by A. L. Sadler
SONG:
Alas, for Tsushio Maru and Anju Hime,*
Turned out to work by Sansho Taiyu.
They must go separate ways,
The brother must go to the hills,
The sister must stay on the shore.
Farewell! Come back soon!
They cry to each other.
SABUROBEI: O Toku! Go and give him something.
YOSHINO: All right.
(Stands up and looks out.)
KOSAKU (looking at her): Oh! It’s the Taiyu Yoshino, isn’t it?
YOSHINO: Do you know me then?
KOSAKU: Well, I haven’t exactly the honor of your acquaintance, but I have been called to the house you used to be in two or three times for performances. But what a change! (Looking round.) There’s some difference between this place and where you were before, isn’t there?
YOSHINO: Yes, and as they say, one’s spirits change with one’s surroundings. I feel quite at home and free from care here.
KOSAKU: Ah yes, you won’t find much to bother you in a place like this. I’m pretty free from care too, going round with my puppets, and I hope to call on you again before long.
YOSHINO: Yes, please do.
(Takes a pin from her hair and gives it to him.)
KOSAKU: Oh! What a beautiful pin! But I don’t like to take a costly thing like this. You are too generous. A few halfpence would suit me much better, really.
YOSHINO: But I haven’t got even a few halfpence, so please take this instead.
KOSAKU: What? Not got even a few halfpence! Oh! Ah well, that’s lucky for me anyhow, so I will accept your kind offer. But this is a change indeed—after what you have been used to. Even worse than the fate of Anju Hime.
(Starts his puppets again.)
SONG:
On the beach the little princess
Drops the salt-water pails she has no strength to carry.
Longingly she looks to the hills for her brother,
And he is too weak to cut the brushwood,
And slips and stumbles on the rocks and tree-roots.
She fears he will fall down into the valley—
Both weep and lament on hill and strand.
Ah! In this case the puppet-man feels the pathos of it more than the audience. (Exit looking very sorrowful.)
SABUROBEI: Oh dear! What a bother it is to be known to all the world.
YOSHINO: Yes, and so it is a good thing that we came to such a quiet place among the hills, isn’t it?
SABUROBEI: Perhaps so, but it is not a very good place for business. I mean to make a living somehow or other even by this poor clay daubing, but in this mountain hamlet we may have to dress in leaves and eat berries, for all I know.
YOSHINO: Well, the hermit Kanzan and the Mountain Lady living together would be a new subject for the painters.
SABUROBEI: Ha-ha-ha-ha!
(Enter Gohei, servant of the Haiya family.)
GOHEI: Is anyone at home?
YOSHINO: Ah, Gohei San? Please come in.
GOHEI (enters the room): So you are hard at it, sir?
SABUROBEI: If your hands aren’t busy here your mouth suffers.
GOHEI: Master seems quite hardened to this, er—low water, eh?
SABUROBEI: I may be hardened to it, but I haven’t taken it at the flood yet. You get pretty well buffeted in the sea of life at times.
GOHEI: But haven’t you any mind to come back to the safe refuge of the paternal bark?
SABUROBEI: I may not be without such an idea perhaps, but that little word disinheritance is somewhat of a bar, isn’t it?
GOHEI: Ah, but that disinheritance isn’t irrevocable. If master wished —
SABUROBEI: What d’you mean? If I wished?
GOHEI (looking at Yoshino and hesitating): Well, that’s rather difficult to explain here.
YOSHINO: Oh, I'll go and get some tea, I think.
(Exit.)
SABUROBEI: How is it difficult to explain?
GOHEI: Well, it’s er—that lady, you see.
SABUROBEI: And what about her?
GOHEI: Well, if master would give her up.
SABUROBEI: What?
GOHEI: Perhaps my clumsy way of speaking may offend the master, but whatever you say the Taiyu is the cause of all this trouble, and as long as she stays with you things must remain as they are, and however painful your circumstances may be I don’t see how your father can alter his decision. Now I don’t know what the master may think about it, but if she were to be sent away that would be, at any rate, a proof that you had repented, and then, if the family put their heads together in the matter of intercession, I have no doubt that everything would be all right.
