Japanese Ghosts Week 7b Outline

I. Foxy Women

A. Women as foxes take two main forms:

1.
2.

B. Questions for analysis of medieval stories (#81, 82, 207, 125)

1. How do foxes affect men and women differently?
2. What happens to men?
3. What happens to women (in #125, the Empress)?

C. Analysis

1. "The Loving Fox" [#81]
Man has sex with a fox. The woman tells him that he should die, but she will die in his place. Finds a dead fox with his fan at a nearby temple. Makes seven copies of the Lotus Sutra and dedicates them to the fox's soul. She appears and tells him she will be born in Tori heaven.

?2. "Touched in the Head" [#82]
A wealthy man named Yoshifuji goes off to the capital, and he falls in love with a woman he meets on the street. He goes off to live with her, she gets pregnant and has a child. In the meantime his family is convinced he is dead, so they are saying prayers, and carve an image of the Eleven-Headed Kannon to try and find his body. A man with a stick comes and forces Yoshifuji to leave the beautiful woman's house, and it turns out that he has been under the storehouse for 13 days with a bunch of foxes. A Buddhist monk and a Taoist diviner are brought in to exorcise and purify him from the fox influence, but it takes a while for him to get over it. He thought that he'd been with the woman for 13 years.

3. "Singed Fur" [#207, p. 300]
A man lets a strange woman climb up on his horse, but a bit later she jumps off and turns into a fox. She does this a couple of times, and then a group of men of the palace guard bet one of their number that he could get her. Picks her up and ties her to the saddle. Has to take a detour, and thinks that he ends up at the palace gate where his men meet him.  But when he lets the girl go in the circle of men, she runs away and the men disappear. They'd led him to the charnel ground at Toribeno. By the time he gets back to Kyoto he's really sick. But he tries again, and the second time he takes some of his own men with him. This time he succeeds, and when she turns into a fox, the men singe her hair and shoot her with stinging arrows. The next time he visits the brook, he sees the girl and she declines getting up on his horse, saying that she got too badly burned the last time.

4. "A Memorable Empress" [#125, p. 178]
The Somedono Empress (Fujiwara Meishi, mother of Emperor Montoku is possessed by an evil spirit, and a hermit (yamabushi) comes down from his mountain to exorcise it. He gets the spirit to transfer to a lady in waiting, who gets hysterical, and when they bind her, an old fox appears. But then the yamabushi sees the Empress with almost nothing on, and he falls passionately in love with her. Swears he'll become a demon so he can have sex with her. Starves himself to death, and instantly becomes a demon. Sleeps with the Empress everyday. The Empress is bewitched by him, and apparently can't tell that he's a demon; everyone else is so terrified that they run away. Ends up having sex with the demon in front of the Emperor.

D. Summary:

1. Gender difference

2. Comparison of female Serpents and female Foxes

E. The Legend of Tamamo no Mae

1.Set up of story: Kuzunoha (Kudzu Leaf), fox married to Abe no Yasuna; according to legend she is the mother of Abe no Seimei (921-1005) the onmyoji yin-yang master, which explains his magical powers.

a. Animal spouse theme, like "Loving Fox"

Kabuki version: the fourth part, "Kuzunoha" or "The Fox of Shinoda" from the five-part Ashiya Doman Ouchi Kagami (A Courtly Mirror of Ashiya Doman).

