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Shusaku
Keywords: Culture & History, People
Honinbo Shusaku (1829-62) is considered by many to be the greatest player of the golden age of Go in the mid-19th century. He was nicknamed "Invincible Shusaku" because of his perfect score of 19 successive wins in the annual castle games. Shusaku was born on 5 May 1829,
the son of merchant Kuwahara Wazo, in a village near the town of Onomichi. His talent for Go was discovered early, and by the age of six he was already known as a Go prodigy in the environment. Lord Asano, the daimyo of the region, heard of the child's qualities, and after playing a game with him, became his patron, and allowed him to get lessons from Asano's own personal trainer, Hoshin, a player of professional level. In January 1837, Ito Showa, one of the strongest players of the day, visited Onomichi, and played a game with Shusaku, who by this time was already near (professional) shodan, and was impressed with the boy's ability. Because he could no longer get his teaching in Onomichi, in November 1837, Shusaku was sent to Edo to become a disciple of the Honinbo school. On 28 November, 1839, Shusaku was awarded a shodan diploma, and in 1840, during a one-year visit back home, he was awarded a yearly stipend by Lord Asano. Arriving back in Edo in September 1841, Shusaku was given the name we now know him under (until then he was called Torajiro), and promoted to 2-dan. In 1843, still only 14 years old, he was promoted to 4-dan. In 1844 he left for another stay at Onomichi, this time staying there for eighteen months. In July 1846, during his travel back to Edo, Shusaku met Gennan Inseki 8-dan, of whom it is said that he was of Meijin strength, but had the bad luck of living in a time when there were several other extremely strong players, especially Shuwa. In the first game of this encounter, Shusaku took two stones. Gennan, realizing that he had no chance of winning, left the game unfinished, and the next game was played with Shusaku just taking Black. This was actually a great honor, Gennan indicating that Shusaku's strength was much greater than his degree indicated. The first game on just Black, is Shusaku's most famous game of his career, and contains the most famous move of all of Go history: the Ear Reddening Move. The game, which Shusaku won by a three-point margin despite a mistake in a new variant of the taisha joseki, is considered a lifetime masterpiece for both players. They played three more games, of which one was left unfinished and the other two were also won by Shusaku. Shusaku, who on his arrival in Edo heard that he had been promoted to 5-dan, must already have been 6-dan or 7-dan in strength at the time. Back in Edo, Shusaku was asked to become the heir of Shuwa, who was to become the next head of the Honinbo house, but he refused, because of his obligations towards Lord Asano and towards his own family. After some mediation, the Asano clan relinquished its claim on Shusaku, so early 1847 Shusaku could become Shuwa's heir. It was also decided that he would marry Jowa's daughter. In the meantime, Shusaku and Shuwa played a famous series of seventeen games in October 1846 to September 1847. Later that year, Josaku died, and Shuwa became the new leader of the Honinbo house. Shuwa was already recognized as the strongest player of the day. In 1848 Shusaku was officially recognized as Shuwa's heir, and in the same year he was (finally) promoted to 6-dan. In 1849, he took part in the castle games for the first time. In the years to come, he would play a total of 19 castle games, and win them all. He also got his promotion to 7-dan somewhere in these years; some say it happened in 1849, others claim that only in 1853 he was promoted to 7-dan. In 1853, Shusaku played a famous sanjubango (thirty-game match) against Ota Yuzo. Although Shusaku was by most players regarded the strongest player of the day (with the exception of Shuwa), Ota Yuzo was not so sure. Shusaku had many problems with Ota Yuzo, and only in 1849 managed to reach tagai-sen (playing on even) against him. Still, in the match itself, Shusaku proved the stronger player, managing to win the majority of games, and not losing a single one of the games in which he played Black. After 17 games he forced Ota Yuzo to a sen-ai-sen handicap (meaning that Ota took Black 2 out of 3 games), and after game 23, in which Ota Yuzo managed to get a jigo with White, Ota Yuzo discontinued the series. Although Shusaku had convincingly beaten Ota Yuzo, it was not only recognized that this was because of Shusaku's strength rather than Ota Yuzo's weakness, but it was even seen as evidence of Ota Yuzo's strength that he had managed to keep Shusaku at tagai-sen for so long. In the years that followed, to Shusaku's dismay it happened in more than one year that the castle games were not played. He did not play many games in these years. One important match was a jubango (ten-game match) against Shuho, who was intended to become Shusaku's heir. Shuho, playing on a handicap of all Black, won this match with a score of 6-3 and one jigo. In 1862, a cholera epidemic broke out in Edo, and several disciples of the Honinbo house caught the disease. Shusaku involved himself in caring for the sick, which resulted in his catching the disease himself. On 10 August 1862, still only 33 years old, he died. Shusaku is known for being undefeated in all of his nineteen castle games, and for the Shusaku fuseki, which still remains popular. Because of his talent and achievements, he has been given the title of 'Go saint' (Kisei) by later historians of Go. Of all players in Go history, only Dosaku has received the same honour.
