"Noh", or, Accomplishment : a study of the classical stage of Japan |
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 | "Noh", or, Accomplishment : |  |
Ban-gumi
In the performance of Utai, or Noh, the
arrangement of pieces for the day is called
"Ban-gumi." "Gumi" means a setting in
order, and "Ban" is derived from the old
term "Ban-no-mai," which was formerly used
when the two kinds of mai, or dancing, the
Korean "u-ho" and the Chinese "sa-ho,"
were performed one after the other.
Now the Ka-den-sho, or secret book of Noh,
decrees that the arrangement of plays shall be
as follows:
A "Shugen" must come first. And Shugen,
or congratulatory pieces, are limited to Noh of the
Gods (that is, to pieces connected with some religious
rite), because this country of the rising sun is the
country of the gods. The gods have guarded the
country from Kami-yo (the age of the gods) down to
the time of the present reign. So in praise of them
and in prayer we perform first this Kami-No.
The Shura, or battle-piece, comes second, for
the gods and emperors pacified this country with
bows and arrows; therefore, to defeat and put out
it is sympathetic magic.)
Kazura, or Onna-mono, "wig-pieces," or pieces for
females, come third. Many think that any Kazura
will do, but it must be a "female Kazura," for after
battle comes peace, or Yu-gen, mysterious calm, and
in time of peace the cases of love come to pass. Moreover,
the battle-pieces are limited to men; so we now
have the female piece in contrast like in and yo (the
different divisions of the metric, before mentioned).
The fourth piece is Oni-No, or the Noh of spirits.
After battle comes peace and glory, but they soon
depart in their turn. The glory and pleasures of
man are not reliable at all. Life is like a dream and
goes with the speed of lightning. It is like a dewdrop
in the morning; it soon falls and is broken.
To suggest these things and to lift up the heart for
Buddha (to produce "Bodai-shin") we have this
sort of play after the Onna-mono, that is, just after
the middle of the programme, when some of the
audience will be a little tired. Just to wake them
out of their sleep we have these plays of spirits
("Oni"). Here are shown the struggles and the
sins of mortals, and the audience, even while they sit
for pleasure, will begin to think about Buddha and
the coming world. It is for this reason that Noh is
called Mu-jin-Kyo, the immeasurable scripture.[5]
Fifth comes a piece which has some bearing
upon the moral duties of man, Jin, Gi, Rei, Chi,
Shin; that is, Compassion, Righteousness, Politeness,
Wisdom, and Faithfulness. This fifth piece
teaches the duties of man here in this world as the
fourth piece represents the results of carelessness
to such duties.
Sixth comes another Shugen, or congratulatory
piece, as conclusion to the whole performance, to
congratulate and call down blessings on the lords
present, the actors themselves, and the place. To
show that though the spring may pass, still there is
a time of its return, this Shugen is put in again just
as at the beginning.
This is what is written in the Ka-den-sho.
Then some one, I think Mr. Owada, comments
as follows:
Though it is quite pedantic in wording, still the
order of the performance is always like this. To
speak in a more popular manner, first comes the
Noh of the Divine Age (Kamiyo); then the battle-piece;
then the play of women; fourth, the pieces
which have a very quiet and deep interest, to touch
the audience to their very hearts; fifth, the pieces
which have stirring or lively scenes; and, sixth,
pieces which praise the lords and the reign.
This is the usual order. When we have five
pieces instead of six, we sing at the end of the performance
the short passage from the play Takasago,
beginning at "Senshuraku wa tami wo nade,"
Autumns." (From the final chorus of Takasago.)
This is called the "adding Shugen." But if in the
fifth piece there are phrases like "Medeta kere"
or "Hisashi kere"—"Oh, how happy!" or "O
everlasting,"—then there is no necessity to sing the
extra passage. In performances in memory of the
dead, Tsuizen-No, they sing short passages from
Toru and Naniwa.
Though five or six pieces are the usual number,
there can be more or even fewer pieces, in which
case one must use the general principles of the above
schedule in designing and arranging the programme.
I think I have quoted enough to make clear
one or two points.
First: There has been in Japan from the
beginning a clear distinction between serious
and popular drama. The merely mimetic
stage has been despised.
Second: The Noh holds up a mirror to
nature in a manner very different from the
Western convention of plot. I mean the Noh
performance of the five or six plays in order
presents a complete service of life. We do not
find, as we find in Hamlet, a certain situation
or problem set out and analysed. The Noh
service presents, or symbolizes, a complete
diagram of life and recurrence.
The individual pieces treat for the most
to that of the Greek plays, in which we find,
for instance, a known Oedipus in a known
predicament.
Third: As the tradition of Noh is unbroken,
we find in the complete performance numerous
elements which have disappeared from our
Western stage; that is, morality plays, religious
mysteries, and even dances—like those of the
mass—which have lost what we might call
their dramatic significance.
Certain texts of Noh will therefore be
interesting only to students of folk-lore or of
comparative religion. The battle-pieces will
present little of interest, because Chansons de
Geste are pretty much the same all the world
over. The moralities are on a par with Western
moralities, for ascetic Buddhism and ascetic
Christianity have about the same set of preachments.
These statements are general and
admit of numerous exceptions, but the lover of
the stage and the lover of drama and of poetry
will find his chief interest in the psychological
pieces, or the Plays of Spirits; the plays that
are, I think, more Shinto than Buddhist.
These plays are full of ghosts, and the ghost
psychology is amazing. The parallels with
Western spiritist doctrines are very curious.
interest, and one might set it aside if it were
not bound up with a dramatic and poetic
interest of the very highest order.
I think I can now give a couple of texts,
without much more preface than saying that
the stage is visible from three sides. It is
reached by a bridge which is divided into three
sections by three real pine trees which are small
and in pots. There is one scene painted on
the background. It is a pine tree, the symbol
of the unchanging. It is painted right on the
back of the stage, and, as this cannot be shifted,
it remains the same for all plays.
A play very often represents some one going
a journey. The character walks along the
bridge or about the stage, announces where he
is and where he is going, and often explains
the meaning of his symbolic gestures, or tells
what the dance means, or why one is dancing.
Thus, in Sotoba Komachi, a play by Kiyotsugu,
two priests are going from Koyosan to
Kioto, and in Settsu they meet with Ono no
Komachi; that is to say, they meet with what
appears to be an old woman sitting on a roadside
shrine—though she is really the wraith of
Ono, long dead.
| "Noh", or, Accomplishment : | |