Part 21

_Literature._--From the neighbouring continent the Japanese derived the art of transmitting ideas to paper. But as to the date of that acquisition there is doubt. An authenticated work compiled A.D. 720 speaks of historiographers having been appointed to collect local records for the first time in 403, from which it is to be inferred that such officials had already existed at the court. There is also a tradition that some kind of general history was compiled in 620 but destroyed by fire in 645. At all events, the earliest book now extant dates from 712. Its origin is described in its preface. When the emperor Temmu (673-686) ascended the throne, he found that there did not exist any revised collection of the fragmentary annals of the chief families. He therefore caused these annals to be collated. There happened to be among the court ladies one Hiyeda no Are, who was gifted with an extraordinary memory. Measures were taken to instruct her in the genuine traditions and the old language of former ages, the intention being to have the whole ultimately dictated to a competent scribe. But the emperor died before the project could be consummated, and for twenty-five years Are's memory remained the sole depository of the collected annals. Then, under the auspices of the empress Gemmyo, the original plan was carried out in 712, Yasumaro being the scribe. The work that resulted is known as the _Kojiki_ (_Record of Ancient Matters_). It has been accurately translated by Professor B. H. Chamberlain (_Transactions of the Asiatic Society of Japan_, vol. x.), who, in a preface justly regarded by students of Japan as an exegetical classic, makes the pertinent comment: "Taking the word Altaïc in its usual acceptation, viz. as the generic name of all the languages belonging to the Manchu, Mongolian, Turkish and Finnish groups, not only the archaic, but the classical, literature of Japan carries us back several centuries beyond the earliest extant documents of any other Altaïc tongue." By the term "archaic" is to be understood the pure Japanese language of earliest times, and by the term "classical" the quasi-Chinese language which came into use for literary purposes when Japan appropriated the civilization of her great neighbours. The _Kojiki_ is written in the archaic form: that is to say, the language is the language of old Japan, the script, although ideographic, is used phonetically only, and the case-indicators are represented by Chinese characters having the same sounds. It is a species of saga, setting forth not only the heavenly beginnings of the Japanese race, but also the story of creation, the succession of the various sovereigns and the salient events of their reigns, the whole interspersed with songs, many of which may be attributed to the 6th century, while some doubtless date from the fourth or even the third. This _Kojiki_ marks the parting of the ways. Already by the time of its compilation the influence of Chinese civilization and Chinese literature had prevailed so greatly in Japan that the next authentic work, composed only eight years later, was completely Chinese in style and embodied Chinese traditions and Chinese philosophical doctrines, not distinguishing them from their Japanese context. This volume was called the _Nihongi_ (_Chronicles of Japan_). It may be said to have wholly supplanted its predecessor in popular favour, for the classic style--that is to say, the Chinese--had now come to be regarded as the only erudite script. The _Chronicles_ re-traversed much of the ground already gone over by the _Record_, preserving many of the songs in occasionally changed form, omitting some portions, supplementing others, and imparting to the whole such an exotic character as almost to disqualify the work for a place in Japanese literature. Yet this was the style which thenceforth prevailed among the litterati of Japan. "Standard Chinese soon became easier to understand than archaic Japanese, as the former alone was taught in the schools, and the native language changed rapidly during the century or two that followed the diffusion of the foreign tongue and civilization" (CHAMBERLAIN). The neglect into which the _Kojiki_ fell lasted until the 17th century. Almost simultaneously with its appearance in type (1644) and its consequent accessibility, there arose a galaxy of scholars under whose influence the archaic style and the ancient Japanese traditions entered a period of renaissance. The