일본 근세 전기 소설에 있어서 여자고용인의 양상－사이카쿠소설을 중심으로－

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to investigate characteristics of women employees depicted in the Modern Japanese biographical literatures such as Saikaku novels and Ganajosi,especially in 『Miyakohujokukagami』and 『Sikidookagami』, an encyclopedia of bawdy house. The employees of the Edo era are those who work and get paid by the owner during designated contract period, not like slaves or servants of the previous era. Thus, the relationship between the women employees and their owner is not subordinate as found in slaves and servants, which is subordinate. In other words, the time when the relationship of employment as an employer and employee is established is the Edo era. However, one of the interesting aspects of this relationship is that the ower has a private right of sanction and he or she goes unpunished by law even though the owner infringes women employees’ sexual right. As such, women employees’ life is the one as the socially disadvantaged. In spite of their social status as the underprivileged as expressed in the works, their existence is different from other women who are samurais’, farmer’s, or merchant’s wives. In a male-dominated society, those women’s existence is mainly to carry on their husband side’s family line as the ownership of properties or lands belongs to their husband, as bread earner. To sum up, it is not too much to say that the women employees’ life is the one as independent and dynamic workers, who bravely participate in economic activity for the livelihood of their family.