In an important and unique contribution to the study of noh, this volume includes, for the first time, essays on the subject of one noh play written by scholars from both sides of the Pacific Ocean in their own language, Japanese or English (with a summary of each contribution translated into the other language also included). The essays show some of the breadth and depth that is available for the study of Japanese literature and drama both in Japan and abroad. Japanese scholars Amano Fumio, Nishino Haruo, Takemoto Mikio, and Wakita Haruko join with actor Uzawa Hisa and American scholars...

In Kanbunmyaku: The Literary Sinitic Context and the Birth of Modern Japanese Language and Literature, Saito Mareshi demonstrates the centrality of Literary Sinitic poetry and prose in the creation of modern literary Japanese. Saito’s new understanding of the role of “kanbunmyaku” in the formation of Japanese literary modernity challenges dominant narratives tied to translations from modern Western literatures and problematizes the antagonism between Literary Sinitic and Japanese in the modern academy. Saito shows how kundoku (vernacular reading) and its rhythms were central to the rise...