6 - Japan and Ye Sette of Odd Volumes and London’s Thirteen Club in the 1890s

Summary

THE JAPAN SOCIETY founded in 1891 was not the only organization which showed an interest in Japan in the 1890s. Ye Sette of Odd Volumes was much favoured by some of the founders of the Japan Society of London. It in turn may well have influenced the Thirteen Club of London to hold a Japan-themed dinner.

YE SETTE OF ODD VOLUMES

‘ Ye Sette of Odd Volumes’ was a late Victorian dining club with a whimsical name and to modern eyes a contrived set of ceremonies and titles. Members were called ‘His Oddship Brother’. Toni Huberman in her biographical portrait of Charles Holme (Britain and Japan: Biographical Portraits, Volume VI, p. 257) wrote: ‘One could say that without Ye Sette of Odd Volumes the Japan Society might never have existed. Ye Sette was ostensibly a gentleman's club, without benefit of a club house. Originally founded by the publisher Bernard Quaritch and a group of friends in 1878, it seems to have been an excuse for a good dinner once a month, and the company of congenial friends.’ They were expected to contribute and read papers on topics of possible interest to other members. These were privately printed in a series called ‘Opuscula’.

Ye Sette of Odd Volumes held a dinner on Friday 3 June 1892 at Limmer's Hotel in London which had a Japanese theme. This was the 146^th meeting of Ye Sette with His Oddship, Brother William Murrell, in the Chair. According to The Year-Boke [sic] of the Sette of Odd Volumes for 1892–1893 one of the guests invited by Edward Heron-Allen, ‘Vice-President and Necromancer’ was Oscar Wilde.

The menu was:

The artist for the menu was said to be Issai.

The versified chronicle of the evening began:

Again the ODD VOLUMES assembled,

Correctly got up to a man,

Prepared to discuss, with hors d’oeuvres,

THE ART OF OLD Japan.

We drank to the Queen; we boasted

What wonderful guests we had got;

And then in a batch they were toasted,

And served up, hot and hot.

O, the Inros of Old Japan!

Kakimonos [sic] of Old Japan!

How instructive to hear the OLD VOLUMES,

On the ART OF OLD Japan!