THE MASKS OF KYŌGEN: A STUDY OF MORPHOLOGY, TAXONOMY, AND PERSONAE

Date

2021

Contributor

Department

Instructor

Depositor

Speaker

Researcher

Consultant

Interviewer

Narrator

Transcriber

Annotator

Journal Title

Journal ISSN

Volume Title

Publisher

Volume

Number/Issue

Starting Page

Ending Page

Alternative Title

Abstract

ABSTRACT Kyōgen is the oldest continuously performed comedy in the world and introduced masking to performances more than a century earlier than the commedia dell’arte of Italy. The masks in use today remain essentially unchanged from at least the17th century. My thesis explores the origins, evolution, conformations, and personae of Kyōgen masks. Existing scholarship focuses on mask usage in Honkyōgen, the genre of independent comedy performance, but masked Kyōgen actors also enact important roles in Sarugaku-Nō plays and the sacred ritual of Shikisanban. Knowledge of the roles represented by Kyōgen masks in these two branches of Nōgaku is vital to understanding the development of important mask types and properly interpreting their personae. Given the dearth of historical documentation of Kyōgen masks and the paucity of modern research, my thesis draws heavily on formal analysis of Kyōgen masks made prior to the Meiji period. For this purpose, I present photographs of nearly 400 different masks, the largest and most comprehensive archive, by far, ever published.

Description

Keywords

Art history, Japanese masks, Kyōgen, Noh theater, traditional Japanese theater

Citation

Extent

343 pages

Format

Geographic Location

Time Period

Related To

Related To (URI)

Table of Contents

Rights

All UHM dissertations and theses are protected by copyright. They may be viewed from this source for any purpose, but reproduction or distribution in any format is prohibited without written permission from the copyright owner.

Rights Holder

Local Contexts

Email libraryada-l@lists.hawaii.edu if you need this content in ADA-compliant format.