LITERATURE AND THE DRAMA
The literature of Japan is a somewhat
recondite subject, while the Japanese drama is at
present, like many other things in the country, to
a great extent in a state of transition. Still,
some remarks on these two matters are, I consider,
absolutely essential in order that my readers may
form some idea of two important phases of Japanese
life. The literature of Japan is indeed largely
mixed up with the national life through many centuries a
reflection, in fact, of it. The late Sir Edwin
Arnold, whose great authority on everything connected
with Japan is generally admitted, has observed in reference
to the literature of that country: “The
time will come when Japan, safe, famous, and glad
with the promise of peaceful years to follow and to
reward this present period of life and death conflict,
will engage once again the attraction of the Western
nations on the side of her artistic and intellectual
gifts. Already in this part of the globe persons
of culture have become well aware how high and subtle
is her artistic genius; and by and by it will be discovered
that there are real treasures to be found in her literature.
Moreover, England, beyond any other European country,
is likely to be attracted to this branch, at present
naturally neglected, of what may be called the spiritual
side of Japanese life.”
The drawback to the fulfilment of
the somewhat optimistic forecast of Sir Edwin Arnold
is the great difficulty experienced by the Western
nations in acquiring a sufficient knowledge of the
language in which the treasures of Japanese literature
are embedded if not entombed. No man can ever
grasp the beauties of a literature, and especially
an Oriental literature, through the medium of a translation,
however well done. A translation is like a diamond
with the brilliancy removed, if we can imagine such
a thing. It may be faultlessly correct in its
rendering, and yet absolutely misleading in its interpretation
of the original.
Japanese literature embraces poetry,
history, fiction, books of ceremony and travel, as
well as many works of an ethical nature. Poetry
is supposed to have reached its most brilliant period
in Japan a long way back long even before
Geoffrey Chaucer took up his pen to write those immortal
lines which I fear but comparatively few Englishmen
now read. In reference to this poetry of twelve
hundred years ago, Mr. Aston perhaps the
greatest authority on the subject remarks:
“While the eighth century has left us little
or no prose literature of importance, it was emphatically
the golden age of poetry. Japan has now outgrown
the artless effusions described in the preceding
chapter, and during this period produced a body of
verse of an excellence which has never since been
surpassed. The reader who expects to find this
poetry of a nation just emerging from the barbaric
stage of culture characterised by rude, untutored vigour,
will be surprised to learn that, on the contrary, it
is distinguished by polish rather than power.
It is delicate in sentiment and refined in language,
and displays exquisite skill of phrase with a careful
adherence to certain canons of composition of its own.”
I confess my knowledge of the language
is insufficient to enable me to read Japan’s
literary treasures in the original, and as I have
remarked, no man through the medium of a translation
can adequately form a correct opinion respecting any
description of foreign literature. I fear, however,
that modern Japan is as little concerned with its
eighth-century poetry as the modern Englishman is with
that of Chaucer, not to speak of those great poets,
most of whom are now forgotten, who lived long before
Chaucer and whose verses were not only read but sung
throughout the length and breadth of the land.
In a much later period of the history
of the country, literature was undoubtedly greatly
in vogue. There was evolved what I may term a
distinct literary class, the language and literature
of China were diligently studied, and very much of
the literature of this time is written in Chinese.
That language, indeed, seems to have been at one period
regarded in Japan very much as Latin was, and in some
quarters is even still, regarded in Europe as the
appropriate medium for expressing the most sublime
thoughts of the brightest intellects. The fiction
of this period, usually termed the Heian and
there is plenty of it still in existence was
for the most part written by women, so that it will
be seen the female novelist is not, as some persons
appear to imagine, a comparatively modern development.
After the twelfth century and most of the
literature I have referred to is anterior to that petty
wars between the feudal princes appear to have been
incessant, and the whole country was for a great number
of years more concerned with fighting than with literature.
History or historical romance seems to have been the
favourite literary exercitation during this period.
