Flower Cages, Theatrical Traps: The Edo Shogunate's Fear of Emotion and the Power of Performance (Edo Period)

Flower Cages, Theatrical Traps: The Edo Shogunate's Fear of Emotion and the Power of Performance (Edo Period)

The Edo shogunate was wary of oiran (courtesans) and kabuki not simply because it feared a disturbance in public morals. There lurked a fundamental fear of the power of popular culture, which could shake the shogunate system itself.

The prostitutes were not mere manual laborers. Especially the high-ranking courtesans called "tayu" (courtesans), who were also skilled in waka poetry, calligraphy, and painting, possessed intelligence and culture that attracted both townspeople and warriors. Although enclosed within the confines of the brothel system, these women manipulated their emotions, money, and knowledge to transcend the boundaries of status and order. Rumors of samurai going madly in love, abandoning their homes, and offering themselves up as chaperones must have reached the ears of the shogunate. It shook the Confucian ideals of "loyalty" and feudal "house" to their very foundations.

Kabuki, on the other hand, was also a threat to the tranquility of the reign. This art form, which originally began with dances by prostitutes, evolved into wakashu kabuki performed by beautiful young men, and then into yaro (male) kabuki performed by male actors who responded to the popularity of the townspeople. In the process, the performances, with their colorful performances, gaudy costumes, and intermingling with patrons who would leap from the stage, attracted the ire of the shogunate. The kabuki stage, often in the form of a period drama, also became a place for satirizing the shogun and the old government, and the playhouse became an outlet for political sentiments rather than a mere entertainment space.

What the shogunate feared most was the power of "solidarity" that such culture engendered. In the shibai-goya and yugaku, samurai, merchants, artisans, and others of different classes gathered together to exchange feelings and money across social boundaries. A certain Hatamoto devoted himself to an actor, while a certain Machiya spent his fortune on a courtesan. This relationship broke down the vertical structure of master and servant demanded by the shogunate, and gave birth to horizontal ties, in other words, the germ of an autonomous society of the common people.

The economic problems were also serious. Oiran and actors were the idols of the merchants' economy, and astronomical amounts of money were spent on costumes, gifts, and entertainment. There was no end to the number of people who went into debt to go to the theater and try to win the hearts of oiran, and this could lead to economic ruin and crime in the townspeople's society. The shogunate saw the destructive power of such a torrent of money and tried to keep it under a certain control by "enclosing" it institutionally.

Even more serious was the spread of values in which sentiment overrode reason. In the Edo period's philosophy of governance, obeying one's superiors, serving one's parents, and protecting one's home were valued above all else. In kabuki and brothels, however, "martyrdom in love" was considered a virtue, and people became intoxicated with this value on stage and through stories. A series of heart-to-heart affairs occurred, and there were many cases of people deserting their domains and running away from home. For the shogunate, this was a sign of the collapse of the system, as emotions overtook order.

In this light, the shogunate's policies toward courtesans and kabuki - the enclosure of the Yoshiwara, the banning of women's kabuki, the censorship of scripts, and the banning of actors from wearing the family name of the actor - were not mere moral considerations. They were a quiet war against culture, aimed at maintaining order and prolonging the life of the ruling power. Uncontainable pomp and uncontrollable emotion. Nevertheless, the shogunate chose to "manage" it within the system rather than suppress it completely. This is precisely where the soft but cunning rule of the Edo period emerges.