Shogun is a 1975 novel by American author James Clavell. It is one of six books in Clavell’s Asian Saga, which chronicles the ways Europeans interacted with countries in Asia from the 17th to the 20th centuries. The novel tells the story of English ship pilot John Blackthorne, loosely based on the real life navigator William Adams, who becomes intimately involved in the rise to power of Yoshi Toranaga, a fictionalized version of Tokugawa Ieyasu, the first shogun, or military dictator, of the islands, credited with unifying them into one country.

Shogun received critical acclaim, and was an enormously successful bestseller upon its release, introducing Japanese history and culture to the US. It was twice adapted for TV, in 1980 and in 2018. Please note that the book contains acts of and references to seppuku, which is a form of ritual suicide originally practiced by samurai and others in feudal Japan.

Plot Summary

When the book begins, one year has passed since the death of the taiko, the Japanese ruler. The taiko’s son Yaemon is the rightful heir, but he is not old enough to assume command, so when the taiko died, the leadership formed a Council of Regents. Two of the members of the Council—Ishido and Toranaga—are enemies, although they maintain a pretense of civility.

During the Prologue, the gifted English maritime pilot John Blackthorne is sailing aboard the Erasmus, a Dutch ship. The Dutch are looking to open new trade routes and establish a profitable relationship with Japan. A storm blows them off course into Japanese waters.

When they arrive in Japan, the locals treat them with hostility: Blackthorne and his men are imprisoned in a cellar, and one of them is boiled alive after displeasing a daimyo, or local feudal lord. Blackthorne is spared. While imprisoned, Blackthorne learns more about Japan from another inmate: a Franciscan monk.

Toranaga repeatedly questions Blackthorne about Europe—knowledge no one in Japan has. At first, Toranaga uses a Christian missionary interpreter, Father Alvito, but eventually switches to a beautiful woman named Lady Mariko, when it becomes clear that Alvito is not interpreting faithfully. Blackthorne quickly understands that there are many complex and often conflicting political machinations at work around him. Blackthorne explains the nuances of Western power struggles. It surprises Toranaga that there is enmity between differing sects of Christianity; and that the Pope believes Portugal has ownership of Japan.

As Blackthorne’s knowledge of the West gives Toranaga an edge, the English pilot becomes the target of several attacks by Toranaga’s enemies: a failed kidnapping and, later, an assassination attempt by a group of ninjas. After Toranaga loses faces with the Council of Regents and offers his resignation, Blackthorne helps Toranaga escape the city—and the Council’s command that he die by ritual suicide to save his honor. Blackthorne is now officially in Toranaga’s service; he slowly builds up his Japanese language skills and his knowledge of customs and culture. He deeply admires the society he initially feared.

Toranaga promotes Blackthorne to the rank of hatamoto, which means he is also a samurai. He begins an affair with Mariko as he plots with Toranaga to defeat the other warlords vying for power. At the same time, Blackthorne plans to take the Portuguese Black Ship, a vessel that transports silk from China to Japan—he could use the money plundered from the Black Ship to return to England. However, he decides to first help Toranaga defeat Ishido, one of Toranaga’s enemy warlords, who has been holding the families of the other daimyos hostage in Osaka, which protects him from attacks by Toranaga. Mariko has a plan to make him release the hostages. While they are there, ninjas attack the castle and Mariko sacrifices herself to protect other ladies of the court, buying them and Blackthorne enough time to escape.

To placate the daimyos he has displaced, Toranaga orders Blackthorne’s ship Erasmus to be burned—the English pilot will never leave Japan. Toranaga wins the final battle against Ishido and subjects him to a long death. As the novel ends, Toranaga’s only wish is to become shogun.