In Kabuki, we find a curious contradiction between the high esteem for representation by means of traditional dramaturgy with inherited stylized acting and the lower regard for the play texts themselves. The texts have suffered considerably from free alteration, abbreviation and adaptation by later revisers. When considering the gradual evolution of the Sukeroku plays, it becomes evident that Kabuki texts have been regarded as changeable scripts rather than established literary works. The fluidity of a text was proof of a play's dramatic vitality, so that the text was accepted as something expendable rather than a fixed literary work. Unlike the case of Shakespeare's plays, there has been little hesitation to meddle with words or tamper with the plots. As well as the innate nature of Kabuki, the current production system is largely responsible for the use of abridged or adapted texts, since an abbreviated script is much preferred to the lengthy original play. As a result, only one or two scenes of the whole play may be performed. The present script of Sukeroku Yukon no Edo Zakura is an abridged version based on the script of the 1915 production at the Kabuki-za. The abridged version of the relationship between Edo commoners and the Soga family, and the mixture of the aragoto and wagoto artistic styles lacks much of the vivid picture portrayed in the original. The quintessential appeal of Kabuki lies in the superb combination of the refined physical appeal of the actors and the dynamic dramaturgy of the play texts. Just as Shakespeare's language has been reevaluated, so is it time for us to appreciate the significance of the play scripts of Kabuki, as well as the physical tradition of acting.

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Vladimir and Estragon, the main protagonists in Beckett's Waiting for Godot, are often regarded as clowns, although there is no mentions that they are 'clowns' in the text. Wolfgang Iser comments the points as 'a process of interpretation' of the text. Admittedly, on watching their comical behaviour and cross-talk repetitions, we notice the fact that we see the truth of the human condition in their actions. We also hear voices telling the truth in their speech. That is, they are truth-tellers like Shakespeare's fools. However, unlike Shakespeare's fools, Vladimir and Estragon are not wise enough to know how they should behave. From this point, Vladimir and Estragon are in an ambiguous position: they seem to be stage clowns, and at the same time, they seem to have a similar nature to Shakespeare's fools. The aim of this essay is to examine the obscure figure of Vladimir and Estragon as fools/crowns by a comparison with Shakespeare's fools.

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Before D.H.Lawrence began writing Paul Morrel, he had planned to write a biographical novel about his mother whose fictional name was called 'Matilda'. As his mother lay dying on December 6, 1910, however, he discontinued writing his mother's novel and began weaving his mother's life story into his own biographical novel. The final title, Sons and Lovers, was given to the novel as the author veered his initial intention in a different direction. The author's ambition to become a successful writer might have been the cause of the transformation of the subject. As a result the title took on an ambiguity concerning the major role between 'sons' and 'lovers'. Kate Millett, a radical feminist criticized Sons and Lovers as being a male chauvinistic story of a young, ambitious Paul who undermined young women's efforts to be emancipated from the conventional world and took the side of traditional women, like his mother. It is true that the discrepancy between Lawrence's real self and "mother's son" bore a great deal of mis-understandings. On the other hand, Kate Millett's criticism against the author's spokesman displayed not only a striking originality by offering a conflicting women's viewpoint, but also helped focus on the daily lives of ordinary women in which they strove against situations where the strict common law in the novel was not on the side of women's freedom.

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There is a huge gap between Henry Adams as a scholar of American history who wrote the nine-volume History of the United States during the Administrations of Thomas Jefferson and James Madison and Adams as author of Mont-Saint-Michel and Chartres. Before Mont-Saint-Michel and Chartres, he tries to be "logically accurate and habitually thorough." Adams also seems to find pleasure in debunking mythologized, idolized politicians like John Randolph of Roanoke who is "venerated as a descendant of Pocahontas" or George Washington. In Mont-Saint-Michel and Chartres, however, he is going in the opposite direction: he repeatedly writes that he does not need accurate information, historical truth or facts. Adams tries to capture a sense of what the European Middle Ages had to say through its poetry, architecture, legends and myths, totally disregarding the socioeconomic conditions or geopolitics of those things. This essay covers Adams's three-month stay in Japan. Attempts are made to illuminate how Adams, who was obsessed with the idea of seeking facts and logic, became more open to mystical, mythical stories and artifacts about them. The microfilmed document called "Adams's Japan Expenses" contains not only the record of his monetary transactions, but also information about legendary stories and historical figures he came to know through his hosts and the artifacts while he stayed in Japan. Close examination of the information from this document as well as his letters and his travel companion, La Farge's description of their journeys clearly shows the validity of Shoichi Saeki's statement that it was in Asia that Adams underwent a transformation from an empirical historian to the literary writer who authored Mont-Saint -Michel and Chartres.

