BUN’YABUSHI A LESS KNOWN FORM OF JAPANESE PUPPET ENTERTAINMENT AND ITS IMPLICATIONS FOR THEATER
BUN’YABUSHI A LESS KNOWN FORM OF JAPANESE PUPPET ENTERTAINMENT AND ITS IMPLICATIONS FOR THEATER

Summary/Abstract: The bunraku, the Japanese puppet theater, is internationally known for the almost perfect movements of its puppets which are handled by three puppeteers at the same time. Furthermore, the bunraku has a very elegant and complex choreography. Numerous European and American authors have studied it; however, in Japan there is an ancestor of bunraku that is little known in the West but which is essential to examine in order to better understand the history of Japanese theater and its deep links with literary production. This research is about a particular type of ancient puppet theater, called bun’yabushi, which remained linked to peripheral local realities, far from the major cultural and political administrative centers. We have tried to understand the history, peculiarities and importance of bun’yabushi, also proposing a comparative analysis with what is known about jōruri.

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