Runaway Horses - References To Historical Events

References To Historical Events

Runaway Horses is the most explicitly political of the novels in The Sea of Fertility and contains detailed descriptions of the court and penitentiary systems of the time, and of official attitudes towards political extremists.

• The May 15 Incident of 1932, during which Prime Minister Inukai was assassinated, is in the newspaper Honda reads in the opening scene (ch. 2)
• The kendo tournament takes place at Omiwa Shrine at the foot of Mount Miwa near Sakurai, Nara (ch. 4)
• The Shimpūren Rebellion of 1876: an attack on Kumamoto Castle led by "The League of the Divine Wind" (Japanese Shinpūren), and retreat to Mount Kinpo, immediately prior to the Satsuma Rebellion (ch. 9)
• Meiji Shrine and Yasukuni Shrine are visited every month by Iinuma's academy (ch.12)
• A petition presented at the Japanese Diet in June 1932 for a moratorium on farmers' debts (ch. 15)
• The UK goes off the gold standard in 1931 (ch. 15)
• The retiring Finance Minister Takahashi's efforts to sabotage the embargo on gold exports (ch. 15)
• The possibility of the recognition of Manchukuo (ch. 15)
• The policy of reflation (ch. 15)
• The rice riots of 1918, which prompted Premier Terauchi's resignation (ch. 15)
• The Bon Festival in Karuizawa (ch. 15)
• The Olympic Games of 1932 in Los Angeles, United States (ch. 18)
• Honda goes to the Osaka Noh Theatre in Tennoji-Dogashiba (ch. 19)
• Master Kaido's 6-acre (24,000 m2) training camp is at Yanagawa, in Minamitsuru District, Yamanashi. The camp lies under Motozawa Cliff, next to the Katsura River, near Mount Gozen (ch. 22-23)
• Isao remembers sparring with the kendo master Fukuchi (ch. 27)
• The London Naval Conference of 1930, considered humiliating to Japan (ch. 37)
• Sagoya shoots Premier Hamaguchi (ch. 37)
• Famine in Tohoku and Hokkaidō in 1931 (ch. 37)