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The existence of the two protagonists Milly Theale and Kate Croy characterize Henry James's The Wings of the Dove. And when we notice more than a break in a consistent structure in this form, here appears many possibilities the author might have intended to develop. The divided story disperses the continuity and dilutes the centerdness, which allows Milly to be described by others and to construct the story for herself at once. This situation also provides an ideal model of communication, and guides the story to turn on itself.

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Ezra Pound hated the United Kingdom so much that he headed for France and then for Italy, where he ended his life. Needless to say, he left the United Kingdom partly because of his dislike for the general public, but there remains one question regarding the reason he left: why did he escape not to his homeland America, but to Italy? He liked it extremely, especially Venice, which he referred to many times in his book of poetry, 'Cantos'. What was the reason for his persistence with Venice? We can work out the answers to these questions by looking at ideas of the 19 th-century author, artist, and social reformer, John Ruskin. Ruskin felt disgust at the Renaissance art because of man-made things, and loved those works of art that remained in Venice, which seemed to have elements of the Middle Ages. Similarly, Pound exhibited a preference not for artificial art but the art of antiquity. So in Venice, he could find out, by the influence of Ruskin, the art in which the ancient Pantheon existed, which was beyond the wisdom of man. Therefore, Pound lived at Venice and paraphrased his own image of Venice into the literary works of his.

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The film Baby Doll (1956), directed by Elia Kazan, is based on Tennessee Williams' one-act plays, "27 Wagons Full of Cotton" (1953) and "The Unsatisfactory Supper" (1946). Through the process of the collaboration of Kazan and Williams, the film came to have an ending quite different from that of the published text. Though often dismissed as sentimental, the end of the published text accurately conveys the playwright's intention of presenting the heroine as a victim of the patriarchal system of the Deep South. Furthermore, Williams articulates the heroine's neurotic and victimized state in Tiger Tail (1979), the full-length play version of Baby Doll. Baby Doll never optimistically celebrates heterosexual love. Rather, Williams uses its heroine as a conventional sex symbol, but with sarcasm: her pubescent sexuality was originally derived from Flora Meagan in "27 Wagons Full of Cotton," in which she must endure rape by the vicious Vicarro (Silva Vacarro in Baby Doll). Vacarro (both in the film and the script) must scare Baby Doll to arouse her sexual feelings, and the awakening makes her subservient enough to sign a paper leading to her husband's arrest. I will attempt in this paper to examine Baby Doll basically as a victim by taking up the film's relation to the original one-act play, "27 Wagons Full of Cotton" and its subsequent stage version, Tiger Tail (1978). I will also show that the two different endings of Baby Doll at bottom share the same version of the heroine's victimized state, yet in its undisguised portrayal of the heroine's neurotic state, the ending of the published version is more faithful to the playwright's artistic vision.

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This study investigated the perceived use of listening strategies among 243 Japanese EFL university learners through the use of a written questionnaire. The following research questions were addressed: (1) What are the underlying characteristic features of the listening strategies that the learners attempt to employ and believe themselves able to use? (2) What differences are observed in the degree of listening strategy perception among groups of differing listening proficiency? (3) Which listening strategies are the best predictors of performance on a listening test? and, (4) What differences are observed in the predictors of listening test performance between proficient listeners and less proficient listeners? The result of factor analysis yielded a four-factor solution: "Top-down Listening Processing Strategies," "Listening Strategies Employed to Cope with Lengthy Aural Transactional Discourse when Delivered at Natural Speed," "Phonology-based Bottom-up Listening strategies," and "Listening Strategies Making Use of Salient Features as Cues." These factors indicated strategies characteristic of processing of transactional aural discourse and strategies related to interaction of bottom-up and top-down processing. The result of multiple regression confirmed that the strategies employed to cope with lengthy aural message proved to be the best predictor of listening test performance. Differences in proficiency level caused significant differences in ratings on the listening strategy questionnaire and differences in the relationship between listening strategies and a listening test score.

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The aim of this research is to show that Agree is the primary operation to apply to derivation, and that when Agree is applied, Maximization must be observed. Shima(2000) argues, against Chomsky(1998, 2000), that Move is a cheaper operation than Merge. We basically follow his Preference Principle. When we consider derivation of locative inversion, we find that Maximization can reduce the number of Probings to check the same amount of features, since it prohibits partial elimination of features. Therefore, Maximization is economically favored. However, there is some overlap between the Move Preference Principle and Maximization, since they are both involved in checking an EPP feature. In order to remove the overlap, we focus on the three subcomponents of Move, that is, Agree, Pied-Piping and Merge, and argue that Agree is the primary operation because the other effects of Move are included in Maximization and because Inside Probing is more economical than Outside Probing. Finally we consider derivation of there-construction. Since, with Maximization, there-construction would be thought not to be derived, we assume that there are two types of verb be, namely, Φ_<comp> and Φ_<def> in order to remain an associate NP where it is.

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