EA 120 Japanese Theater Week 3b

Japanese Theater (Fall 2016) Week 3b

HUMOR IN KYÔGEN

Delicious Poison (Busu) starting at the moment where Taro Kaja and Jiro Kaja figure out the "poison" is sugar, and runs through Jirokaja tearing the scroll. Japanese subtitles

Newly written kyogen about Kaminari and Delicious Poison performance for children; Delicious Poison begins with Tarokaja and Jirokaja fanning around 3:50 and runs through their eating it all up.

I. What makes Kyôgen funny?
A. Carolyn Haynes’ article on “Parody in Kyôgen” mainly focuses on two kinds of humor in the group of plays that explictly parody Noh

(NOTE: not all Kyogen parody Noh! But even in plays that don't explictly parody Noh, there may be elements that depend on audience's knowledge of Noh for it to be funny):

1. Paradigmatic: taking accepted notions (like karmic retribution or Universal Salvation) and pushing them to extremes

a. e.g. Universal Salvation (Tako, Semi)

2. Syntagmatic: reversing roles and expectations. According to Haynes, plays that "skillfully exploit structures and motifs that are prominent in noh, turning them to humorous effect by undermining the audience's expectations" (Haynes, p. 261)

a. role reversal: masters and servants, husbands and wives, gods and human beings.

1) ge-koku-jô (low overthrows the high): who wins?

eg. Mushrooms (Kusabira) where the mushrooms win out over the Yamabushi mountain priest

eg. Thunderbolt(Kaminari) where the quack doctor wins out over the Thunder deity.

b. elevated style versus silly content:

1) eg. chanting in Delicious Poison

Right before Tarokaja eats the busu:

From sleeves all wet with fresh dew (i.e. tears)
I brush tears of parting
Busu pulls me to its side
And I must follow.

At the end where he and Jirokaja are making fun of the master:
First we took one great big bite,
but we are still alive.
Next we both took one more big bit,
three bits and then four bites
five bites and then six bites
we took more bits than ten
we ate and ate until there was
not a single bite left.
Life that never dies
is the greatest treasure we own.
Oh how strong is the life we have
within our bodies.

B. Other elements of what makes Kyôgen funny (week 3 page)

1. Visuals:

a. masks:(images)

b. costumes:
c. miming:

2. Language

a. formal style (but content is silly):

1) entrance of grandfather in Pillow Mania

2) Mountain priest intoning nonsense prayers in Mushrooms and Owls

b. onomatopoeia

1) eg. “zarari, zarari” for ripping the scroll, and "garari, chin" for breaking the tea bowl in Delicious Poison

2) eg. nonsense words as the two servants sit in unison

c. verbal play

1) puns, but humorous ones (eg. confusing “person/rusu” and “poison/busu” in Delicious Poison)

2) poetic catalogues (eg. Komachi and the Hundred Nights lists fruits and nuts; in Mushrooms, priest counts all the different kinds of mushrooms, in Pillow Mania lists different kinds of pillows)

3) allusive variations:

a. allude to famous poems, but change a word or two to make funny, or recontextualize the poem so the meaning is different

b. use incantations from Noh exorcism rituals, but change words to make funny (eggplant mudra)

II. Makura Monogurui (Pillow Madness)

A. Example of syntagmatic parody: elevated style with silly content, role reversal

B. Use of Noh style: mostly refers to the Noh play Matsukaze about a woman obsessed with the man who abandoned her

1. Visually:

a. old man image

b. compare to Hanjo

2. Performance:

3. Text:

a. Allusive variation:

1) poem: 1023 from the Kokinshû (first Imperial Anthology of Poetry)

'From my pillow
and from the foot of my bed
love comes pursuing.
What am I to do?
I'll stay in the middle of the bed.'

2) classical stories:

3) noh plays: Matsukaze

b. has a dominant image as in Noh

1) katami (momento): usually a momento like a fan that has been given by a lover; the character keeps it with them at all times and obsesses about it. Eg. Robe and court cap in Izutsu, fan in Hanjo. Here it is paper-mache pillow that Oto threw at him.

c. word play:

1) sasa no harimakura:

sasa no ha = branch of bamboo
harimakura = paper-mache pillow

2) catalogue of pillows

d. re-enactment of a memory as in Noh, but again silly content; does result in happy ending, though.

III Tako (The Octopus) as maikyôgen (dance kyôgen) parodying mugen Noh

A. Paradigmatic: Carrying Buddhist concepts conveyed in Noh to ludicrous extremes.

B. Karmic retribution and Universal salvation: the idea in Buddhism that even nonsentient beings, like plants and lower forms of life can suffer karmic retribution for their "sins," and can also attain salvation. In Noh, usually butterflies and flowers (plum blossoms and irises) but here more ordinary plants and animals:

1. Cicada (Semi): eaten by a crow

2. Hamaguri: clam suffering in roasting hell

3. Tokoro: a potato (saved by becoming a snack for a priest)

4. Not responsible for their fate (unlike human beings):

C. Main plot structure of maikyogen parodies "dream vision" noh about warriors

1. In Tako ghost of octopus appears to priest in disguise, but whole interaction is on high speed:

Ghost: Ho, there, priest!
I have something to ask you.

Priest: Something to ask me? What is it?
Ghost: I am the ghost of an octopus
Who passed away last spring.
Please take pity and pray for my soul!
So saying, it vanished.

2. After interlude, comes back to re-enact final battle scene in "hell," but here "hell" is exactly like everyday life for insects, plants, and animals

a. Compare to the "psychological" hell for ghosts in dream vision noh