I have worked on Japan and the Culture of the Four Seasons on and off for many years and have accumulated many debts. I would like to thank Horikiri Minoru for being my host at Waseda University when I began to research this book and the late Ogata Tsutomu for many years of mentorship. Okuda Isao, who has been both a longtime mentor and a friend, helped me in ways that are too numerous to recount. Komine Kazuaki has also been a constant intellectual companion. I cannot thank enough Andrew Watsky, who read the full manuscript not once but twice and offered extremely detailed and helpful comments, particularly in areas of painting and tea ceremony. I am grateful to Wiebke Denecke, Matthew McKelway, David Atherton, and Jennifer Guest, all of whom read the manuscript and gave me invaluable feedback. I am thankful to Lewis Cook, who went over the entire manuscript multiple times as a fellow scholar and close friend. I must mention Kitamura Yuika, who, in translating parts of the early manuscript, carefully checked the contents and references.
The questions that I was asked and the responses that I received at public lectures at the University of Alberta, the Asia Society, Columbia University, Emory University, Japan University (Nichidai), Kyoto University, the University of Michigan, Ochanomizu University, Rikky [University, the University of Virginia, and Waseda University were also immensely helpful. Specifically, I want to thank Akazawa Mari, David Bialock, Steven Carter, Anne Commons, Michael Como, Cheryl Crowley, Torquil Duthie, Fujiwara Katsumi, Hirano Tae, Hiroki Kazuhito, Ii Haruki, Kanechiku Nobuyuki, Kusaka Tsutomu, Christina Laffin, Yukio Lippit, David Lurie, Melissa McCormick, Julia Meech, Max Moerman, Joshua Mostow, Mieko Murase, Nagashima Hiroaki, Nakamachi Keiko, Noda Ken’ichi, Ogawa Yasuhiko, John Rosenfield, Shang Wei, Shinohara Susumu, Henry Smith, Sen So-oku, Suzuki Jun, Wendy Swartz, Tanaka Yukari, Toeda Hirokazu, Tokuda Kazuo, and Watanabe Kenji. For research assistance, I must mention David Atherton, Jennifer Guest, Nan Hartmann, Katherine Robinson, Satoko Naito, Shiho Takai, Christina Yi, and Chi Zhang. My thanks to Michiko Tsuneda, who worked for me as an editorial assistant; to Nayon Cho, who designed the cover; and to Milenda Lee, who designed the book.
I would like to thank John Weber for allowing me to use his screen painting for the jacket. I was also aided by Sarah Thompson at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, and Sinead Kehoe and Masako Watanabe at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. The anonymous readers for Columbia University Press were immensely helpful and generous in their feedback. I was blessed to have Irene Pavitt as editor: her enormous dedication to the manuscript in all phases and aspects was an incredible labor of love. Once again, I express my gratitude to Jennifer Crewe at Columbia University Press for her many words of advice and for having changed the course of my career. Last but not least, I thank Tomi Suzuki for being a constant source of intellectual inspiration and support.