Lost Leaves: Women Writers of Meiji JapanMost Japanese literary historians have suggested that the Meiji Period (1868 1912) was devoid of women writers but for the brilliant exception of Higuchi Ichiyo (1872 1896). Rebecca Copeland challenges this claim by examining in detail the lives and literary careers of three of Ichiyo's peers, each representative of the diversity and ingenuity of the period: Miyake Kaho (1868 1944), Wakamatsu Shizuko (1864 1896), and Shimizu Shikin (1868 1933). In a