The Nō Plays of Japan

YOUNG WOMAN’S MASK _Frontispiece_ FACING PAGE YOUNG MAN’S MASK 70 DEMON MASK 152 THE ANGEL IN _HAGOROMO_ 176 IZUTSU 216 THE DRAGON LADY IN _AMA_ 234 YŪYA READING THE LETTER 238...

Once upon a time a boy and a girl, children of country people, used to meet at a well and play there together. When they grew up they became a little shame-faced towards one ano...

I am Hitomaru. I live in the valley of Kamegaye. My father Kagekiyo the Passionate fought for the House of Hei[67] and for this was hated by the Genji.[68] I am told they have b...

A young man, going into the world to make his fortune, stops at an inn on the road and there meets with a sage, who lends him a pillow. While the inn-servant is heating up the m...

_Eboshi-ori_ is a _genzai-mono_, that is to say a play which describes events actually in progress. In _Kumasaka_ these same events are rehearsed by the ghost of one who partici...

Seami tells us (_Works_, p. 246) that this play was written by Enami no Sayemon. “But as I removed bad passages and added good ones, I consider the play to be really my work” (p...

My name is Kiyoyori the Bird-Catcher. I was very well known on the Terrestrial Plane. But the span of my years came to its appointed close; I was caught in the Wind of Impermane...

I am a man who lives in the Capital. Maybe because of some great wrong I did in a former life ... I have fallen into trouble and cannot go on living here.

I am a teacher. I keep a school at one of the temples in the City. I have a pupil whose father is dead; he has only his mother to look after him. Now I will go and say good-bye...

The God of Sumiyoshi whose strength is such That he will not let you subdue us, O Rakuten! So we bid you return to your home, Swiftly over the waves of the shore! First the God...

Both of these plays deal with the ruthless exactions of religion; in each the first part lends itself better to translation than the second. _Tanikō_ is still played; but _Ikeni...