SOURCE: Chang Sik Yun. “The Tragic Metaphor of the Noh Drama.” Theater Annual 24 (1968): 1-5.

In the following essay, Chang argues that Noh ghost plays communicate a Buddhist worldview by using a tragic metaphor that points to man's attachment to the world and his simultaneous realization that it is an illusion.

There is a group of noh plays classified as mugen noh, which, for lack of a better translation, may be called phantasy or ghost plays. To this group belong the so-called warrior plays and woman plays which I think communicate a vision of human condition that may be characterized as tragic. As a way of presenting a model of warrior play, I might give a bare outline of Zeami's Tadanori.

A Buddhist priest travels to Suma-no-ura, a place traditionally associated with desolation and exile, and meets an old fisherman, the shite. Their dialogue revolves round the mystery shrouding...