Page:A History of Japanese Literature (Aston).djvu/216

200 for a long period. Hideyoshi, who was Shōgun in all but name, was very fond of the Nō, and is said to have taken part in them as an actor. Several of the more recent date from his time. In the Yedo period the Shoguns gave great attention to Nō performances. They were made a ceremony of state, and were acted by young gentlemen of the military class educated specially for this profession. Even at the present day there are some remains of their former popularity with the Samurai. Representations are still given in Tokio, Kiōto, and other places, by the descendants or successors of the old managers who founded the art five hundred years ago, and are attended by small but select audiences composed almost entirely of ex-Daimios or military nobles and their ex-retainers. To the vulgar the Nō are completely unintelligible.

Of the two hundred and thirty-five Nō contained in the latest and most complete collection (the Yō-kyoku Tsūge), no fewer than ninety-three are assigned to Se-ami Motokiyo, the second of the line of official managers; his father, Kwan-ami Kiyotsugu, being credited with fifteen. Motokiyo's son-in-law and successor has twenty-two assigned to him, those of the remainder which are not anonymous being distributed among a dozen or so of the subsequent holders of the office. The great majority belong to the fifteenth century.

The Yō-kyoku Tsūge editor suggests, with great probability, that although the names of Kiyotsugu, Motokiyo, and their successors are given as authors of the Nō, they were in reality only responsible for the music, the pantomimic dance (the "business," as we might say), and the general management. He surmises that the libretto was the work of Buddhist monks, to which class almost all