2. Tamamo no Mae, the nine-tailed fox, exorcised by Abe no Yasunari  (sometimes Abe no Seimei, but dates are wrong).

a. Basic Story: A nine-tailed fox, appearing as a beautiful woman, causes havoc in the imperial courts of China and India, before appearing in Japan as a court lady who becomes a favored concubine of Emperor Toba. She causes him to be extremely ill, but is discovered by Abe no Yasunari (sometimes Yasuchika) during a special yin-yang ritual using a mirror that reflects her true identity. She leaps up on to the altar in the palace, and then flies off to Nasuno moor. She is chased down by two warriors, Kazusanosuke and Miuranosuke, who shoot her down with arrows. She falls to the earth, and where she dies the Sesshô-seki (Death Stone) appears. Anything that comes close to it dies. Years later the Zen priest Gennô is wandering by and the fox spirit appears to him, breaking the rock in two. He is able to exorcise and pacify the spirit.

b. Images:

1) Fox exorcism
2) Fox on altar
3) Fox on thundercloud
d) Death Stone

a) Noh play The Death Stone (Sesshôseki)

Slide Show

video of second act (after fox comes out of the stone)

2) Zen Priest Gennô

D. Gender politics of female foxes:

1. Real life situation behind The Death Stone

a. Retired Emperor Toba (1103-1156, r. 1107-1123)

1) Becomes emperor at age 4, abdicates at age 20 and then as Retired Emperor controls from behind the throne (Fujiwara in decline)

b. Toba's son Emperor Sutoku (1119-1164, r. 1123-1142)

1) Follows similar trajectory to his father: emperor at age 4, forced to abdicate at age of 20; becomes Retired Emperor and begins vying for power with his father (who is only 15 years older)

c. Toba's son Emperor Konoe (1139-1155 r. 1142-1155)

1) Dies at age 17 and precipitates succession crisis

d. Toba's son Emperor Go-Shirakawa (1127-1192, r. 1155-58)

1) Sutoku expected his son to be next emperor, but Toba puts another of his own sons on the throne

e. Emperor Toba dies July 20, 1156.

f. Hogen Rebellion (July 28-August 16, 1156)

1) Sutoko rebels against accession of Go-Shirakawa.

2) Minamoto and Taira warrior families ally with the two sides (setting stage for later Genpei Civil War 1180-1185 between the two clans).

3) Sutoku's forces beaten by Go-Shirakawa's forces.

4) 1156 Sutoku is banished and dies in exile, becomes a tengu or onryo (next big onryo after Michizane)

2. Role of Fujiwara Tokuko (concubine of Retired Emperor Toba)

a. After Emperor Toba abdicated (at the age of 20), he had added considerably to the number of his concubines. One in particular, Fujiwara no Tokuko, said to have exercised a powerful, malignant influence over him, encouraging the political intrigues that caused so much trouble during his time.

She may be the source for the image of a supernatural woman who gets control of the Emperor and causes trouble. In The Death Stone, the trouble is merely that the Emperor becomes ill; in real life, there were much more serious problems which eventually lead to the Genpei Civil War.

3. General point:

a. Women who confine themselves to domesticity are good; foxes who do so are also good.

b. Women who intervene in politics are bad. They are:

1) discounted (if they are successful)

2) demonized as femme fatales (if they are unsuccessful).

a) If the latter, their apparent political power is treated as a function of their seductive beauty, which causes chaos and destruction, and which is often seen as supernatural (in the examples for today, women as foxes).

II. Tsurigitsune (The Fox and The Trapper)

A. Comparison with other Kyôgen plays: what is funny here?

B. How is this play similar to a Noh play?

C. What is the attitude toward Buddhism conveyed by story and characters?

1. The fox

2. The trapper

3. Who are we supposed to empathize with?

D. How does this fox compare to other foxes we've seen?

"Saigo no Kitsune": Nomura Mansaku's last performance of Tsurigitsune

Tsurigitsune second act: video 1 (fox returns in true form and tries to decide whether to eat the rat in the trap or not NOTE: sound on this is messed up, need to mute); video 2 (fox escapes from hunter).

Tradition of Performing Arts in Japan (Kabuki): (starts at 25:00)

Section from Act 4 of Yoshitsune senbon zakura(Yoshitsune and the 1000 Cherry Trees), performed by Ichikawa Ennosuke as the fox Genkuro who has been impersonating the retainer Tadanobu as he escorts Shizuka Gozen back to her lover Minamoto Yoshitsune.