The Shogun’s Secret World of Women

In this talk, novelist Lesley Downer will describe the life, luxury and intrigue of Ooku, the Women’s Palace at Edo Castle which was home to hundreds of women – mother, wife and concubine, but only one man, the shogun. Weaving her talk around the story of Princess Atsu, the Satsuma girl sent at the age of twenty to be the shogun’s bride, Downer will recount some of the scandalous events that took place in the Women’s Palace and the extraordinary women who resided there.