日本の伝統演劇を語る上で、能と歌舞伎は双璧をなす存在です。いずれも数百年の歴史を有し、独自の様式美を極限まで磨き上げてきました。その芸術的価値は世界的にも高く評価され、いずれもユネスコの無形文化遺産に登録されています。しかし、両者は対極とも言える美意識に立っており、その対比を通じて、日本文化の振れ幅と懐の深さを実感することができるでしょう。
In any account of Japan's traditional theater, Noh and Kabuki stand as the twin pillars. Each has a history of centuries, and each has polished a distinctive formal beauty to its limit. Their artistic worth is highly regarded around the world, and both are inscribed on UNESCO's Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity. Yet the two stand on aesthetic sensibilities that are, in fact, opposite poles of each other, and the contrast between them lets us feel the breadth and the generous reach of Japanese culture.
能の起源は、奈良時代に中国大陸から伝来した「散楽」にさかのぼると言われています。やがて農耕儀礼や寺社の祭礼と結びついて「猿楽」となり、室町時代に観阿弥・世阿弥父子の手によって、現在の能の形に大成されました。武家の保護を受けて発展したことから、能には武士の精神性が色濃く反映されています。
Noh's origins are said to go back to "sangaku," brought over from the Chinese mainland in the Nara period. In time it merged with agricultural ritual and shrine and temple festivals to become "sarugaku," and in the Muromachi period the father-and-son masters Kan'ami and Zeami completed it into the form that we know today as Noh. Because it developed under the protection of the warrior class, Noh carries within it a deep coloring of the spirituality of the samurai.
舞台に立つ能のシテは、面をつけて演じます。表情を覆い隠したまま、わずかな首の傾きや視線の動き、足の運びだけで、人間のあらゆる情念を表現する——その極限まで抑制された動きは、見る者を圧倒せずにはおきません。動かないことが、最も雄弁に語る瞬間が、能には確かに存在するのです。
The shite, the leading actor of a Noh play, stands on stage wearing a mask. With expression hidden, using only a slight tilt of the head, the smallest shift of the gaze, or a single stride of the foot, he gives voice to every shade of human passion — and movement held to such extreme restraint cannot fail to overwhelm the viewer. There is, in Noh, a moment in which not moving speaks the most eloquently of all.
世阿弥は『風姿花伝』において、「秘すれば花」という言葉を残しました。すべてを見せ尽くしてしまっては、芸の魅力は消えてしまう——隠すことによってこそ、観客の想像力を喚起し、真の感動を生み出すことができるのだという思想です。この美学は、能のみならず日本文化全体に通底する哲学と言っても過言ではないでしょう。
Zeami left, in his treatise Fushikaden, the line that has become famous: "What is kept hidden becomes the flower." The thought is that to display everything is to extinguish the charm of art — only by concealing can one stir the imagination of the audience and call forth true emotion. It is no exaggeration to call this aesthetic a philosophy that runs through not only Noh but the whole of Japanese culture.
能の舞台装置は、極限まで簡素なものに削ぎ落とされています。背景には松の絵が一本描かれているだけ、小道具もごくわずか。それでも演者の所作と謡、囃子の音だけで、雪景色も、戦場も、彼岸の世界までもが、観客の心の中にありありと立ち上がってくるのです。
The stage setting of Noh has been pared down to the utmost simplicity. The backdrop bears only a single painted pine tree, and the props are kept to the barest minimum. Even so, from the actor's gestures, the chanted lines, and the sound of the small ensemble alone, a snow-covered landscape, a battlefield, or even the world of the dead can rise up vividly within the heart of the audience.
一方の歌舞伎は、能とは対照的に、江戸時代の庶民の娯楽として花開きました。その起源は出雲阿国の「かぶき踊り」と言われています。やがて女歌舞伎、若衆歌舞伎の禁止を経て、現在の男性のみが演じる「野郎歌舞伎」の形へと変化していきました。「かぶく」とは「傾く」を意味し、世の常識から外れて目を引く様を表します。その名にふさわしい派手さこそが、歌舞伎の生命線なのです。
Kabuki, by contrast, blossomed in the Edo period as the entertainment of the common people. Its origins are said to lie in the "kabuki dance" of Izumo no Okuni, and after a stage that saw women's kabuki and youth kabuki banned in turn, it took the form of the all-male "yarou kabuki" still performed today. The verb "kabuku" originally meant "to tilt," that is, to swerve outside the bounds of common taste and catch the eye — and the flamboyance that lives up to that name is the very lifeline of Kabuki.