47 Ronin A Samurai Story from Japan

Jennifer Bassett

Oxford Bookworms LibraryLevel 1

A level 1 Oxford Bookworms Library graded reader. Written for Learners of English by Jennifer Bassett.

When Lord Asano drew his sword on Lord Kira one spring day in 1701, it began a story that is now a national legend in Japan. Lord Kira lived, but Lord Asano died, and after his death, his samurai became ronin, samurai without a master. And so began their long plan for revenge on Lord Kira. Their loyalty to their dead master made them famous, and people in Japan remember them to this day. The story of the forty-seven ronin has been told and retold for 300 years – in plays, novels, and films. A major Hollywood film was made about the forty-seven ronin in 2013.

Jennifer Bassett

47 Ronin A Samurai Story from Japan

47В RONIN A Samurai Story from Japan

The story of the forty-seven ronin is a very famous one in Japan. It is a true story about real people, but many of the facts are now lost in time. Soon after the ronin took their revenge, the story was retold in plays, known as Chushingura. Since then the story has been retold in song, story, drama, television plays, visual art, and many films. Each time the story is retold, the details change. But one thing does not change – this story is still as famous in Japan today as it was 300 years ago.

The story begins in Edo (now modern Tokyo) in spring 1701, in the Shogun’s palace. Lord Asano is taking lessons in palace ceremony from Lord Kira, one of the lords in the Shogun’s palace. Kira has only hard words for Asano, and by the end of that terrible day, Lord Asano is dead. Asano’s samurai are now ronin – samurai without a lord or master. They have no home, no place in the world. They have only loyalty to their dead lord.

This is the true story of the forty-seven ronin …

NOTES ABOUT SAMURAI

Samurai

Warriors, famous fighting men in the old days in Japan. They lived by a special set of rules, the samurai code of honour (bushido in Japanese).

Ronin

Samurai without a daimyo (a lord or master). In Japan today ronin are more often called roshi.

Seppuku

Ritual suicide – killing yourself by cutting your stomach open with a knife. This was part of bushido, the samurai code of honour, and for samurai, it was better to commit seppuku than to live a life without honour.

Daimyo

A lord, a powerful ruler of a region in Japan in the old days. Daimyo often had their own armies of three or four hundred samurai to guard their castles and land.

Shogun

The military ruler of Japan in the old days, under the Emperor.

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