PSU’s Center for Japanese Studies Presents:
The Remarkable Story of Japan's Lost Bunraku Masterpiece,
The Adventures of High Priest Kôchi, and its Return to the Stage
Emeritus Prof. Laurence Kominz- PSU Kabuki Director
and Introducing guest master musician, Echigo Kakutayû (Seiki Keene)
This presentation provides historical and artistic context for PSU’s gala Kabuki production, May 25-28. It’s a miracle that we have this play to perform at all. Printed as a book in Edo in 1685, every copy in Japan was lost, and the sole, surviving book languished in the British Museum since the museum’s founding, mis-catalogued as a Chinese tale. How it got to England is a remarkable story. In 1962 a diligent Japanese scholar discovered the book, correctly identified it, and brought a facsimile back to Japan, where the arduous process of rehabilitation began.
Kominz and Kakutayû will present a short documentary in English about the loss, travels, and discovery of the play, and how it was brought back to the puppet stage in Japan. They will also explain and demonstrate the work that has been done to transform this puppet play into a kabuki play for live actors to perform, and the challenges of presenting in English such an archaic play, full of Buddhist doctrine, morality, and miracles.
Kominz and Kakutayû will provide musical narration for the play itself. The photo depicts them practicing musical narration.
(Echigo Kakutayû, legal name Keene Seiki, is the adopted son of scholar, Donald Keene.)