Kabuki In Modern Japan

Kabuki In Modern Japan PDF Author: Brian Powell
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 1349209457
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 237

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Book Description

Kabuki In Modern Japan

Kabuki In Modern Japan PDF Author: Brian Powell
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 1349209457
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 237

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Book Description


Edo Kabuki in Transition

Edo Kabuki in Transition PDF Author: Satoko Shimazaki
Publisher: Columbia University Press
ISBN: 0231540523
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 389

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Book Description
Satoko Shimazaki revisits three centuries of kabuki theater, reframing it as a key player in the formation of an early modern urban identity in Edo Japan and exploring the process that resulted in its re-creation in Tokyo as a national theatrical tradition. Challenging the prevailing understanding of early modern kabuki as a subversive entertainment and a threat to shogunal authority, Shimazaki argues that kabuki instilled a sense of shared history in the inhabitants of Edo (present-day Tokyo) by invoking "worlds," or sekai, derived from earlier military tales, and overlaying them onto the present. She then analyzes the profound changes that took place in Edo kabuki toward the end of the early modern period, which witnessed the rise of a new type of character: the vengeful female ghost. Shimazaki's bold reinterpretation of the history of kabuki centers on the popular ghost play Tokaido Yotsuya kaidan (The Eastern Seaboard Highway Ghost Stories at Yotsuya, 1825) by Tsuruya Nanboku IV. Drawing not only on kabuki scripts but also on a wide range of other sources, from theatrical ephemera and popular fiction to medical and religious texts, she sheds light on the development of the ubiquitous trope of the vengeful female ghost and its illumination of new themes at a time when the samurai world was losing its relevance. She explores in detail the process by which nineteenth-century playwrights began dismantling the Edo tradition of "presenting the past" by abandoning their long-standing reliance on the sekai. She then reveals how, in the 1920s, a new generation of kabuki playwrights, critics, and scholars reinvented the form again, "textualizing" kabuki so that it could be pressed into service as a guarantor of national identity.

Japanese Plays

Japanese Plays PDF Author: A.L. Sadler
Publisher: Tuttle Classics
ISBN:
Category : Drama
Languages : en
Pages : 324

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Book Description
Classic Noh, Kyogen and Kabuki Works Nothing reflects the beauty of life as much as Japanese theater. It is here that reality is held suspended and emptiness can fill the mind with words, music, dance, and mysticism. A.L. Sadler translates the mysteries of Noh, Kyogen, and Kabuki in his groundbreaking book, Japanese Plays. A seminal classic in its time, it provides a cross-section of Japanese theater that gives the reader a sampler of its beauty and power. The power of Noh is in its ability to create an iconic world that represents the attributes that the Japanese hold in highest esteem: family, patriotism, and honor. Kyogen plays provide comic relief often times performed between the serious and stoic Noh plays. Similarly, Sadler's translated Kyogen pieces are layered between the Noh and the Kabuki plays. The Kabuki plays were the theater of the common people of Japan. The course of time has given them the patina of folk art making them precious cultural relics of Japan. Sadler selected these pieces for translation because of their lighter subject matter and relatively upbeat endings—ideal for a western readership. More linear in their telling and pedestrian in the lessons learned these plays show the difficulties of being in love when a society is bent on conformity and paternal rule. The end result found in Japanese Plays is a wonderful selection of classic Japanese dramatic literature sure to enlighten and delight.

The Kabuki Theatre

The Kabuki Theatre PDF Author: Earle Ernst
Publisher: New York : Grove Press
ISBN:
Category : Japanese drama
Languages : en
Pages : 372

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Book Description
An account of the influences of the Japanese puppet theater. No plays, and modern Western drama on Kabuki theater.

A Kabuki Reader: History and Performance

A Kabuki Reader: History and Performance PDF Author: Samuel L. Leiter
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1317478045
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 384

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Book Description
Unique in any Western language, this is an invaluable resource for the study of one of the world's great theatrical forms. It includes essays by established experts on Kabuki as well as younger scholars now entering the field, and provides a comprehensive survey of the history of Kabuki; how it is written, produced, staged, and performed; and its place in world theater. Compiled by the editor of the influential Asian Theater Journal, the book covers four essential areas - history, performance, theaters, and plays - and includes a translation of one Kabuki play as an illustration of Kabuki techniques.

Onnagata

Onnagata PDF Author: Maki Isaka
Publisher: University of Washington Press
ISBN: 0295806249
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 272

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Book Description
Kabuki is well known for its exaggerated acting, flamboyant costumes and makeup, and unnatural storylines. The onnagata, usually male actors who perform the roles of women, have been an important aspect of kabuki since its beginnings in the 17th century. In a “labyrinth” of gendering, the practice of men playing women’s roles has affected the manifestations of femininity in Japanese society. In this case study of how gender has been defined and redefined through the centuries, Maki Isaka examines how the onnagata’s theatrical gender “impersonation” has shaped the concept and mechanisms of femininity and gender construction in Japan. The implications of the study go well beyond disciplinary and geographic cloisters.

The Curious Casebook of Inspector Hanshichi

The Curious Casebook of Inspector Hanshichi PDF Author: Kidō Okamoto
Publisher: University of Hawaii Press
ISBN: 0824831004
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 378

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Book Description
"That year, quite a shocking incident occurred. . . ." So reminisces old Hanshichi in a story from one of Japan’s most beloved works of popular literature, Hanshichi torimonochô. Told through the eyes of a street-smart detective, Okamoto Kidô’s best-known work inaugurated the historical detective genre in Japan, spawning stage, radio, movie, and television adaptations as well as countless imitations. This selection of fourteen stories, translated into English for the first time, provides a fascinating glimpse of life in feudal Edo (later Tokyo) and rare insight into the development of the fledgling Japanese crime novel. Once viewed as an exclusively modern genre derivative of Western fiction, crime fiction and its place in the Japanese popular imagination were forever changed by Kidô’s "unsung Sherlock Holmes." These stories—still widely read today—are crucial to our understanding of modern Japan and its aspirations toward a literature that steps outside the shadow of the West to stand on its own.

Takarazuka

Takarazuka PDF Author: Jennifer Robertson
Publisher: Univ of California Press
ISBN: 0520211510
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 294

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Book Description
The all-female Takarazuka Revue is world-famous today for its rococo musical productions, including gender-bending love stories, This text explores how the Revue illuminates discourses of sexual politics, nationalism, imperialism and popular culture in 20th-century Japan.

Traditional Japanese Theater

Traditional Japanese Theater PDF Author: Karen Brazell
Publisher: Columbia University Press
ISBN: 9780231108737
Category : Drama
Languages : en
Pages : 580

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Book Description
The first book of its kind: a collection of the most important genres of Japanese performance--noh, kyogen, kabuki, and puppet theater--in one comprehensive, authoritative volume.

The Red Devil Battery Sign

The Red Devil Battery Sign PDF Author: Tennessee Williams
Publisher: Dramatists Play Service Inc
ISBN: 9780811210478
Category : American drama
Languages : en
Pages : 116

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Book Description
This book is William's symbol for the military-industrial complex and all the dehumanizing trends it represents from mindless cocktail party chatter to bribery of officials to assassination plots directed against those who won't play the game, to attempted coups by right-wing zealots.