The future of Tae-sama’s life
NHK’s TV series “Bakebake” for the second half of 2025 is a story modeled on Yakumo Koizumi (Patrick Lafcadio Hearn), who left behind such literary masterpieces as “Unknown Faces of Japan” and “Ghost Stories”, and his wife Setsu Koizumi, who supported him and told him various ghost stories. [Image] Eh…! Keiko Kitagawa level? This is the actual Setsu Koizumi, daughter of the “model for Tae,” who was said to be the most beautiful woman in the Matsue clan. In the fourth week, the main character Toki Matsuno (played by Akari Takaishi) came to Tokyo to bring back her husband Ginjiro (played by Kanichiro), who had left the Matsuno family. Toki is conflicted when Ginjiro asks her not to return to Matsue but to live with him in Tokyo. In episode 19, Toki’s adoptive grandfather “Kan’emon” (played by Fumiyo Kohinata), who is in Matsue, reported to his relative “Tae Amemizu” (played by Keiko Kitagawa), Toki’s biological mother, that she may not return from Tokyo. At that time, Tae told her that she was leaving Matsue after losing her husband “Den” (played by Shinichi Tsutsumi) in episode 15. Viewers voiced their concerns about Tae, who was born into a prominent family in the Matsue clan and had no experience in household chores, wondering if she would be able to survive away from Matsue, saying, “I don’t think a princess can do a job or anything like that, so is she going to be okay? What will happen to her in the future? *The article from this point forward touches on information that may lead to spoilers for “Bakebake. Toki’s model, Setsu Koizumi’s real mother, Chie Koizumi, was born in March 1837 as the daughter of the Shiomi family, a retainer of the Matsue domain. She was a highly educated daughter of a samurai family, but because of her so-called “princess upbringing,” her life skills were still poor. Chie married Minato Koizumi at the age of 14 and had 11 children (Setsu was the sixth child she adopted). After the Meiji Restoration, her husband Minato started a successful weaving company, and Chie lived a comfortable life for many years. However, after 1886, the company’s performance began to decline, her second son died young, her eldest son ran away, and Minato died of rheumatism in 1887, in succession. In “Bakebake,” Tae was still living in the Amemizu family mansion as of episode 19, but the Koizumi family actually moved out of the mansion during Mr. Minato’s lifetime and took refuge in the tenement house where their retainers once lived and in the homes of relatives and friends. Chie’s parents, the Shiomi family, and other relatives of the old samurai family had all fallen, so she had no one to turn to. Chie, who was a noble daughter of a samurai family, did not work after selling off her family’s possessions and eventually became a beggar. However, the situation changed when Setsu began working as a maid for Lafcadio Hearn, an English teacher at an ordinary junior high school in Matsue, and they later became husband and wife. At the time, Mr. Hahn’s salary of 100 yen per year as a teacher was second only to that of the prefectural governor. Setsu began to send money to Chie, and her life became stable. Chie moved to Osaka in her later years and died in January 1912 at the age of 74. It is unclear where Tae would leave Matsue, but it is unlikely that she would be able to make a living. It will be interesting to see if she, too, will become a beggar in the future. *The “Taka” in Akari Takaishi is “Hashigodaka” Reference book: “The Life of Koizumi Setu, Wife of Yakumo” (Author: Yoji Hasegawa / Tide Publishing Co.
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