SABUROBEI: Pooh, Gohei you were born in poverty and you’ve spent all your life up till now as a servant in our family. You’ve never spent any money, and so you don’t know anything about the value of it. I should like to stick you in the place of Konoe for a few days.
GOHEI: Eh?
SABUROBEI: I may have spent a little money, but now I come to think it over it was the money that was amusing itself. All the flattery and adulation was merely for the money, but my real self was not there. It had flown away somewhere—up to the seventh heaven perhaps. But when the money had taken itself off and there was none left, then, in amazement, I came back to myself, and did so with a complete understanding of human nature and the real zest of life. True, in my father’s house there is a lot of money, but while I was living there, even before I took to frequenting the gay quarter, I was quite without my soul, for I was just a well-behaved watch-dog of money-bags. Now I have to get along without a penny in my pocket, but in this rough hut I am master of my soul. I have a calm deep-rooted appreciation of things, and palace and thatched cottage are all the same to me. Ah, and never knew till now the proper taste of powder-tea!
GOHEI: But this is frivolous talk!
SABUROBEI: What d’you mean? Frivolous talk indeed! Here, let me offer you a cup, you unenlightened fellow.
GOHEI: No thanks. I have no need of it.
SABUROBEI (producing two tea-bowls): Look here! This tea-bowl was brought back from Korea by the great General Kato Kiyomasa when he helped to conquer it in the sixteenth century, and by him presented to his lord the Taiko Hideyoshi. And it was highly approved by Sen-no-Rikyu the chief of all tea-masters. A thousand pieces of gold would not buy it. And this is one that I have made myself after studying it and so absorbing its rhythmic harmony of form that it has become a part of me. These two vessels are just like what I was in former days and now. When I was at home and in affluence I was like this Rikyu tea-bowl: a famous object enough to be kept in a box, but without any bottom, and quite useless either for tea or water. Now I am just a bowl of soft pottery of no intrinsic value, but complete and able to hold the zest of life.
GOHEI: Ah, but tea must taste better if it is drunk out of a cup worth a thousand pieces.
SABUROBEI: What do you mean? Taste better! You don’t understand in the least!
GOHEI: I think it must be master who does not understand. Now, why not try and see things in the proper light?
SABUROBEI: What proper light? There!
(Strikes the Rikyu tea-bowl with his pipe so that it breaks in two.)
GOHEI (amazed at him): Oh! What have you done? It’s worth a thousand pieces!
SABUROBEI: Ha-ha-ha! Broke! Yes, that’s just like me when I wasted all my substance in riotous living, Great man or precious pot, it’s all the same; they’ll break quickly enough. Just give them one whack!
GOHEI: Ah, what a pity! What a loss! What a waste of money!
SABUROBEI: Yes, there’s no more money value in it now however well you may mend it, it will never be what it was before. But if you make a new one like this. There’s elegance for you! And your tea will have as fine a taste as you could wish.
GOHEI: How will it have a good taste?
SABUROBEI: Oh, you dolt, you haven’t the least glimmer of understanding! Here! Do have a cup for go
odness sake.
GOHEI: Er—thank you very much, but that’s all right. Next time I come perhaps—
SABUROBEI: Oh, people who don’t like tea had better stay away from here!
GOHEI: Excuse me. I am very sorry to have troubled you. (As he goes out of the gate)
Ah, what a pity that he should still remain so deluded.
(Exit with an air of dejection. Yoshino comes in again.)
SABUROBEI: Well. Did you hear what he said? That’s a fellow it’s no good arguing with.
YOSHINO: Whatever happens you will still—?
SABUROBEI: How should I think of leaving you.
YOSHINO: But we’ve hardly enough to keep a wreath or two of smoke above the eaves, much less can we think of anything in the way of comforts.
SABUROBEI: Even if I starve it will be with Paradise within me.
YOSHINO: Ah, but that splendid home of yours!
SABUROBEI: Mere stones and tiles where no affection is.
YOSHINO: But this bare-plastered solitary hut—
SABUROBEI: It is a very happy wretchedness.
YOSHINO: You really mean it?
SABUROBEI: Why should I tell a lie to you?
