Uramado

December 1958

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Cover of Uramado, December 1958

Issue Details

Volume
3
Issue
15
PDF pages
293

Summary

The December 1958 issue of Uramado is a large illustrated fiction anthology built around a special feature on slavery, oppression, captivity, and coercive authority. Its contents range from modern crime melodrama and foreign-set adventure to historical fiction, grotesque fantasy, psychological suspense, and serial period narrative. The cover presents a shackled woman beside a heavy iron ball, while the formal contents spread frames bondage, servitude, imprisonment, forced labor, and escape as the issue’s governing motifs.

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The opening sequence establishes the magazine’s strongly visual character. “Strange Tale of Nude-Woman Island” is presented as a colorful illustrated adventure involving abduction, underground passages, secret ceremonies, masked captors, and a community of imprisoned women. Fujisawa Osamu’s “Young Nude” follows as a photographic portfolio of studio nudes posed against a dark background, emphasizing bodily contour, flexibility, and sculptural composition. Nakajima Kimi’s illustrated narrative “The Scarlet Crape-Paper Tale” then shifts to an Edo-period setting of seduction, betrayal, confinement, and violence.

The central body combines modern and historical stories united by unequal power. “The Price of a Virgin” follows a criminal conspiracy involving an underworld organization, sexual manipulation, narcotics, murder, and an endangered woman. The main special feature begins with “Palace of Troubled Slaves,” depicting a woman sold in a slave market, transported to a fortified estate, restrained, punished, and compelled to perform. “The Cage of Hell,” “Prostitution Slave Street,” “Tragic Wish at Hatchōbori,” and “Strange Suicides” extend the issue’s interest in incarceration, criminal exploitation, hidden institutions, urban vice, and mysterious death.

Later contributions broaden the geography and tone. “Prostitute Rain,” “Jar Hell,” “Calendar of Fragrant Skin,” and “White Flame” mix erotic obsession with crime and psychological menace. “The Foreign Magazine’s Female Slaves” explicitly treats representations of female bondage in overseas publications, giving the issue a documentary and comparative interlude. Historical and adventure stories such as “The Ivory Throne,” “The Poisonous Yellow Moth,” “The Slave-Ship Incident,” and “The Female Slave’s Jewel” explore colonial fantasy, forced transport, rebellion, dangerous rulers, and contested possession.

The closing third returns increasingly to Japanese period fiction and the supernatural. “Earless Grass,” “The Bodhisattva of the Cellar,” and “The Incarnated Ecstatic Female Buddha” employ religious imagery, hidden chambers, transformation, and grotesque revelation. The final installment of “Skull Lantern” closes the issue with an extended Edo-period tale of abduction, torture, criminal pursuit, and rescue. Editorial matter, publication information, contribution notices, and advertisements complete an issue whose visual and narrative identity rests on the spectacle of domination and the repeated possibility of resistance, flight, revenge, or reversal.

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Table of Contents 26 items
  1. Strange Tale of Nude-Woman Island by Natsumoto Keinosuke
    Summary

    An illustrated historical erotic adventure recounts the capture and coercive exploitation of women on a mysterious “Nude-Woman Island,” combining narrated episodes with staged scenes of captivity, restraint, and domination.

  2. Young Nude by Fujisawa Osamu
    Summary

    A photographic nude feature presents a young female model in a series of posed studio images emphasizing the body, posture, and visual spectacle of nudity.

  3. The Scarlet Crape-Paper Tale by Nakajima Kimi
    Summary

    An illustrated historical erotic tale follows the abduction and subjugation of a woman through elaborate rope and cloth restraints, coercive encounters, and the fantasies of captors and servants.

  4. The Price of a Virgin by Gamage Kazumi
    Summary

    A serialized erotic crime narrative follows gangster Renjiro’s pursuit and coercive domination of the young woman Yoko amid abduction, violence, sexualized punishment, and police investigation, accompanied by dramatic illustrations.