story of this period and of its products has been admirably told by Sir Ernest Satow ("Revival of Pure Shinto," _Proceedings of the Asiatic Society of Japan_, vol. iii.), whose essay, together with Professor Chamberlain's _Kojiki_, the same author's introduction to _The Classical Poetry of the Japanese_, and Mr W. G. Aston's _Nihongi_, are essential to every student of Japanese literature. To understand this 17th century renaissance, knowledge of one fact is necessary, namely, that about the year A. D. 810, a celebrated Buddhist priest, Kukai, who had spent several years studying in China, compounded out of Buddhism, Confucianism and Shinto a system of doctrine called _Ryobu Shinto_ (Dual Shinto), the prominent tenet of which was that the Shinto deities were merely transmigrations of Buddhist divinities. By this device Japanese conservatism was effectually conciliated, and Buddhism became in fact the creed of the nation, its positive and practical precepts entirely eclipsing the agnostic intuitionalism of Shinto. Against this hybrid faith several Japanese scholars arrayed themselves in the 17th and 18th centuries, the greatest of them being Mabuchi and Motoori. The latter's _magnum opus_, _Kojikiden_ (_Exposition of the Record of Ancient Matters_), declared by Chamberlain to be "perhaps the most admirable work of which Japanese erudition can boast," consists of 44 large volumes, devoted to elucidating the _Kojiki_ and resuscitating the Shinto cult as it existed in the earliest days. This great work of reconstruction was only one feature of the literary activity which marked the 17th and 18th centuries, when, under Tokugawa rule, the blessing of long-unknown peace came to the nation. Iyeyasu himself devoted the last years of his life to collecting ancient manuscripts. In his country retreat at Shizuoka he formed one of the richest libraries ever brought together in Japan, and by will he bequeathed the Japanese section of it to his eighth son, the feudal chief of Owari, and the Chinese section to his ninth son, the prince of Kishu, with the result that under the former feudatory's auspices two works of considerable merit were produced treating of ancient ceremonials and supplementing the _Nihongi_. Much more memorable, however, was a library formed by Iyeyasu's grandson the feudal chief of Mito (1662-1700), who not only collected a vast quantity of books hitherto scattered among Shinto and Buddhist monasteries and private houses, but also employed a number of scholars to compile a history unprecedented in magnitude, the _Dai-Nihon-shi_. It consisted of 240 volumes, and it became at once the standard in its own branch of literature. Still more comprehensive was a book emanating from the same source and treating of court ceremonials. It ran to more than 500 volumes, and the emperor honoured the work by bestowing on it the title _Reigi Ruiten_ (_Rules of Ceremonials_). These compilations together with the _Nihon Gwaishi_ (_History of Japan Outside the Court_), written by Rai Sanyo and published in 1827, constituted the chief sources of historical knowledge before the Meiji era. Rai Sanyo devoted twenty years to the preparation of his 22 volumes and took his materials from 259 Japanese and Chinese works. But neither he nor his predecessors recognized in history anything more than a vehicle for recording the mere sequence of events and their relations, together with some account of the personages concerned. Their volumes make profoundly dry reading. Vicarious interest, however, attaches to the productions of the Mito School on account of the political influence they exercised in rehabilitating the nation's respect for the throne by unveiling the picture of an epoch prior to the usurpations of military feudalism. The struggles of the great rival clans, replete with episodes of the most tragic and stirring character, inspired quasi-historical narrations of a more popular character, which often took the form of illuminated scrolls. But it was not until the Meiji era that history, in the modern sense of the term, began to be written. During recent times many students have turned their attention to this branch of literature. Works of wide scope and clear insight have been produced, and the Historiographers' section in the Imperial University of Tokyo has been for several years engaged in collecting and collating materials for a history which will probably rank with anything of the kind in existence.

