A renowned performer in his own time, Komparu Zenchiku was rediscovered in the modern period as the author of numerous treatises on his art, which he studied under the tutelage of his father-in-law, Zeami Motokiyo (1363–1443). Even more recently, Zenchiku has begun to receive the attention he deserves as a major playwright in the Japanese dramatic tradition. Revealed Identity begins with an introduction on the cultural, philosophical, and sociopolitical contexts in which fourteen fascinating plays that have been attributed to Zenchiku were produced. The plays are then grouped into five thematic the relationship between humans and the nonsentient world, transgression and the suppression or subjugation of the demonic, divinity and its intersection with landscape and the abject, the figuration of female characters as “women who wait,” and delusion and ambiguity in works based on the classic Tale of Genji. The entire study is organized around a concept called “revealed identity,” which is defined as a relentless nondualism coupled with a sense of drama as an opportunity to reveal the true nature of a character, rather than illustrating a transformation of that nature. In this regard, Zenchiku’s attitude toward noh diverges from that of his contemporaries and challenges the classic Western view of drama that defines it in terms of conflict and action.

For centuries, scholars have wondered what daily life was like for the common people of Japan, especially for long bygone eras such as the ancient age (700–1150). Using the discipline of historical demography, William Wayne Farris shows that for most of this era, Japan’s overall population hardly grew at all, hovering around six million for almost five hundred years. The reasons for the stable population were complex. Most importantly, Japan was caught up in an East Asian pandemic that killed both aristocrat and commoner in countless numbers every generation. These epidemics of smallpox, measles, mumps, and dysentery decimated the adult population, resulting in wide-ranging social and economic turmoil. Famine recurred about once every three years, leaving large proportions of the populace malnourished or dead. Ecological degradation of central Japan led to an increased incidence of drought and soil erosion. And war led soldiers to murder innocent bystanders in droves. Under these harsh conditions, agriculture suffered from high rates of field abandonment and poor technological development. Both farming and industry shifted increasingly to labor-saving technologies. With workers at a premium, wages rose. Traders shifted from the use of money to barter. Cities disappeared. The family was an amorphous entity, with women holding high status in a labor-short economy. Broken families and an appallingly high rate of infant mortality were also part of kinship patterns. The average family lived in a cold, drafty dwelling susceptible to fire, wore clothing made of scratchy hemp, consumed meals just barely adequate in the best of times, and suffered from a lack of sanitary conditions that increased the likelihood of disease outbreak. While life was harsh for almost all people from 700 to 1150, these experiences represented investments in human capital that would bear fruit during the medieval epoch (1150–1600).

English (translation)Original Japanese