Haku Rakuten

Parody of the Noh play Haku Rakuten; woodblock print by Suzuki Harunobu, c. 1766. In the cultural contest between Japan and the continent, Bai Juyi is substituted with a Korean ambassador, holding an ink wash painting in the traditional style. and Sumiyoshi Myōjin with the winning charms of a modish Japanese bijin, holding a bijin-ga painting in the radical ukiyo-e style.[1]

Haku Rakuten (白楽天) is a Noh play in the first category by Zeami Motokiyo, about the Japanese god of poetry repelling the Chinese poet Bai Juyi (or Po Chü-i) from Japan 500 years earlier, in defiance of the (perceived) challenge from China to the autonomy of Japanese poetry.[2][3]

  1. ^ "Parody of the Noh Play 'Hakurakuten'". Metropolitan Museum of Art. Retrieved 24 August 2021.
  2. ^ A Waley, The Noh Plays of Japan (1976) p. 185
  3. ^ Sesar, Carl (1975). "China vs. Japan: the Noh Play Haku Rakuten". In Crump, J.I.; Malm, William P. (eds.). Chinese and Japanese Music-Dramas. University of Michigan Press. pp. 143–188. doi:10.3998/mpub.19223. ISBN 9780892640195. JSTOR 10.3998/mpub.19223.