泉鏡花の「註文帳」の各場面を表した「卓上芸術」の作品です。
大雪の夜に遊女お縫の幽霊に導かれ、脇屋欽之助（かつてお縫と心中を図り生き残った松島主税の甥）が、吉原の紅梅屋敷を訪ねます。その頃、剃刀研ぎの五助のもとからは紅梅屋敷のお若の剃刀がなくなっていました。そして、お縫の霊にとりつかれたお若は、欽之助の上着から五助に預けたはずの剃刀を見つけて欽之介を刺し、自らの命を絶ちます。
清方は、鏡花の作品世界に対する深い理解と共感を、「絵物語」の形式で表わしました。

From the Novel Chūmonchō by Izumi Kyōka (1927)
ink and pale color on paper; matted
25.1 x 34.0 cm each
(First exhibited at the 12th Kyōdo-kai Exhibition)

This is a masterpiece of tabletop art depicting scenes from Izumi Kyōka’s novel Chūmonchō.
Led by the ghost of the prostitute Onui, Wakiya Kinnosuke (the nephew of Matsushima Chikara, the man who once made a love suicide pact with Onui, but survived) visits Kōbai Yashiki (the house of scarlet plum: a dormitory for prostitutes) in the Yoshiwara pleasure quarter on a snowy night. On the same evening, a razor belonging to Owaka of Kōbai Yashiki disappears from the shop of Gosuke, the knife sharpener. Possessed by the ghost of Onui, Owaka finds the razor she had left with Gosuke in Kinnosuke’s coat. She stabs Kinnosuke and then ends her own life.
Kiyokata expresses his profound understanding and sympathy for Kyōka’s storytelling universe through the format of the illustrated story.