I have found some facts concerning divorce in the imperial family, and as the divorce rumours for princess Masako seem to come back again from time to time like a boomerang – probably when there is again some journalist desperately searching for something to write about her and finding old articles in the internet – I want to post them here. Actually, I knew the whole time that I have read them SOMEWHERE but I was absolutely unable to remember where, and I thought if somebody asks me for the source, I can only say: “Sorry…” So, I will put it here for just in case… And in this way I will, at least, remember in future where I got this information from.
This is from a link that I have found somewhere in the older threads of this forum (but at present do not remember where ) and have saved the contents in order to read them at leisure but somehow never did it thoroughly until now, at the time I did it only superficially. It is called: “Pandora´s Box: The Chrysanthemum Throne.
This is the link:
History of the Japanese royal family
The information about divorce comes from the fourth and last part: "The Princess and the "Grey Men"."
The author says in it that the same month as the IHA made the announcement, that Masako was suffering from “adjustment disorder”, suggestions of divorce were “leaked” from the IHA to the Japanese press. Both of this happened shortly after the famous press conference of the Crown Prince on May 10, 2004, during which he had accused unnamed persons of having tried to nullify his wife´s character and career and which had caused great trouble to the IHA, to say the least.
The author of “The Chrysanthemum throne” believes that by making the Princess´ illness and its nature officially public “the IHA intentionally tried to create the impression of a mentally disturbed woman in order to strengthen their case against the Princess.” She also thinks that, in their opinion, the executives of the IHA had no time to lose “because, earlier this year, the Emperor was diagnosed with prostate cancer” as the law “prohibits an emperor from divorcing his wife; it does not, however, prevent a crown prince from doing so.”
She says that if the Emperor dies before the Crown Prince divorces, then the possibility of divorce (and thus, remarriage) would be gone forever. So, according to her, the IHA was at the time in a hurry to get rid of Masako as fast as possible. (In vain, as we know but that does not mean they have not done their very best towards it…
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But she also says that although an imperial prince can theoretically divorce his wife “the fact remains that divorce flies in the face of imperial tradition. There has been only one case of divorce in the entire history of the Imperial Family and that was just a minor relative of the Emperor, Prince Kitashirakawa, who obtained a divorce over a hundred years ago.”
I think that all this is very interesting and may be useful for any upcoming discussion about divorce in the imperial family in the future…