EA 40 Japanese Ghosts (Winter 2014) Week 8b

I. Yotsuya Ghost Stories (Tôkaidô Yotsuya Kaidan)

1. author: Tsuruya Nanboku IV (1755-1829)

2. period: first performed 1825
    a. situation of Tokugawa government

b. popularity of ghost stories (kaidan), kizewamono (twisted domestic dramas) and shiranami mono (bandit/outlaw dramas)

3. Basic Story of Yotsuya Kaidan

Characters: Aoyama Tessen ( former retainer of Enya Hangan); Oiwa his wife; Kohei his servant (formerly a servant of another retainer of Enya Hangan);
neighboring doctor named Itô Kihei and his grandaughter Oume (Itô is the personal doctor of the evil Ko no Moronao)

a. Representation of ghosts (Oiwa and Kohei)

b. How do they die? How do they get revenge? Are they pacified?

VIDEO

Youtube: canal scene with Oiwa and Kohei nailed to board (Ichikawa Ennosuke as Oiwa/Kohei and Ichikawa Danjuro as Tamiya Iemon)

Youtube: b&w version of kabuki play

 

a. Time period: "Genroku"

    C. Chûshingura celebrates samurai (Bushidô)values:
            1)
            2)
            3)
 

D. How does Yotsuya pervert and betray those values?

E. How does Yotsuya continue to support samurai values?

A. New themes/cultural anxieties (non-Buddhist)

1.

2.

B. Character compared to Noh

1. Simplification of psychology (little interiority) -- why?

2. Passive

3. Guilty conscience

4. Need help

C. Visual representation of change in level of power for victim ghosts

1.

2.

3.

 

D. Neo-Confucian ideal of "onna-rashisa" (female-likeness)

1. Supposed inherent qualities of females that they must work hard to overcome

a.
b.
c.
d.
e.

1) female demons

2. Male ideal of femininity

a.
b.
c.
d.
e.

1) female victim ghosts