Madame Chrysanthème

About “Madame Chrysanthème”

Madame Chrysanthème is an 1887 novel by Pierre Loti, written in French and presented as the journal of a naval officer who was temporarily married to a Japanese woman while stationed in Nagasaki. The story is based on the officer's one-month paid relationship with a woman named Kiku, known as Chrysanthemum, in the Jūzenji neighborhood in 1885. The novel was highly successful, with 25 editions in the first five years after its publication. It was translated into several languages, including English, and is seen as an important work in shaping Western views of Japan at the turn of the 20th century. In Japan, the novel is known as お菊さん, a direct translation of the French title. (Summary adapted from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0.)