A good deal of the literature thereof is still, I
understand, read in Japan, especially by its youth,
for whom the stirring episodes embodied in the history
and historical romances of these bellicose times seem
to have an especial fascination.
The Tokugawa period, covering the
270 years during which the Government of the Tycoon
was installed in Yeddo, was one during which literature
made great progress in Japan. Those years were
a time of profound peace; the country was cut off
from the rest of the world, thrown in upon itself,
and accordingly had ample leisure, and possibly much
inclination, to develop its artistic side, especially
in literature. The study of books was prevalent
everywhere, and quite a band of teachers arose in
the land whose mission it was to expound its ancient
literature, and exhume for public edification and delectation
many of the buried literary treasures of the past.
These teachers were not content with mere oral description;
they wrote what would now be termed treatises or commentaries,
many of which show great depth of learning, by way
of expounding and explaining the classics of Japan
with a view of bringing them within the ken of the
great mass of the people. This period (the Tokugawa)
also had its works of fiction; it produced many dramas
and, I believe, some, if not much, poetry. The
romances of this time are, I am told, written principally
for or down to the level of the common people.
The classics of Japan were, and probably still are,
like the classics of Greece and Rome in respect of
the mass of the people of this country, not understood,
and most likely were they, would not be appreciated.
And hence in the Tokugawa period what I may term the
popular writer was evolved, and he turned out, under
a nom-de-plume for the most part, books for
the lower orders. These works are now regarded
as somewhat vulgar, but they are in many respects
a mirror of the age in which they were written, and
it is doubtful if they are much coarser in style than
some of the novels published in England in the eighteenth
century. Vulgarity, it must be remembered, is
largely a matter of opinion, and because either the
Japanese of to-day or the foreigner who has perused,
perhaps in a translation, this fiction of a couple
of centuries back, dubs it according to the opinion
of to-day vulgar, it by no means follows that it was
so considered in Japan two hundred years back.
Since the Revolution of 1868 it is
doubtful if Japan has produced any distinctive literature.
The whole country and all the national modes of thought
have been in a state of transition, a condition of
unrest circumstances not conducive to the
production of classical literature; moreover, literary
ideas and conceptions have changed and are still changing changing
rapidly. The development of a powerful newspaper
press must have a marked and far-reaching effect on
Japanese literature. So also must the study of
Western literature by the educated classes a
study which is both extensive and increasing.
Japanese literature is now undoubtedly in the melting-pot,
so to speak, and what will be the precise result it
is impossible to determine. It must be confessed
that the modern Japanese who has been educated according
to Western methods, and is adequately acquainted with
the languages and literature of Europe, is infrequently
an admirer of the peculiar literature of his own country.
Possibly it suffers by comparison. Japan has
produced no Dante, or Shakespeare, or Milton.
The moods of her people, and probably the limitations
and peculiarities of the language, have prevented
the possibility of the appearance of such divine geniuses.
There is, its critics declare, an absence of sustained
power and sublimity in Japanese literature generally,
while the didactic and philosophical, if not altogether
lacking, is extremely rare therein. But it seems
to me the height of absurdity to compare the literature
of a country like Japan with the literature of some
other land where everything is, and always has been,
essentially different. To properly comprehend,
and probably to be able to appreciate Japanese literature,
it would be necessary to get, so to speak, into the
atmosphere in which it was produced. To judge
it by twentieth-century standards and canons of criticism
and from European standpoints is not only unfair but
must create a totally false impression.
