a beggar, starved, and on the verge of life he stumbled around till one day a porter found him, cleaned him up, and carried him in a palanquin for a while until breaking into a fight with his fellow porters and kicking Musui onto the street. Musui slept on the edge of a cliff, fell, hit his testicles on a rock, and could barely walk. Later a fisherman took him in, and for a while Musui worked for him, before running off with some money early in the morning. After that, Musui pretty much headed home, and to his surprise, people were relieved to see him, and according to Musui s commissioner Ishikawa, a month later, and the Katsu family name would ve died out. Now we move on to Musui s youth. His grandmother was still unbearable, so Musui avoided the house. Musui was also asked to guard a box of money for his brother, but was tempted by one of his friends and stole some. Then, when his brother was yelling at him, Musui s father interjected, and let Musui off the hook, and everyone continued on as if Musui never stole the money at all. Musui got into a big fight with a couple of friends and they all escaped unharmed. Musui gained respect for his sword and learned about appraising swords. Then Musui tried to fence with those same friends and got beaten unconscious. He took a few fencing lessons and was soon surpassing the top students of many different fencing schools. He also gained many followers, including some teachers of fencing school. Musui just kept getting into more and more fencing duels. He intimidated and beat the top students from any school he found. He walked around in the night with his underlings . Fearing no one, Musui saw himself as the king of fencing. At the same time, to keep up this appearance, Musui spent more money than he had, and at one point, realized that he was borrowing money with no intention of paying back. He realized one day that he was 21 and penniless, so he ran away again. Musui met up the fisherman he used to work for, and revealed that he stole some money from the fisherman s house when he left last time, and paid back his debt to the fishermen, and then some. Then Musui had to cross into a different province, and talked his way out of having to show official papers to let him through. Later on, when denied entry into an inn, Musui made up a name and claimed to be one of the top people of the shogunate. The innkeepers apologize, and Musui was well fed and

rested, and instead of paying, he was even offered money. Musui continued this charade, up until he reached his old friends house (by palanquin). His friend was amazed by Musui appearance, and Musui stayed a few days. When making his preparations to leave, Musui s friend fell sick, so Musui stayed some more to take care of his friend and his affairs. One day, a relative of Musui came to tell Musui he is wanted back home. So Musui returned, and his father told him he was doing a pretty bad job at running his life. He locked Musui in a cage for a while, and then asked Musui to get a real job, and Musui prepared to do so. Now starts the adult phase of Musui s life. Though Musui couldn t find any work, he did help solve a lot of other people s problems. Concerned about his own troubles, Musui received advice from an elderly man that he should try and return a good deed for every ill will. Musui tried this and suddenly, his relations with everybody improved, even with his grandmother. Afterwards, a man named Hyogo, a Shinto priest, set up an association for his shrine, and asked Musui to be a part of it. So Musui causes the association to grow into a large group, and organizes a big festival. But then during the festivities, Hyogo went on a drunken rant about one of Musui s friends, which then left Musui no choice to beat down this Hyogo. The next day, members of the association begged Musui to forgive Hyogo, and he reluctantly agreed. At Hyogo s house, Hyogo apologized and Hyogo s nephew tried to attack Musui, and then fled. Musui chased him, and got lost, got locked in a closet, and then once he decided to forgive everyone, he was let out. Then everyone had a drink, and things were fine. Musui left the association the next day. Then, at some point, Musui saw a person using prayers and predicting lotteries, busted in, mastered it, and everyone was in awe. Musui also went on to marry two people together, preformed austerities, and tried fasting a few times. His son reached the age of 7. Musui s adult life continued, and he advised his landlord against taking a promotion, which the landlord took, and ended up in considerable debt. Musui enrolled his son in writing and reading lessons, and on the way to one, he was bitten in the testicles by a dog, and barely survived. Then Musui's new landlord was in debt, and though Musui tried to fix it, the landlord, Okano, became ill and died, leaving the name Okano with a negative reputation, but Musui found a nice bride for his son, and the family line was restored. Back to being out of money again, Musui preformed a pilgrimage, and then his friends tried to help him out, but Musui wouldn t have any of it, and returned to sword selling. His friends all had their swords sold through him. Musui also judged several fencing competitions, regarded as the best of the best. Musui relationship with his brother strained. Musui s brother got a cage for Musui to live in, and Musui said he was just going to commit suicide, and got everyone worried, and then decided it was time to retire. The family name was passed onto his son. Musui now spent his days trying out different money making schemes and easily spending all the money he gained. He attempted a pilgrimage, and started getting interested in puppet plays and dances that he went to watch frequently. Then a big controversy started with a man named Josuke, who cheated an acquaintance of Musui s out of money, and now had that same acquaintance in debt for a hefty sum. So Musui traveled to where the villagers lived and tried to raise money, but they were very stingy. So Musui put on a big show, pretended to predict weather, and was about to commit suicide, when the villagers into begging him to take the money to pay off Josuke. Then Musui went back to the village and demoted and promoted all the necessary people. Musui tried some more money schemes, got weaker in health, and thus concluded his take on life in retirement. Some more events were that a man named Saito tricked a silver nugget away from someone and Musui was able to get it back using his wits. He also got into more fights. In the last chapter Musui reflects on his life, and is grateful to have lived so full a life and be blessed with his family, his circumstances, and realizes the true meaning of righteousness and that he was following the opposite all along.