  5. Palace of Troubled Slaves by Odagiri Sō
    Summary

    An illustrated historical erotic serial follows Natsu, a woman captured and sold into slavery, as she endures coercive restraint, humiliation, punishment, and attempted escape amid slave-market and palace intrigue.

  6. The Cage of Hell by Shima Fuji
    Summary

    A serialized SM fiction narrative set around a theatrical troupe, in which actresses and other women are subjected to coercive bondage, punishment, humiliation, and sexualized backstage domination by men who stage and observe their suffering. The story emphasizes theatrical spectacle, escalating restraint, and the transformation of abuse into erotic performance.

  7. Prostitution Slave Street by Iida Toyokichi
    Summary

    A serialized erotic crime narrative follows men who abduct, confine, and sexually exploit women in a prostitution district, depicting coercion, captivity, violence, and the circulation of enslaved women through organized brothels. The story uses dramatic dialogue and staged photographic or illustrative scenes to intensify its depiction of domination and oppression.

  8. Tragic Wish at Hatchōbori by Hashizume Hikoshichi
    Summary

    A historically set, illustrated crime narrative follows samurai and townspeople through coercion, betrayal, pursuit, and violent retribution in Edo-period Hatchōbori. Its melodramatic plot combines forbidden desire with captivity and murder.

  9. Strange Suicides by Kanbe Yūichi
    Summary

    A sensational illustrated report presents a series of unusual suicides, including deaths by hanging, gas, drowning, firearms, and other carefully described methods, accompanied by staged photographic scenes and explanatory commentary.

  10. Prostitute Rain by Erigaki Zan
    Summary

    A serialized erotic horror narrative follows high-school student Ayako as her encounters with teachers escalate into coercive sexual abuse, pursuit, humiliation, and violent domination amid persistent rain and threatening supernatural imagery.

  11. Jar Hell by Kawaguchi Naoki
    Summary

    A serialized supernatural erotic-horror tale in which a mysterious woman and predatory men become entangled in confinement, bodily transformation, hallucination, and violent domination associated with an uncanny jar or vessel.

  12. Calendar of Fragrant Skin by Iwahori Hikaru
    Summary

    An Edo-period erotic serial follows the beautiful Otama as she is drawn into a world of sexual coercion, captivity, voyeuristic display, and power struggles within elite households and pleasure settings.

  13. White Flame by Kōno Haruo
    Summary

    A first-person erotic narrative portrays an intense and secretive sexual relationship between two men, framed through longing, reunion, physical intimacy, and emotional dependence.

  14. An Eerie Notebook: Do Not Open That Box by Sasaki Chikara
    Summary

    A fictional found notebook recounts bizarre and terrifying incidents involving a mysterious sealed box, supernatural events, violence, and the efforts to uncover the truth behind them.

  15. Female Slaves in Foreign Magazines by Tōge Kōsuke
    Summary

    This illustrated survey of foreign erotic magazines examines depictions of female slavery, bondage, captivity, and coercion through imported photographs, staged scenes, and magazine commentary.

  16. The Ivory Throne by Tachibana Shintarō
    Summary

    A serialized adventure fantasy follows expeditions, African rulers and soldiers, enslaved people, and violent struggles surrounding the fabled Ivory Throne, emphasizing captivity, coercion, and rescue.

  17. Bubble Hell by Matsui Yoriko
    Summary

    A serialized erotic narrative follows Ginji and Junko through an increasingly coercive relationship involving restraint, physical punishment, humiliation, domestic scenes, and conflicted marital desire.

  18. The Captive Beauty by Hada Hikaru
    Summary

    A historical erotic serial set amid Sengoku-era warfare depicts samurai and soldiers capturing, humiliating, restraining, and exploiting women, while following the resistance and escape efforts of the central characters.

  19. Hebiko Island by Magaki Shin
    Summary

    This fictional narrative follows Shigeru and other boys confined in a remote juvenile institution, where they endure hunger, beatings, forced labor, harsh discipline, and attempted escapes while struggling against institutional oppression.