YOSHINO: Ah!
(Bursts into tears)
SABUROBEI: Ah, now I have come to savor the “patina” of life.
(Sound of a flute. Saburobei gets up and goes out taking the tea-bowl with him.)
YOSHINO (going to the gate and looking after him): The moon in the west, and you going off toward the sunrise at early dawning. That was the way we used to part before. But now we are together all day long, and even this unaccustomed work is not very hard. So for your sake I'll face the trials of this fleeting world, for I can trust you never to leave me. Even though the snow beat through our broken fence. Still women will brood over things, and their minds are always full of thoughts of their former life. Ah well, now I will put on the kettle so that the sound of its boiling recalls the song of the wind in the pines.
(Goes up stage and busies herself with the tea utensils. The stage makes a half turn. Enter two townsmen talking.)
ICHISUKE (peeping in at the gate): Yes. She’s in. Taiyu! Taiyu San!
(Yoshino takes no notice but goes on putting in charcoal.)
FUTAHACHI: Yoshino-han! Yoshino-han!
(She still pays no attention but puts on the kettle.)
ICHISUKE: Didn’t you hear me call her Taiyu and yet she doesn’t answer. Since she doesn’t even look up when I address her so respectfully I suppose she must have become deaf. Perhaps this noisy river, for that’s what Otowa-gawa means, you know, has made her deaf. Perhaps the people in this valley are all deaf.
FUTAHACHI: Ha-ha!
(Enter Yōnosuke hastily, dressed as a mendicant priest beating on a gourd.)
YŌNOSUKE (standing outside the gate): Namu Amida Butsu! Namu Amida Butsu! (Hail, Amida Buddha!)
ICHISUKE: Ya-ah! You can tap there as long as you like they’re deaf there, so they can’t hear you.
YŌNOSUKE: Indeed?
FUTAHACHI: Yes. Formerly the Taiyu Yoshino in all her glory, now she has gone to the dogs and is as deaf as a post!
YŌNOSUKE: What d’ye say? Yoshino? Is this the Taiyu’s house then?
ICHISUKE: That it is, sure enough.
YŌNOSUKE: Oh, how lucky! What happiness.
(Tries to rush in.)
ICHISUKE (stopping him): Here! What are you up to?
YŌNOSUKE: To see the Taiyu, of course!
FUTAHACHI: This is a devoted sort of fellow, isn’t he?
YŌNOSUKE: Because of my devotion I put on this pilgrim garb, and thus in altered guise I wandered every where in search of her.
ICHISUKE: Well, you’re a cleverer fellow than we, no doubt, but now she’s another man’s wife you see, so you must be careful what you do.
YŌNOSUKE: What of that? What do I care? I mean to see her at all costs and pour out on her to my heart’s content all the hatred that has been accumulating all this time.
FUTAHACHI: What terrible resolution! But what is this hatred about?
YŌNOSUKE: What’s it about? That’s pretty obvious. Didn’t I visit her time after time, so great was my attachment, and she would not deign even to let me see her once. And then to let herself be bought out and come and live in seclusion in a place like this. Isn’t that enough to make anyone hate her?
ICHISUKE: Oh yes, but you were not the only one were you?
YŌNOSUKE: Does anyone else feel the hate that I do? You there, Taiyu! You may try to get rid of me, but I won’t go!
(Looks in.)
FUTAHACHI: I don’t like this. He’s an uncanny fellow.
ICHISUKE: This crazy drumming pilgrim amuses me. Here! Let’s see you dance. If you dance the Taiyu is sure to look at you.
YŌNOSUKE: Do you really think so?
FUTAHACHI: Oh yes, of course.
ICHISUKE: He’s dancing. Just look!
FUTAHACHI: So he is. Well I never!
SONG:
When I listen to the Harmony of the Universe
In the mountain blast rings the sound of her harp.
When I contemplate the Unity of Phenomena
In the murmur of the streamlet I hear her voice.
While you still abide in this World of Impermanence
How can I think it but vanity and pain?
Though the Angel of Death arise before me
And bid me go forth straight to hell
So great is my desire to be with you
That I should scarcely heed his summons.
