He was born the second son of Kuwajima Katsuyoshi, a samurai serving the Andō family, senior retainers of the Kii Tokugawa. His real name was Kurahashi Juhei. While serving faithfully as a samurai, he was gifted at both drawing and writing, and would later delight the people of Edo with illustrated stories full of humor and satire.
He was taken into service by the Kojima domain in Suruga, working at tasks such as writing documents. The same year he was adopted by his father's elder brother, Kurahashi Katsumasa, also a Kojima retainer, and joined the Kurahashi family. In his youth he studied painting under the ukiyo-e artist Toriyama Sekien and is said to have admired the style of Katsukawa Shunshō.
When Matsudaira Nobuyoshi became lord of the domain, Harumachi was given still greater responsibilities. The domain's Edo residence stood in Koishikawa Kasuga-chō, and his later pen name Koikawa Harumachi is said to derive from this place name and from the name of the popular artist Katsukawa Shunshō. He balanced samurai duties with creative work.
He illustrated the sharebon Tōsei Fūzoku Tsū written by Hōseidō Kisanji, the Akita domain's Edo liaison and a comic author. He was especially close to Kisanji, about ten years his senior, and many works pair Kisanji's text with Harumachi's pictures. Kisanji is also said to have arranged Harumachi's second marriage.
He published Kinkin Sensei Eiga no Yume, writing and illustrating it himself. The story of a country youth who dreams of glory in the city portrayed Edo's fashions and customs with wit and became a huge hit as an illustrated book for adults. The kibyōshi genre is said to have begun with this work.
With works such as Kōmansai Angya Nikki he became a popular author. The same year, his adoptive father retired, so he succeeded to the Kurahashi house with 100 koku and took an important post attending the lord. Apart from the humor in his works, his responsibilities as a retainer grew.
After serving as the lord's chamberlain and steward, he rose to a rank close to that of a senior councilor and took part in the core of Kojima's government. Though it was a small domain, Harumachi had at once the face of a dutiful retainer and that of a comic author popular in Edo.
From about this time he became absorbed in kyōka, comic poetry, under the name Sake no Ue no Furachi, and formed his own circle. In the Tenmei era kyōka was all the rage in Edo, centered on figures like Ōta Nanpo, as samurai and townspeople gathered across class lines to enjoy wordplay and satire.
He became a full senior councilor of the Kojima domain, with 120 koku. The same year in Edo, senior councilor Matsudaira Sadanobu began the Kansei Reforms. Sadanobu promoted thrift and the encouragement of letters and arms and strictly cracked down on luxury and lax morals, so tension spread through the world of popular fiction too.
He wrote the kibyōshi Ōmugaeshi Bunbu no Futamichi, mocking Sadanobu's policy of encouraging letters and arms. Published the following New Year, it caused a sensation, but its laughter at the shogunate's reforms was taken as a problem among Sadanobu's circle. There was also a rumor that it was actually his lord's work issued under Harumachi's name.
At New Year the book was banned by shogunate order. A rumor says he was summoned by Sadanobu but did not go, pleading illness, though this is uncertain. In the fourth month he retired on grounds of illness, and he died in the seventh month. One theory holds that he took his own life for fear of causing trouble for his lord (opinions differ).
Ōta NanpoMatsudaira SadanobuTsutaya Jūzaburō
Sugita GenpakuMaruyama ŌkyoUeda AkinariHayashi ShiheiInō TadatakaHanawa HokiichiHasegawa HeizōShiba Kokan
People of the Edo period ・ People by period
Based on facts found in textbooks and biographies. Uncertain points are marked as such.