Kafu Literature and the Performing World - Literary World and the Hanayanagi Circle from the Meiji Era to the Early Showa Era

Kafu Literature and the Performing World - Literary World and the Hanayanagi Circle from the Meiji Era to the Early Showa Era

The Hanayanagi world is deeply embedded in Nagai Kafu's literature. His "exhaustive record of geisha names" was not merely a memorandum of his amusements, but an attempt to faithfully record the culture of the city. He depicted the atmosphere of geisha, teahouses, and waiting rooms, and the desires and ties of the people who gathered there. At the time, the Hanayagi world was the center of socializing and entertainment in Tokyo, and teahouses were places to meet people, while waiting rooms were places to prepare for entertainment and enjoy the afterglow of the evening. The regular customers, the "familiar" were the supporters of the geisha, and their relationship was symbolized by words such as "color" and "flirtation. These fluctuations and transitions were vividly depicted as human patterns in literature.

Another important element was the culture of "actor-buying. The custom of patronizing popular actors and spending money on them has existed since the Edo period (1603-1867), and is a typical example of the intersection of entertainment and amusement. Through this, Kafu depicted the magnetic field in which the performing arts and the willow world interacted with each other. His literature does not glorify the geisha world, but rather thoroughly records the details and sublimates them into literature in an attempt to pass on the culture of the common people of the city to the future.

Furthermore, we can also point out the connection with Ichiyo Higuchi. Ichiyo, too, took as her subject matter the life of the common people in downtown Tokyo and delicately depicted the daily lives of women. Kafu, while following in her footsteps, incorporated the willow world into his literature in a straightforward manner. Both writers share the same perspective on women living in the lower strata of the city, and both portray the human figure against the backdrop of social change.

In the early Showa period (1926-1989), the Hanayagi world was still the center of culture, although it showed signs of decline, and geisha were depicted in literature and films as well as in entertainment. The entertainment world depicted in Kafu's literature was a microcosm of urban society and the intersection of human desire and entertainment.