Living In Kyoto: Chuushingura: The Treasury of Loyal Retainers aka

Living In Kyoto: Chuushingura: The Treasury of Loyal Retainers aka
The 47 Ronin
Posted by: activeadmin on Wednesday, June 15, 2005 - 08:00 AM

Chuushingura: The Treasury of Loyal Retainers aka The 47 Ronin

In addition to Noh, I also went to see Bunraku, Japanese traditional
puppet theater. Osaka, known for many things—takoyaki, bargaining,
jaywalkers, and snoopy people—is also famous for its Bunraku.

I was excited for a number of reasons. One of course was the bunraku
itself. I'd attended a small introductory seminar the day before by
a bunraku troupe showing how the puppets moved and so on. It's not
like marionettes in the least. There is the head puppeteer who
inserts his hand into the body of the puppet [which is about 4 feet
tall] and controls the facial movements of the wooden head and the
right arm. There are two underling puppeteers, one who controls the
other hand and hands props to the right hand the true underling who
controls only the feet. I think the troupe said it takes about 10
years of apprenticeship working on just the feet before you can
graduate up to left hand. A puppeteer is trained in using only one
particular puppet and plays that role for his career—such as the
middle age man, young girl, married woman, and so on.

The head puppeteer is the only one who shows his face while the
underlings are dressed in black with black gauze covering their
faces to perpetuate the willing suspension of disbelief that in
fact, they don't even exist. As apprentices, their contribution to
the puppetering is considered anonymous, and only the master is
allowed credit. [On a random note, on Japanese TV game shows, you
can sometimes see a random prop guy going out to hand something to
the contestants, and if that is the case, he wears a black gauze hat
thing covering his face. I wonder if it's a modern outgrowth of the
bunraku thing.] The troupe demonstrated a puppet crying, arranging
her hair, and reading a letter, and all her gestures were so in
keeping with real human movements that it was really quite eerie.

The bunraku play I went to see was called Chushingura or, as it's
translated in English, The 47 Ronin. It's based on a real incident
that occurred in Tokugawa Japan [1600's or so]. In the presence of
the shogun, it was forbidden to draw swords. A young nobleman was
being bullied by an older courtier and was so insulted he pulled out
his sword and attacked the elder. For violating the rule, the
younger nobleman was forced to commit seppuku [ritual suicide] while
the elder was unpunished. In order to prevent violence, according to
the laws of that time, whoever engaged in a fight, the attacker as
well as the attacked both would be forced to commit seppuku. That
the corrupt elder courtier was not punished at all upset many
people.

To reinstate the honor of their lord and avenge his death, 47 of his
loyal retainers planned, over the course of 2 years, an elaborate
scheme to kill the elder courtier. They avenged their lord's death
and paraded through town with the head of the elder courtier. All 47
were forced to commit seppuku as well. The play explores the initial
stories of several of the 47, focusing particularly on the life of
the leader of the ronin [lordless samurai]. The lead role was
performed by a master puppeteer who is in his 80's and was
designated a Living National Treasure. It's simply soaked in bathos.
A kind of who can outdo who in self-inflicted suffering. By the way,
the above summary is of the play, not of the actual historical event—
which obviously differs from the play in many key places, for
example, the young lord who's death was being avenged, was in fact
stupid and cowardly.

The story has been wildly popular in Japan ever since. It was made
into both a Kabuki and Bunraku play, and airs in dorama form on TV
every few years. Because it has so many good roles, Chuushingura is
a good way for a TV station to bring out and showcase all of its
major actors. Every year, there's a Chuushingura parade in the town
of Yamashina [a little south of Kyoto] because that's where the
leader of the 47 ronin lived. It's held on Dec. 14, the day they
finally avenged their master's death. The parade was interesting
because it was just random people from the town of Yamashina dressed
as various ronin. You could see families in the crowd saying "look,
there's dad" as men marched by in costume.

Anyway, back to the bunraku. The puppetry truly was enchanting. The
stage is huge and elaborate, with layers and layers to indicate the
outside, the outside of a building, and rooms inside, all of which
the puppets and puppeteers can pass through. In one of the scenes
near the end, white confetti drifted down in just the "outside"
layer to look like snow. On the right of the stage are chanters, who
chant the dialogue much in the same way that Noh plays are done,
except that it's much faster than the elongated drawls of Noh.
There're also shamisen players who provide accompaniment for the
chanters.

A full Bunarku play is a whole day-long affair. I was only going for
the second half of it, which started at 4. I thought it would end by
6 or 7 and then could eat dinner in and explore Osaka. It carried on
until 9 pm. I really enjoyed Bunraku, but 5 straight hours of it
pushed me a little over the edge. It was a battle not to fall asleep
especially because I'd stayed up much of the night before reading
the English translation of the play. And so, my only experience of
Osaka was the subway and the Bunraku theater! But fear not, I did
eventually explore Osaka, and will write it all up, probably several
articles from now.