Poetry.

In their poetry above everything the Japanese have remained impervious to alien influences. It owes this conservation to its prosody. Without rhyme, without variety of metre, without elasticity of dimensions, it is also without known counterpart. To alter it in any way would be to deprive it of all distinguishing characteristics. At some remote date a Japanese maker of songs seems to have discovered that a peculiar and very fascinating rhythm is produced by lines containing 5 syllables and 7 syllables alternately. That is Japanese poetry (_uta_ or _tanka_). There are generally five lines: the first and third consisting of 5 syllables, the second, fourth and fifth of 7, making a total of 31 in all. The number of lines is not compulsory: sometimes they may reach to thirty, forty or even more, but the alternation of 5 and 7 syllables is compulsory. The most attenuated form of all is the _hokku_ (or _haikai_) which consists of only three lines, namely, 17 syllables. Necessarily the ideas embodied in such a narrow vehicle must be fragmentary. Thus it results that Japanese poems are, for the most part, impressionist; they suggest a great deal more than they actually express. Here is an example:--

Momiji-ha wo \ Kaze ni makasete | More fleeting than the glint of Miru yori mo > withered leaf wind-blown, the Hakanaki mono wa | thing called life. Inochi nari keri /

There is no English metre with this peculiar cadence.

It is not to be inferred that the writers of Japan, enamoured as they were of Chinese ideographs and Chinese style, deliberately excluded everything Chinese from the realm of poetry. On the contrary, many of them took pleasure in composing versicles to which Chinese words were admitted and which showed something of the "parallelism" peculiar to Chinese poetry, since the first ideograph of the last line was required to be identical with the final ideograph. But rhyme was not attempted, and the syllabic metre of Japan was preserved, the alternation of 5 and 7 being, however, dispensed with. Such couplets were called _shi_ to distinguish them from the pure Japanese _uta_ or _tanka_. The two greatest masters of Japanese poetry were Hitomaro and Akahito, both of the early 8th century, and next to them stands Tsurayuki, who flourished at the beginning of the 10th century, and is not supposed to have transmitted his mantle to any successor. The choicest productions of the former two with those of many other poets were brought together in 756 and embodied in a book called the _Manyoshu (Collection of a Myriad Leaves)_. The volume remained unique until the beginning of the 10th century, when (A.D. 905) Tsurayuki and three coadjutors compiled the _Kokinshu (Collection of Odes Ancient and Modern)_, the first of twenty-one similar anthologies between the 11th and the 15th centuries, which constitute the _Niju-ichi Dai-shu (Anthologies of the One-and-Twenty Reigns)_. If to these we add the _Hyaku-ninshu (Hundred Odes by a Hundred Poets)_ brought together by Teika Kyo in the 13th century, we have all the classics of Japanese poetry. For the composition of the _uta_ gradually deteriorated from the end of the 9th century, when a game called _uta-awase_ became a fashionable pastime, and aristocratic men and women tried to string together versicles of 31 syllables, careful of the form and careless of the thought. The _uta-awase_, in its later developments, may not unjustly be compared to the Occidental game of _bouts-rimés_. The poetry of the nation remained immovable in the ancient groove until very modern times, when, either by direct access to the originals or through the medium of very defective translations, the nation became acquainted with the masters of Occidental song. A small coterie of authors, headed by Professor Toyama, then attempted to revolutionize Japanese poetry by recasting it on European lines. But the project failed signally, and indeed it may well be doubted whether the Japanese language can be adapted to such uses.

Influence of Women in Japanese Literature.

It was under the auspices of an empress (Suiko) that the first historical manuscript is said to have been compiled in 620. It was under the auspices of an empress (Gemmyo) that the _Record of Ancient Matters_ was transcribed (712) from the lips of a court lady. And it was under the auspices of an empress that the _Chronicles of Japan_ were composed (720). To women, indeed, from the 8th century onwards may be said to have been entrusted the guardianship of the pure Japanese language, the classical, or Chinese, form being adopted by men. The distinction continued throughout the ages. To this day the spoken language of Japanese women is appreciably simpler and softer than that of the men, and to this day while the educated woman uses the hiragana syllabary in writing, eschews Chinese words and rarely pens an ideograph, the educated man employs the ideograph entirely, and translates his thoughts as far as possible into the mispronounced Chinese words without recourse to which it would be impossible for him to discuss any scientific subject, or even to refer to the details of his daily business. Japan was thus enriched with two works of very high merit, the _Genji Monogatari_ (c. 1004) and the _Makura no Zoshi_ (about the same date). The former, by Murasaki no Shikibu--probably a pseudonym--was the first novel composed in Japan. Before her time there had been many _monogatari_ (narratives), but all consisted merely of short stories, mythical or quasi-historical, whereas Murasaki no Shikibu did for Japan what Fielding and Richardson did for England. Her work was "a prose epic of real life," the life of her hero, _Genji_. Her language is graceful and natural, her sentiments are refined and sober; and, as Mr Aston well says, her "story flows on easily from one scene of real life to another, giving us a varied and minutely detailed picture of life and society in Kioto, such as we possess for no other country at the same period." The _Makura no Zoshi (Pillow Sketches)_, like the _Genji Monogatari_, was by a noble lady--Sei Shonagon--but it is simply a record of daily events and fugitive thoughts, though not in the form of a diary. The book is one of the most natural and unaffected compositions ever written. Undesignedly it conveys a wonderfully realistic picture of aristocratic life and social ethics in Kioto at the beginning of the 11th century. "If we compare it with anything that Europe has to show at this period, it must be admitted that it is indeed a remarkable work. What a revelation it would be if we had the court life of Alfred's or Canute's reign depicted to us in a similar way?"

