Utagawa Kuniyoshi

Ryūkō tako no asobi (Fashionable Octopus Games)

c. 1840–42, The British Museum

Eight legs, and still not enough hands.

Octopus here. Octopus there.

Before we knew it,the sorting floor was in chaos.

A tako party.

Not a takoyaki party.

Today, the octopus itself was the party.

In Kokon Ryōrishū, an early Edo-period cookbook,

octopus was counted among the “middle fish,”

alongside squid, bonito, eel and clams.

More than a century later,

Kuniyoshi’s octopuses became a rather lively bunch.

They wrestle.

They dance.

They play music.

They fight.

Kuniyoshi’s octopuses

never sit still.

Edomae meets a tako party.  

The connection—  

The legs go fast.

Even with eight, today,

there don’t seem to be enough.