In every country which has attained
any degree of civilisation, and even in some countries
whose civilisation is still imperfect, the drama has
played an important part, and Japan has been no exception
to the rule. Its dramatic literature is, I believe,
of considerable extent, and to understand, much less
appreciate it properly would require very profound
study. Many of the more or less ancient dramas
are works not only containing the dialogue of the play
but much descriptive matter. They were, as a
matter of fact, written for theatres in which there
were to be not actors but marionettes, singers being
engaged to sing the lines out of sight while the puppets
depicted the characters. Some of these dramas
have, since they were written, been adapted for the
ordinary stage and the characters portrayed by Japan’s
most famous actors. The theatre was long looked
down upon and it is only of comparatively recent years
that it has been looking up. A large number of
persons in this country still appear to be under the
impression that there are no actresses on the Japanese
stage. This is, of course, a mistake, caused no
doubt by the fact that in Japanese theatres the female
characters in a play are so often impersonated by
men. Some two or three centuries back actors and
actresses used, as in Europe, to play in the same piece,
but this was for some reason or other interdicted,
and ever since there have been companies composed
of men and women respectively. In the male companies
some of the female parts naturally fell to men and
in the female companies the male parts were of necessity
depicted by women. Of recent years the tendency
is to revert to the ancient practice and to come into
line with the custom of European countries in this
matter, and ere long, no doubt in Japanese theatres
the female characters will be taken by women and the
male characters by men.
The theatre has always been a popular
institution in Japan, and the pieces usually played
have very much the same motif as the dramas
formerly so popular in this country the
discomfiture of the villain and the triumph of virtue.
The Japanese theatre does not appeal to the ordinary
European visitor, or indeed to many Europeans living
in the country. In the first place, the performance
is too long for the European taste, and in the next,
most Japanese plays are of one kind, and concerned
with one period the feudal. There is,
moreover, a plethora of by-play sword exercise
and acrobatic performances which have nothing
whatever to do with the plot of the piece. In
fact, irrelevancy appears to the European the chief
characteristic of what he sees on the stage of a Japanese
theatre. Nor does the play, as is usual in serious
dramas in this country, revolve round one character,
the hero or heroine. Indeed it is not always easy
to earmark, so to speak, the leading character, and
it is occasionally doubtful in many Japanese plays
whether there is any hero or heroine. But the
same remark may be made here as in reference to the
literature of the country. It is probably essential
to get into the Japanese atmosphere in order to properly
appreciate a Japanese play. The drama in Japan
at any rate serves, and so far as I have had an opportunity
of forming an opinion in the matter, serves well,
its purpose to interest and amuse the frequenters
of the theatres, besides which the lessons it inculcates
are for the most part of a moral nature.
The high art of the Japanese theatre
is represented by the “Noh,” which I suppose
fills much the same position as does the Italian opera
in this country. The “Noh” is, I
believe, very ancient. The written text is sung;
there is a principal and a secondary character and
a chorus. The dialogue is as ancient, some critics
say as archaic, as the time in which the play was
written, and I understand it requires being educated
up to it in order to fully appreciate the “Noh.”
The ordinary Japanese would probably just as much
fail to comprehend or like it as would the Englishman
from Mile End, were he taken to Covent Garden, and
invited to go into raptures over one of Mozart’s
or Meyerbeer’s masterpieces. A performance
of the “Noh” would probably interest those
who find excitement in a representation of “Oedipus
Tyrannus,” or some Greek play. Still,
the “Noh” is appreciated by a large number
of the intellectual classes in Japan, who find an
interest in the representation of this Japanese opera,
as I suppose it may be termed.
As I have already said, very much
the same remarks made in reference to the literature
of Japan apply to its drama. That country is still
in the transition stage, and both its drama and its
literature will undoubtedly be profoundly modified
in future years. Western literature and Western
dramatic art have already exercised considerable influence,
and there are movements on foot whose object is to
replace the old ideas and methods, especially in the
matter of the representation of dramatic works by
those which obtain in Europe and America. Whether
these movements will be successful or not remains to
be seen. There is certainly a large body of public
opinion not only opposed but antagonistic to them.
In spite of the rapid development of Japan in recent
years, there is a very strong conservative party in
the country a party which, though it recognises
or acquiesces in the desirability of change in many
directions, is not prepared to throw overboard everything
because it is old. I sincerely hope that the
distinctive literature and dramatic art of the country
will not be allowed to die out. Japan cannot
afford to forget the past with its influences on the
national life and character, influences at work for
many ages which have assuredly had a material effect
in elevating her to the position she at present occupies.