Over the eastern hills rises the smoke at sunset,
On the north peaks the dew falls morning and evening
Our days in this life may be long or short,
But all save love is a transient dream.
And as I sing even the Buddha assumes your shape.
Namu Amida! Namu Amida! Namu Amida!
(Dances and taps his gourd.)
BOTH THE OTHERS: Ha-ha-ha! How droll! Well, we must be off.
(Start off.)
YŌNOSUKE: Ah, won’t you get the Taiyu to meet me?
ICHISUKE: The Taiyu can’t see and can’t hear. She has in fact become one of the Three Not-hearing Not-seeing and Not-speaking Monkeys, you see.
BOTH: Ha-ha-ha!
(Exit.)
YŌNOSUKE: Oh, what liars they are! Hi! Stop, stop!
(Runs after them. The sound of rain. Enter Shōyu accompanied by a boy without an umbrella.)
SHŌYU: It’s a regular downpour! Run and get an umbrella somewhere!
BOY: Certainly, sir.
(Runs off.)
SHŌYU: Well, I'll take shelter under those eaves over there. (Goes over in front of the window. Smells the incense.) Ah, that’s choice. (Listening.) Yes, there’s the sound of a kettle. H’m, this is an elegant sort of cottage.
YOSHINO (looking out of the window): Oh, you’ll get wet there. Won’t you come inside, please?
SHŌYU: Thank you very much.
YOSHINO: It doesn’t look like stopping yet. Please make yourself at home here for a while. Please, this way.
SHŌYU (entering and standing in the doorway): Then please excuse me. I’m sorry I can’t help troubling you
YOSHINO: But pray come in. Please don’t stand on ceremony.
SHŌYU: Well, since you are so kind I will ask you to excuse my rudeness. I am indeed most impolite to intrude.
(Enters the room and sits down, looking about him the while. A harp is heard in the distance. Yoshino makes tea and serves it.)
SONG:
The cherry blossoms are like falling snow,
But whose tears are falling in the shower?
This poor makeshift cottage is our fate.
For this life is a dream even if we know it not.
To shun this life entirely would be well,
But even if we make the best of it,
’Tis but a sepia sketch of the sound of the wind in the pines.
SHŌYU (sitting in front of the al
cove and looking at the hearth):
Ah, that’s a rare piece of writing on that scroll “From amid the mountains, too, sounds the deer’s yearning cry.” And this shower just gives the right effect of light dew. The sound of the bubbling of the water in the kettle made by a master recalls the breaking of the waves on the shore by some lonely temple. And the tea-bowl, it is by the great Ko-ētsu, is it not?
YOSHINO: Oh no. That is my husband’s work.
SHŌYU: Ah, that makes it the more interesting. Just like the one splash of color of the maples in autumn when the sun sets on the deep green of the fir-clad hills, and everything is all calm and still. Yes, this tea-drinking has been very, very charming.
YOSHINO: I am embarrassed by your kind remarks. And will you not take another cup?
SHŌYU: Thank you, that is just enough. A most delightful entertainment when I came in thus unexpectedly. Excuse the rudeness of my remarking it, but you seem to have no help. (Looking round the room.) The master is not at home perhaps.
YOSHINO: No, he has gone out for a little while.
SHŌYU: And there are just the two of you?
YOSHINO: Yes, that is all.
SHŌYU (picking up a verse written on a slip of paper): Eh, what’s this?
Through the broken window comes the scent of the rain,
Sweeter by far than the rarest incense of China.
Ah, how exquisite! That’s the very essence of taste! One who retires from the world merely for amusement, and lives in idleness to kill time, is a waster of good rice, a mere drone. If the love of solitude is not reinforced by strong character, the hermit’s life is a living death. But here, how different. You have occupation and amusement also. A quiet, restful gray relieved by the brightness of a single flower. That’s the proper contrast. That’s the real hedonism. That’s the very spirit of Teaism. Well, your husband is a fine fellow but I have an only son who likes liquor better than tea and knows more about wasting money in sprees than he does about the way of the aesthete. In fact he has played the fool to such an extent that at last I have had to disinherit him.
