Before the mid 20 century, there was a custom of prohibiting Nohgaku actors from performing at other places except the dedicated Nohgaku theaters.

In July 1921 Umewaka-ryu declared the independence from Kanze-ryu (Kanze school). Umewaka and other Nohgaku schools including Kanze conflicted and they broke off the relationship with each other. Therefore, Umewaka ignored the traditional custom and began to perform in the public halls ahead of the other Nohgaku schools.

At the same time, the public halls, which were originally born as the meeting place for the people, gradually became more the place of entertainment. Especially after the reconstruction from the Great Kanto Earthquake (1923), its tendency got stronger. Some multipurpose halls which were built in the late 1920s were treated as the substantial theaters. Nohgaku actors considered these halls to be easier to perform Nohgaku under the restriction of performing place.

From 1930s Umewaka and Kanze had competed to advance the expansion of the scale of performances. They held the performances at large scale halls with the capacity of more than 1000 people. And finally, in 1942 by the performance at the Imperial Theatre and the Korakuen baseball stadium the restriction of the performing place was abolished.

In this paper, I would like to examine what role Umewaka played in the transformation of the performing places of Nohgaku and also consider the influence of the public halls in the modern era.

Karl Kraus' satirical drama The Invincible (1928) was his reaction to two crises with which the Austrian First Republic confronted in the 1920s. The first being corruption in the field of journalism by the revolver press (Die Stunde) by Imre Békessy, and the second being the political regression demonstrated by Johann Schober, the police chief. It was Schober who was responsible for the police massacre of demonstrating workers on July 15,1927, and this resulted in Kraus writing this drama.

In this drama, Békessy and Schober appear as pseudonyms, Barkassy and Wacker, respectively. Their lines, mostly in self-defense of their actions, are founded on quotations from their own utterances, which Kraus documented in his polemic with them in his magazine Die Fackel (here Der Pfeil with the publisher Arkus). Based on the fact that Békessy was expelled from Vienna as a result of the criticism from Kraus, this caricatural semi-fiction shows the process in which Wacker becomes an apprentice to Barkassy. In this way, the criminal fact became more obscured with the police and journalistic powers, and the two became conclusively “invincible”. In the drama, the black humor culminates in the operetta song that Wacker sings.

The quintessence of this drama, however, exists in the scene where Hinsichtl and Rücksichtl, Wacker's subordinates who are personifying the language as “the most reliable traitor”, cite the report concerning the objective fact of the massacre, thus exposing their unpunished and unrepentant boss. In the context of this drama, these quoted words appeal to the conscience of the recipient as an incomparable accusation, even though they were not actually written as an accusation in and of itself. This effect is due to a performance of the language, which avenges itself here for its abuse. Thus, one can get a clue to the conservatism of Kraus as a language admirer and a reading solo performer. From this perspective this drama provides an actual redemption for the theater-arts to potentially fight against post-truth situations.

『The death of Kim Ok-gyun (金玉均の死)』 is a drama that Ujaku Akita (秋田雨雀) published in the January issue of the 『Ningen (人間)』 magazine in 1920. In this literature, any political aspect is suppressed notwithstanding that Kim was a politically conspicuous figure; he exiled himself to Japan after the failure of his coup (甲申政変) in 1884, and later was assassinated in Shanghai. On the other side, only the cultural aspects - such as classification of Korean and Japanese language, likes and dislikes on foods and the meaning of clothes - are emphasized in this play.

We can find the reason in Akita's diary. It seems that this drama was probably commissioned by Kuzuu (葛生) brothers who were right-wing activists. The elder brother had played a leading role in the management of Genyousha (玄洋社) where 『Kim Ok-gyun (金玉均)』 had been privately printed. For that reason, it can be inferred that this article was read by Akita when he chose Kim as the main subject in this work. Akita was, however, on the opposite side admiring the socialist ideology. So, I conclude he had to exclude the political feature in his work.

Instead, Akita depicted that Kim wants to be a farmer in Hokkaido (北海道) in future. Cultivation of a farm can be thought of as the metaphor of working for the Korean kingdom. As a result, it can be interpreted as a roundabout expression of Kim's will to recover his political position. It also contains Akita's perspective on Korea, which is represented by “reflection for conquerors and training for subordinates” written in his diary.

Noh had existed before Zeami entered the scene, but its form changed drastically through Zeami, which is deeply connected to how he theorized Noh. Zeami played a central role in deviating from Sarugaku, which was a ‘faithful dramatization’ of stories from the originals. It was a change into a production structure as a representation of the ‘intended meanings’ of honsetsu (key foundational texts).

Zeami is the first person to author a treatise on Noh. It is well known that this treatise of his was written in the style of treatises on waka poetry and renga poetry; his intention was to make Noh into a form of literature equal to waka and renga styles of poetry. His theorization is inseparably linked to the establishment of genres in works. Here, we can see how he was following the categorization of Chokusen Wakashu that had been used since Kokin Wakashu and the worldview of renga poetry. Waka poetry in Kokin Wakashu is arranged according to categories such as shiki (season), ga (celebration), ribetsu (parting), kiryo (travel), mononona (acrostics), koi (love), aisho (lament), and zou (miscellaneous). In renga poetry as well, various aspects of the universe and human nature are portrayed in one volume, as described by Yoshitomo, who had an influence over Zeami: ‘rise and decline, joy and sorrow come and go, no different from how things are in the floating world’ (Tsukuba Mondo). Zeami defined Waki-Noh, which is the first category of Noh, as ‘shugen (celebration)’, not only to follow in the wake of Okina but also to make it the foundation for showing the ‘intended meanings’ of various Noh numbers, with diverse phases of the mortal world and afterlife, including shura (scenes of fighting), monogurui (madness), and oni (demon), shown thereafter. His consciousness of the arrangement of Chokusen Wakashu and his intention of modelling after the ways renga poetry is recited are also connected with the ‘enhancement of peace and fun’, ‘longevity, happiness, and harmony’, and ‘celebration of a long life’, which are the ultimate goals of Noh.