Bunraku, also known as Ningyo Joruri, is the most important form of the traditional Japanese puppet theater, founded in Osaka at the beginning of the 17th century. Bunraku consists of three important elements: (1) the dolls (ningyo) and the puppeteers (ningyozukai), often three per complicated doll); (2) the Gidayu chanter; and (3) the shamisen accompanist. The combination of chanting and shamisen playing is called joruri.
Bunraku as we know it came into being through the fortunate collaboration of two giants of Japanese culture: playwright Chikamatsu Monzaemon (1653-1724) and chanter Takemoto Gidayu (1651-1714), who took accompanied narration to its artistic pinnacle. Both worked in the early 1700s at the Takemotoza Theater in Osaka - Bunraku is even today a typical art form of the Kansai area. With more than 100 plays to his credit, Chikamatsu is sometimes dubbed the "Shakespeare of Japan."
Bunraku shares many themes with Kabuki. Bunraku is particularly noted for lovers' suicide plays; the story of the "Forty-seven Ronin" (Chushingura) is also famous. The difference between Bunraku and Kabuki is that Bunraku is an author's theater, as opposed to Kabuki, which is a typical performer's theater. In Bunraku, prior to the performance, the chanter holds up the text and bows before it, promising to follow it faithfully. In Kabuki, actors insert puns on their names, ad-libs, references to contemporary happenings and other things which deviate from the script. The fact that Bunraku plays were written by literary authors also is the reason that while Kabuki plays borrowed from Bunraku (and from Noh, for that matter), the opposite did not happen.
[Bunraku]
One of the earliest plays Chikamatsu Monzaemon wrote for the Takemotoza is the short play The Love Suicides at Sonezaki (Sonezaki Shinju), a domestic tragedy (sewamono) with contemporary content (as opposed to historical plays, jidaimono). It is the first of the many "love suicide" or "double suicide" plays Chikamatsu wrote: a love affair between two young people, a courtesan and a soy sauce merchant, leads to
tragedy. Based on true events in Osaka which took place only weeks earlier, this
masterpiece by Chikamatsu Monzaemon debuted to huge success as a puppet
play and was immediately adapted to Kabuki.
Although the plot is much simpler than in Chikamatsu's more complex later plays, it has a raw directness, and remains one of his finest works, if only for the poetry in the love journey (michiyuki).
Tokubei, a clerk at his uncle's soy sauce shop Hiranoya, is madly in love with Ohatsu, a famous
courtesan of the Tenmanya teahouse. His uncle and boss, Kyuemon, has arranged for Tokubei to marry his
wife's niece, an heiress, but because of his love for Ohatsu, Tokubei has
refused this generous offer. However, his greedy stepmother has
already accepted the dowry in advance from the niece's parents, and this money will have to be paid back.
With difficulty, Kyubei manages to
get the money back, but on his way home, he
encounters an old friend named Kuheiji, who persuades Tokubei to lend him the money for just three days (there are indeed still a few days until the deadline).
Lacking the courage to refuse his old friend's request,
Tokubei agrees to the loan - a grave mistake, which shows how naive Tokubei is. For when he asks for the return of the loan, Kuheiji denies all knowledge
of it, accuses Tokubei of being a swindler and even has his friends beat him up.
Kyuemon is now forced to pay the dowry back to the girl's
parents on Tokubei's behalf and comes looking for him at the Tenmanya. He pleads with Ohatsu to give up Tokubei, saying she is spoiling
the advantageous match arranged for him. Ohatsu, however, swears
that her love for Tokubei is true. Later, Tokubei comes to the Tenmanya to secretly meet Ohatsu. The future now looks so dark that he has decided to commit suicide. When Kuheiji suddenly arrives as a client, she has Tokubei crawl under the
verandah to hide himself and then sits on the step. Kuheiji has brought the
money stolen from Tokubei with the intention of ransoming Ohatsu,
something she of course will never agree to. The answers she gives Kuheiji, are really meant for Tokubei, and she makes clear to him that she is ready to follow him into the grave. To make sure that Tokubei understands, she
stretches out her naked foot in Tokubei's direction. Tokubei caresses her
foot to show that he understands her intention and draws her instep
across his throat as if it were a sword to show that he also is ready to
die.
That night Ohatsu steals out of her room, dressed in white,
clutching a rosary and a razor. She attracts Tokubei's attention, and the two lovers manage to
get safely away. They proceed in a poetic "michiyuki" scene to the forest of the Sonezaki Shrine. There they stop at an unusual tree which has both a pine and palm tree growing out of the same trunk, and decide that this is the place where they will do the grim deed. Tokubei binds Ohatsu to the tree and kills her with the razor (he is so nervous that the first stabs go all awry); while she slowly dies, he cuts his own throat with the same razor. Namu Amida Butsu - without a doubt these models of true love will in the future attain Buddhahood.
[Statue of Ohatsu and Tokubei in Ohatsu Tenjin Shrine, Osaka]
Thus the grim story ends. The actual suicide took place in the forest of Sonezaki (where really a tree existed as described) in the early morning of April 7, 1703 (May 22, 1703) by the girl Hatsu (21 years old) from the Tenmanya teahouse and Tokubei (25 years old) of the Hiranoya soy sauce shop. After this incident, the shrine, which is dedicated to Tenjin (Michizane - an introduction to Tenjin shrine can be found in my post about Kitano Tenmangu in the "Haiku Travels" series) came to be called "Ohatsu Tenjin." Just as in the case of Goethe's The Sorrows of Young Werther, Chikamatsu's popular play led to numerous shinju (double suicide) incidents. The shrine (officially called Tsuyu no Tenjinya) now houses a commemorative stone monument and a bronze statue of Ohatsu and Tokubei (see my photo above). It is just a 5 min walk from Osaka Station.
I have read The Love Suicides at Sonezaki in the translation by Donald Keene (Major Plays of Chikamatsu, Columbia U.P.).
Invitation to Bunraku by Japan Arts Council
Bunraku photo from Wikipedia. Photo of statue Ohatsu and Tokubei is my own.
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