The Dark Age.

The period from the early part of the 14th century to the opening of the 17th is generally regarded as the dark age of Japanese literature. The constant wars of the time left their impress upon everything. To them is due the fact that the two principal works compiled during this epoch were, one political, the other quasi-historical. In the former, _Jinkoshoto-ki (History of the True Succession of the Divine Monarchs)_, Kitabatake Chikafusa (1340) undertook to prove that of the two sovereigns then disputing for supremacy in Japan, Go-Daigo was the rightful monarch; in the latter, _Taihei-ki (History of Great Peace)_, Kojima (1370) devoted his pages to describing the events of contemporaneous history. Neither work can be said to possess signal literary merit, but both had memorable consequences. For the _Jinkoshoto-ki_, by its strong advocacy of the mikado's administrative rights as against the usurpations of military feudalism, may be said to have sowed the seeds of Japan's modern polity; and the _Taihei-ki_, by its erudite diction, skilful rhetoric, simplification of old grammatical constructions and copious interpolation of Chinese words, furnished a model for many imitators and laid the foundations of Japan's 19th-century style. The _Taihei-ki_ produced another notable effect; it inspired public readers who soon developed into historical _raconteurs_; a class of professionals who are almost as much in vogue to-day as they were 500 years ago. Belonging to about the same period as the _Jinkoshoto-ki_, another classic occupies a leading place in Japanese esteem. It is the _Tsure-zure-gusa (Materials for Dispelling Ennui)_, by Kenko-boshi, described by Mr Aston as "one of the most delightful oases in Japanese literature; a collection of short sketches, anecdotes and essays on all imaginable subjects, something in the manner of Selden's _Table Talk_."

The Drama.

The so-called dark age of Japanese literature was not entirely unproductive: it gave the drama (_No_) to Japan. Tradition ascribes the origin of the drama to a religious dance of a pantomimic character, called _Kagura_ and associated with Shinto ceremonials. The No, however, owed its development mainly to Buddhist influence. During the medieval era of internecine strife the Buddhist priests were the sole depositaries of literary talent, and seeing that, from the close of the 14th century, the Shinto mime (Kagura) was largely employed by the military class to invoke or acknowledge the assistance of the gods, the monks of Buddha set themselves to compose librettos for this mime, and the performance, thus modified, received the name of No. Briefly speaking, the No was a dance of the most stately character, adapted to the incidents of dramas "which embrace within their scope a world of legendary lore, of quaint fancies and of religious sentiment." Their motives were chiefly confined to such themes as the law of retribution to which all human beings are subjected, the transitoriness of life and the advisability of shaking off from one's feet the dust of this sinful world. But some were of a purely martial nature. This difference is probably explained by the fact that the idea of thus modifying the Kagura had its origin in musical recitations from the semi-romantic semi-historical narratives of the 14th century. Such recitations were given by itinerant Bonzes, and it is easy to understand the connexion between them and the No. Very soon the No came to occupy in the estimation of the military class a position similar to that held by the _tanka_ as a literary pursuit, and the _gagaku_ as a musical, in the Imperial court. All the great aristocrats not only patronized the No but were themselves ready to take part in it. Costumes of the utmost magnificence were worn, and the chiselling of masks for the use of the performers occupied scores of artists and ranked as a high glyptic accomplishment. There are 335 classical dramas of this kind in a compendium called the _Yokyoka Tsuge_, and many of them are inseparably connected with the names of Kwanami Kiyotsugu (1406) and his son Motokiyo (1455), who are counted the fathers of the art. For a moment, when the tide of Western civilization swept over Japan, the No seemed likely to be permanently submerged. But the renaissance of nationalism (_kokusui hoson_) saved the venerable drama, and owing to the exertions of Prince Iwakura, the artist Hosho Kuro and Umewaka Minoru, it stands as high as ever in popular favour. Concerning the five schools into which the No is divided, their characteristics and their differences--these are matters of interest to the initiated alone.

The Farce.

The Japanese are essentially a laughter-loving people. They are highly susceptible of tragic emotions, but they turn gladly to the brighter phases of life. Hence a need was soon felt of something to dispel the pessimism of the No, and that something took the form of comedies played in the interludes of the No and called _Kyogen_ (mad words). The Kyogen needs no elaborate description: it is a pure farce, never immodest or vulgar.

The Theatre.