Asian Theatre Journal

Yasuda Noboru’s Noh as Living Art, which is the English translation of his 2017 book Nō: 650-nen tsuzuita shikake to wa, is an excellent resource for readers looking to discover new points of access into the [End Page 209] world of nō. Yasuda’s perspective as a waki performer is a refreshing perspective to anglophone literature on the art of nō, which remains heavily biased towards the shite-centered discourse. He also notes in the preface to the English edition that he specifically does not engage in depth with the play texts in this book (x–xi) which, considering the abundance of English language resources on nō texts from a literary perspective, seems a sensible omission. What he does instead is establish various points of connection between nō and key moments history, as well as its relationship to literature, popular culture, and health and wellness merits over time—firmly situating the art in its contemporary context with language that is clear and accessible.

Yasuda’s book is divided into eight concise chapters. Chapter One situates nō as a contemporary practice and introduces essential points, such as shoshin (“beginner’s mind”), nō’s flexibility over time, and the potential benefits of nō to life outside of the art, all of which he wants the reader to keep in mind. Chapters Two and Three do a reasonable job of summarizing over six hundred years of nō history into a mere twenty-three pages. As a unit, these first three chapters not only provide the reader with foundational knowledge from which they can build basic nō literacy but also illustrate the art’s historical trajectory with enough nuance to communicate that the nō we have today is the result of various adaptations over time, rather than a single unchanged tradition.

Chapter Four moves into the nuts and bolts of nō performance, covering basic terms such as suriashi (sliding feet), jo-ha-kyu (“opening-development-climax”), utai (songs), and the categories of plays, as well as an introduction to the stage complete with a particularly clear diagram of the stage borrowed from Manga de tanoshimu nō kyōgen (Enjoying Nō and Kyōgen through Manga, p. 47). However, this chapter also reveals the downside to the more waki-centered approach. There is only a very short section dedicated to the use of masks—which is arguably one of the major draws for many people to the art. Yasuda himself acknowledges this personal gap in his expertise, attributing his knowledge of masks entirely to the experiences shared by his shite colleagues. When Yasuda discusses the mask, he uses the seemingly expressionless, or rather, subtly expressive masks, to make his assertion that the “mask by itself . . . is static and emotionally neutral” (p. 37). This is a very selective approach that prioritizes the more refined mask types, such as the trademark young women masks that often prove to be the iconic “face” of nō itself. Unfortunately, this also overlooks the wide diversity of elderly, gods, demons, and other entities that frequently grace the nō stage with their significantly stronger features. He does, [End Page 210] however, address the physical experience of wearing the masks and the impact it has on the performer, hence remaining true to the phenomenologically driven perspective of his book and perhaps providing enough of a hook to stimulate further engagement on the subject by the reader.

Next, Yasuda devotes Chapter Five to Zeami’s “genius and legacy” (p. 49). Looking beyond the standard idolization of Zeami that is by no means unique to this book, this chapter uses Zeami as a means of introducing ideas around mugen nō (phantasmal nō), spirituality, hana (“The Flower”), and the iemoto (family head) system (the latter of which is potentially confusing since the term iemoto dates back to only the mid-eighteenth century despite nō lineages practically functioning as such since approximately Zeami’s time) (Rath 2016...