  20. The Poisonous Yellow Moth by Mizorogi Jakushi
    Summary

    A dark erotic-fantasy narrative follows a man’s encounter with a mysterious woman whose attraction, bodily transformation, and eventual moth-like identity are linked to poisonous yellow moth powder and occult experimentation.

  21. The Slave-Ship Incident by Dan Tatsuji
    Summary

    A historical account of the Maria Luz slave-ship incident recounts the abuse and attempted escape of Chinese contract laborers, the Japanese legal intervention that freed them, and the ensuing diplomatic dispute over slavery, human rights, and extraterritorial jurisdiction.

  22. The Female Slave’s Jewel by Fujimi Miyako
    Summary

    A historical erotic adventure set in the Mongol world follows enslaved women subjected to captivity, coercive service, rope restraint, punishment, and pursuit amid rivalries over a precious jewel.

  23. Earless Grass by Sasamoto Tōru
    Summary

    A literary narrative follows a young woman with severe hearing loss through hospitalization, surgery, family concern, and an emotionally complex relationship with a nurse as she hopes to regain hearing and independence.

  24. The Bodhisattva of the Cellar by Enjōji Tatsu
    Summary

    An Edo-period erotic captivity tale in which the painter Sōtatsu abducts O-Mitsu, binds and confines her in a cellar, and subjects her to escalating threats, humiliation, and sexual coercion before the narrative’s violent climax.

  25. The Incarnated Ecstatic Female Buddha by Umeda Kusuo
    Summary

    A surreal erotic narrative in which an artist’s encounter with a young woman becomes an obsessive dream of bodily transformation, mystical female sexuality, and the merging of devotional imagery with desire.

  26. Skull Lantern by Shimamoto Haruo
    Summary

    This serialized historical erotic adventure follows samurai, attendants, and other characters through abduction, interrogation, violent captivity, escape attempts, and conspiratorial pursuit in an Edo-period setting, accompanied by dramatic bondage and torture illustrations. Rope restraint, blindfolding, needles, beatings, and executionary menace recur as both narrative devices and visual motifs.

Highlights

  • The formal contents spread organizes the issue as a special feature on slavery and oppression, combining twenty-six substantive works across photography, crime fiction, historical melodrama, foreign adventure, and supernatural narrative. (PDF p. 4).
  • “Strange Tale of Nude-Woman Island” opens with a highly illustrated fantasy of abduction, underground passages, masked captors, ritualized violence, and a hidden community of imprisoned women. (PDF pp. 6–13).
  • Fujisawa Osamu’s “Young Nude” is an extended studio portfolio using black backgrounds, contorted poses, and tightly framed limbs to emphasize the body as an abstract sculptural form. (PDF pp. 14–19).
  • “The Price of a Virgin” combines organized crime, murder, narcotics, sexual manipulation, and a threatened woman in a noir-style narrative illustrated with photographic collage and drawings. (PDF pp. 29–42).
  • “Palace of Troubled Slaves” begins the principal special feature with a woman purchased in a slave market, transported to a fortified compound, restrained, punished, and forced to entertain her captors. (PDF pp. 43–54).
  • “Prostitution Slave Street” develops the theme through a modern urban setting of commercial sexual exploitation, coercive control, and the social machinery surrounding prostitution. (PDF pp. 69–84).
  • “The Foreign Magazine’s Female Slaves” surveys representations of female bondage and servitude in overseas periodicals, providing a rare comparative and documentary feature within the fiction-heavy issue. (PDF pp. 156–163).
  • “The Ivory Throne” and “The Poisonous Yellow Moth” form a substantial late-middle sequence of foreign adventure, dangerous rulers, captivity, intrigue, and political violence. (PDF pp. 164–219).
  • “The Slave-Ship Incident” and “The Female Slave’s Jewel” center forced transport, confinement aboard ship, contested ownership, rebellion, and the circulation of enslaved women as valuable property. (PDF pp. 220–244).
  • The concluding “Skull Lantern” installment sustains an Edo-period atmosphere of abduction, punishment, criminal pursuit, bodily peril, and rescue before the publication and editorial back matter. (PDF pp. 271–292).

Contributors

Named contributors represented in this issue: