View Content #17811

From http://www.jfny.org/language/events.html

Coinciding with the return of the acclaimed Heisei Nakamura-za kabuki company to Lincoln Center Festival this summer (July 7 – 12), The Japan Foundation, New York and The Nippon Club are pleased to present a public lecture “KABUKI: WHAT’S IT ALL ABOUT?” by Professor Samuel L. Leiter of Brooklyn College and the Graduate Center, City University of New York. The lecture will take place on July 2 at the Nippon Club in New York City.

Since the end of World War II, Japan’s kabuki theatre has become familiar to theatre audiences around the world. The word kabuki itself has become so familiar that it has even entered the vocabulary of Western journalists to describe things—such as political maneuvers—that have nothing to do with what kabuki really is. Kabuki is an over 400-year-old genre that was, in premodern times, the most popular form of theatre for Japan’s urban citizens. Even today it remains extremely vibrant within the remarkably diverse world of Japanese theatrical entertainment. However, to truly appreciate this traditional theatre, it is helpful to be aware of its historical foundations and its principal artistic conventions, with which even many educated Japanese are not familiar. In this talk, Prof. Samuel L. Leiter will provide a brief, well-illustrated overview of kabuki’s origins and development, and will explain a number of theatrical methods that will help make kabuki easily understandable. Language students, especially, will benefit from the introduction of commonly used Japanese terms derived from kabuki.

For more details go to http://www.jfny.org/language/events.html