A blank space: normally we associate it with the negative space on the written page. In this paper, I view blank spaces as metaphorical spaces. A text exists and prompts a new creation: the blank space is where this new creation takes place. Here, I wish to explore the act of appropriating the classics in early modern Japanese literature as an example of such blank spaces. Shin Yoshiwara tsunezune-gusa（published in 1689）and Yoshiwara tsurezure-gusa（composed around 1709）, for instance, offer a minimal parody of the language used in the medieval Tsurezuregusa to describe crude contemporary topics: the discrepancy in contents with Tsurezuregusa is what provokes laughter. The same type of humor can be detected in Nise monogatari（ca. 1644）, which offers a minimal parody of every section of the Heian-period court tale Ise monogatari, but presents episodes about food, drink, illness, and gambling. Other texts employed the style of classical texts as models to record one’s thoughts. In Tsurezure Azuma kotoba（composed before 1806）kabuki actor Ichikawa Danjūrō V follows the style of Tsurezuregusa to advance reflections on contemporary matters. In Kuse Monogatari（composed around 1791 and published 1822）Ueda Akinari imitates the prose style of Ise monogatari to discuss human foibles and to satirize his contemporaries. To parody or to imitate a text is to understand its original structure and logic, and to write something new accordingly. Blank spaces exist in the act of reading the classics or learning from them; these blank spaces invite readers to turn into writers; the readers-turned-writers use the blank spaces to express whatever they wish. Classical works, themselves, contain blank spaces, which lead to creativity. This line of thinking allows us to grasp what I view as the vitality of the classics.