Authors: Arno Hollosi, Andre Engels, ...
The official Shusaku website (in Japanese) with pictures:
Another, more recent picture: See also The Ear-Reddening Move of Shusaku, a mystery short story by Jonathon Wood. Harpreet: I'm not trying to start a fight, really, but to what degree do people here feel that Shusaku has been overrated? Never mind that he had an ancient spirit playing his games for him... he still was not able to best Honinbo Shuwa and it seems to me that at least some of his winning percentage comes from the fact that he was a bit of a sandbagger for quite some time. He was not promoted fast enough to reflect his strength and so he unfairly played Black more than he should have. Yes, they're all dead now but I feel a little badly for Shuwa who seems to have been stronger than Shusaku. Also I feel badly for Shuho who just had a lot of bad luck in his life. The jubango against Shuho (who took all black) was lost by Shusaku. That's not domination, just unfair overshadowing. Dieter: I don't know about the Shuwa-Shusaku statistics but I do remember having read that at some point Shusaku would move to White, which refused. Also, if he occasionally found a tough opponent (such as OtaYuzo) he still was the best player overall. Andre Engels: Yes, he would move to white, but that would still be only at sen-ai-sen, that is, Shusaku would have played black in 1 out of every 3 games. He clearly was able to score much better than 50% with black, but we don't know what he would have done on white. Invincible contains a list of all known games between the two. In the 17-game series (1846-1847), Shusaku scored 13 wins, 4 losses, of the games after that (1849-1851, plus one suspended in 1860) he came to 3 wins, 1 loss, 2 games unfinished. All of these were played with Shusaku on black. SillySmarch?: Can someone please explain to me why the man called Torajirou took the name Shusaku, and what it means? I can't find this information in my books. Andrew Grant He took the name Shusaku because Shuwa told him to. Names like Shusaku, Shuwa, Shuho etc. are not their original names. It was traditional to take a new given name, usually one chosen by your teacher, if you became a high dan player in those days. Shusaku literally means "Skillful-Strategy". The "shu" character was taken from Shuwa's name and the "saku" from Shuwa's predecessor Josaku. FHayashi It was also quite common to change your name at the drop of a hat back in those days in Japan. For instance, the famous samurai Miyamoto Musashi didn't have that name when he was born. In the far east of the past, there wasn't that much importance put on one's given name. Even now, there are remnants of the practice in traditional positions, like the two head Sumo referees that take traditional names upon their promotion. BobMcGuigan: The taking of a special name after a significant achievement continues to the present in go. Kato assumed a special name (Kensei) when he won the Honinbo title recently. I think in modern times this practice has been associated mostly with the Honinbo title. In the past, when someone became head of the Honinbo go house he took Honinbo as his family name and the names we are familiar with (Jowa, Shuwa, Shuho, Shusai, etc) as given names. Gennan Inseki is another example of a go player who changed his name. This is a copy of the living page "Shusaku" at Sensei's Library. ![]() |