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Uramado

March 1960

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Cover of Uramado, March 1960

Issue Details

Volume
5
Issue
3
PDF pages
256

Summary

The March 1960 issue of Uramado is explicitly presented as a special issue devoted to denki shōsetsu, or legendary and fantastic fiction. Its editorial design combines historical adventure, crime and suspense, supernatural motifs, eroticized danger, female captivity, and illustrated spectacle. The opening pages establish this mixture immediately: an American erotic-torment picture story is followed by the color illustrated feature Extinguish the Fire of Bare Skin!! and a brief color nude presentation. The formal contents then leads into a succession of heavily illustrated historical and fantastic narratives.

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The first major story, Legend of the White Monkey Tower, follows travelers, bandits, a young woman, hidden treasure, and a mysterious white-monkey legend, using Edo-period adventure conventions and frequent illustrations of pursuit, restraint, violence, and rescue. It is followed by Fujimi Iku’s Legend of Hawk’s Nest Valley, another extended period adventure in which armed men, a young woman, secret treasure, family history, and mountain danger converge. Blood Calls the Diamond shifts the setting toward modern international crime and suspense, while Strange Tale of Hōnenji returns to Japanese historical mystery. Hasegawa Isamu’s The Snow Demon Woman Has Four Fingers introduces a more overtly supernatural register, centering on a mysterious woman and the uncanny clue of her four-fingered hand.

The middle of the issue moves among fantastic adventure, mystery, short editorial material, and visual experimentation. Mizusawa Yukio’s legendary-fiction contribution, the feature summoned by a disappearing cage or basket, Asatarō Shigure, and Segawa Yasuko’s The Horinushi Mondo Incident, Part One continue the issue’s emphasis on pursuit, crime, violence, and hidden identities. A short editorial feature, A Certain Beauty Exercise, is unusually photographic and bondage-oriented, presenting women restrained to chairs and other supports as a mock exercise sequence. Reader Short Reviews provides a compact participatory interlude before the magazine returns to long-form fiction. The Trap of the Shadow Flower and Suzuki Kazuo’s Illustrated Notes on Punishment Implements and Customs broaden the issue from narrative fiction into erotic crime and historical-punishment material.

The later sections sustain this alternation between literary fantasy, cultural commentary, and erotic sensationalism. An essay on women in the world of Izumi Kyōka examines female characterization in modern literature, while Legend of the Musasabi Incense Burner returns to adventure fiction. Love-Hate Seal Impressions develops a historical mystery involving emotional entanglement and violence. A six-page index of previously published Uramado issues functions as substantial archival back matter. The final sequence includes Red Paper, The Nude Woman Collapses into a Demonic Dream, and Iida Toyokichi’s Hell-Picture Wife, which closes the issue in a mode of dark erotic fantasy and psychological disturbance. Overall, the issue demonstrates Uramado’s characteristic fusion of denki storytelling, illustrated violence, eroticism, historical curiosity, supernatural atmosphere, and reader-oriented magazine culture.

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Table of Contents 23 items
  1. American Edition: Erotic-Torment Picture Story
    3
  2. Extinguish the Fire of Bare Skin!! by Tachibana Shintarō
    11–18
  3. Woman Holding Her Hair by Minomura Kou
    19–20
  4. Legend of the White Monkey Tower by Furuyada Masahide
    27–35
  5. Legend of Hawk's Nest Valley by Fujimi Iku
    36–55
  6. Blood Calls the Diamond by Hayama Takeshi
    56–65
  7. Strange Tale of Hōnenji by Okano Takeya
    66–77
  8. The Snow Demon Woman Has Four Fingers by Hasegawa Isamu
    78–91
  9. Legendary Curse-Binding of the Hunting Tribe by Mizusawa Yukio
    92–103
  10. The Cage That Summoned It by Dō Fumihiko
    104–117
  11. A Certain Beauty Exercise
    118–119
  12. Asatarō Shigure by Mikunizawa Takashi
    120–130
  13. Reader Short Reviews
    131–139
  14. The Horinushi Mondo Incident, Part One by Segawa Yasuko
    140–155
  15. The Trap of the Shadow Flower by Tsurunuma Jirō
    156–171
  16. Illustrated Notes on Punishment Implements and Customs by Suzuki Kazuo
    172–185
  17. Women in the World of Izumi Kyōka by Naka Yasuhiro
    186–197
  18. Legend of the Musasabi Incense Burner by Tama Gunpei
    198–210
  19. Love-Hate Seal Impressions by Kano Katsuhiko
    211–223
  20. Uramado Back-Issue Contents Index
    224–229
  21. Red Paper by Enjōji Tatsu
    230–235
  22. The Nude Woman Collapses into a Demonic Dream by Tōge Kōsuke
    236–247
  23. Hell-Picture Wife by Iida Toyokichi
    248–266

Highlights

  • The issue announces itself as a Special Issue on Legendary Fiction and uses a formal contents spread framed by reclining nude line drawings, visually joining literary fantasy with erotic illustration. (PDF pp. 1,4).
  • An American erotic-torment picture story and Extinguish the Fire of Bare Skin!! open the issue with Westernized crime, firearms, nudity, and danger before the magazine turns to Japanese historical fiction. (PDF pp. 3,7–14).
  • Legend of the White Monkey Tower is a substantial illustrated period adventure centered on travelers, bandits, a young woman, hidden treasure, violence, and the mystery of a white-monkey tower. (PDF pp. 17–25).
  • Fujimi Iku's Legend of Hawk's Nest Valley is one of the issue's major long-form narratives, combining mountain adventure, a captive or endangered young woman, armed pursuit, family secrets, and hidden gold. (PDF pp. 26–45).
  • Blood Calls the Diamond shifts the special issue into modern international crime and suspense, using illustrations of guns, pursuit, nightlife, and violence to evoke hard-boiled Western adventure. (PDF pp. 46–55).
  • The Snow Demon Woman Has Four Fingers introduces an overt supernatural motif, with the four-fingered woman functioning as both mystery and uncanny erotic presence within an illustrated adventure narrative. (PDF pp. 68–81).
  • A Certain Beauty Exercise is an unusual photographic feature presenting women restrained to chairs and supports under the guise of bodily exercise, making bondage itself the central visual subject. (PDF pp. 108–109).
  • Illustrated Notes on Punishment Implements and Customs moves away from fiction into a historically framed discussion of penal objects, bodily punishment, and customary practices, accompanied by explanatory drawings. (PDF pp. 162–175).
  • The essay Women in the World of Izumi Kyōka examines female figures in Kyōka's literary world and marks a shift from sensational fiction toward literary-cultural commentary. (PDF pp. 176–187).
  • The closing group of Red Paper, The Nude Woman Collapses into a Demonic Dream, and Hell-Picture Wife returns the issue to eroticized psychological disturbance, uncanny femininity, and dark illustrated fiction. (PDF pp. 220–256).

Contributors

Named contributors represented in this issue:

Kinbaku Today is an independent online journal dedicated to the study, practice, and cultural history of Japanese rope bondage. Blending essays, translations, interviews, and archival research, it explores kinbaku not simply as technique, but as a living dialogue between history, performance, and human connection.
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