Free Lost Japan by Alex Kerr

the audience is a particularly famous example. Actors enter and leave the stage via this walkway; separated from the action on the main stage, the actor on the
hanamichi
enters a solitary realm where he is free to reveal the inner depths of his role. For instance, the play
Kumagai Jinya
(
Kumagai’s Battle Camp
) is a traditional tale of
giri-ninjo
(the conflict between love and duty): Kumagai must kill his own son and substitute the boy’s severed head for the son of his lord. His ruse is successful, but in remorse Kumagai shaves off his hair to enter a life of asceticism, and exits down the
hanamichi.
When the late Kanzaburo XVIII played Kumagai, he imparted such a sense of personal desolation as he exited down the
hanamichi
that
Kumagai Jinya
seemed not a tale of
giri-ninjo
, but an antiwar play.
    Kabuki stagecraft sometimes seems symbolic of life itself. An example of this is
danmari
, or pantomime scenes, in which all the lead characters come silently out onto the stage at the same time.
As though walking in pitch darkness, they move about in slow motion, oblivious to each other’s existence; they run into each other or drop things which are retrieved by others. There is an eerie quality about
danmari
which has nothing to do with any specific play. Watching scenes of
danmari
, where a man picks up a letter his lover has dropped, or two people looking for each other pass by unawares, one senses the blindness of human existence. What begins as just another bit of eccentric Kabuki stagecraft ends up symbolizing a deeper truth.
    Why did stagecraft develop to such a level in Japan? At the risk of oversimplification, I would say it was because Japan is a country where the exterior is more often valued over the interior. One may see the negative effects of this in many aspects of modern Japanese life. For instance, the fruits and vegetables in a Japanese supermarket are all flawless in color and shape as if made from wax, but they are flavorless. The importance of the exterior may be seen in the conflict between
tatemae
(officially stated position) and
honne
(real intent), which is a staple of books written about Japan. Listening to the debates in Japan’s Diet, it is abundantly clear that
tatemae
is given precedence over
honne.
Nevertheless, this emphasis on the surface is not without its positive side, for Kabuki’s unparalleled stagecraft is a direct result of such prizing of the outward.
    Though I learned many things from Kabuki stagecraft, the aspect I found most fascinating was the artistry used to capture and accentuate the emotion of a single fleeting moment. The
mie
, when actors pose dramatically with eyes crossed and arms flung out, is an obvious example of this. But it may be said of many other Kabuki
kata
as well. For example, there might be a scene where two people are casually talking; then, from some detail of the conversation, the characters suddenly comprehend each other’s true feelings. In that instant, action stops, actors freeze, and from stage left wooden clappers go ‘
battari!
’. The two characters resume speaking as though nothing has happened;
however, in the instant of that ‘
battari!
’, everything has changed. While most forms of theater try to preserve a narrative continuity, Kabuki focuses around such crucial instants of stop and start, start and stop.
    This can also be said of Kabuki audiences’ expressions of appreciation. At a Western play or concert, the audience waits politely until the very end before applauding; nothing could be more ill-mannered than to clap between movements of a symphony. In contrast, during highlights of a Kabuki play, audience members will show their appreciation by shouting out the
yago
(house names) of the actors. When the play is over, they just get up and leave.
    The shouting of
yago
is an art in itself. One doesn’t shout at any time, but only at certain moments of dramatic tension. You can recognise the amateurs in the audience by their poorly timed