（Florilegio Musicale Ongaku-no-Tomo
Sha Feb.1990 pp.49-71）
THE
JAPANESE ATTITUDE TOWARD SOUND AS DEPICTED IN SEI SHONAGON'S
PILLOW
BOOK
MOTEGI Kiyoko
Department of
Music
I. Preface
II. The Pillow
Book as a Subject for Research
III. Previous
Research, Part One: The Japanese Ear
IV. Previous
Research, Part Two: Auditory Perception in the Pillow Book
V. Sounds in the Pillow
Book
VI. The Attitude
Toward Sound as Depicted in the Pillow Book
VII. Abstract
Sounds as Words
VIII.
Conclusion
I.
Preface
In this paper I extract some of
the many references to sound that appear in Sei Shonagon's
Pillow Book and discuss how, when, and where people of Sei Shonagon's era perceived their
auditory world. The sounds are
various: Buddhist and Shinto ceremonial sounds, natural sounds such as wind,
rain, and insects, artificial or mechanical sounds such as wagon wheels and
tools, and the musical sounds of flute, koto,
biwa, and the human
voice. By analyzing the
relationship between people and sounds in medieval
The impetus for this research came
when I was writing a series of articles for a monthly journal. I was looking for pictures and other
visual materials that could be used to illustrate how the medieval Japanese were
more sensitive to sound and music than their modern counterparts. This was because, as I discuss later in
this paper, most of the literature I have read concerning the Japanese auditory
sense contends that the traditional Japanese had a much richer, more sensitive
appreciation of sound than we have today.
There are even some who contend that the noise pollution and other
symptoms of insensitivity we see in modern
But that's not all. People not only didn't listen, they made
noise of their own. Gentlemen are
shown in amiable conversation; hawkers are busily plying their trades. From these scenes it would appear that
performances were conducted under very noisy circumstances. If this was the typical environment for
musical appreciation, we can only conclude that the highly vaunted traditional
Japanese sensitivity to sound was a myth even in medieval times, and that there
is no substantial difference between then and now.
Such a sweeping generalization
cannot be made on the basis of a few scrolls, however. Those that I inspected are only one
small part of nearly 1000 years of Japanese artistic activity, and were edited
to suit purposes unrelated to the research of acoustical perception. But the absolute absence of concert
scenes was nevertheless striking, and I wanted to pursue the matter
further. It then occurred to me
that there was no need to limit myself to visual materials. Written descriptions could also throw
light on the "musical consciousness" of the Japanese, and it was with this
intention that I chose Sei Shonagon's Pillow Book as the subject of my
research.
II.
The Pillow Book as a Subject for Research
In 1934, the literary
specialist YAMADA Yoshio published a book entitled, Genji Monogatari no
Ongaku ["Music in the Tale of Genji"].
In this work Yamada examines music-related words or phrases found in
Murasaki Shikibu's tale, including government positions, music
theory terminology, instruments, and vocal, instrumental, and dance pieces. Referring to such lexical works as the
Gunshoruiju and works related to the
history and music theory of gagaku such as
Gakka Roku,
Taigensho, and Kyokunsho, he then considers the meaning of those
words and phrases, and discusses the aristocracy's attitude toward music as
depicted in the novel.
There are many aspects worthy of
attention in the world of human sensibility depicted in the Tale of Genji, but we must remember that it is a fictional
world. In contrast, Sei Shonagon's
Pillow Book has an informal, miscellaneous nature that reflects a more everyday
sort of world. This contrast is
heightened by the very different personalities of the two authors.
Both works focus on a highly
developed aesthetic sensibility and has been the subject of numerous
treatises. But to date no
musicological study has been made on the auditory sense described in the Pillow
Book, and this paper was written to fill that gap. It must be acknowledged from the outset
that the Pillow Book contains the observations of a single individual and
therefore cannot be taken as representative of Heian culture in general. It would be most instructive to conduct
a comparative study on Murasaki Shikibu's diary, the Murasaki Shikibu
Nikki, which, like the Pillow Book, records the everyday life of a Heian aristocrat.
According to scholars, the Pillow Book
has two geneologies, each of which is further divided
into two. For this paper I have
used the Sankan Text in the Nihon
Koten Bungaku Taikei series published by Iwanami Shoten, which has been most commonly used since the
war. The observations I make would
be unaffected in any case had I used the Noin
Text.
III.
Previous Research, Part One: The Japanese Ear
Before turning to the Pillow Book
itself, I would like to present a brief summary of research that has been
conducted on the Japanese auditory sense.
The work of three people in particular will be considered: that of the
medical doctor TSUNODA Tadanobu, the composer OGURA Ro, and the musicologist
KIKKAWA Eishi.
1) TSUNODA
Tadanobu
Boin to
Yamatogokoro ["Vowels and
the Japanese Spirit"] (Included in a 1978 edition of
Seiron, published by Sankei)
Tsunoda's theories concerning the difference between
Japanese and Western apprehension of natural sounds first appeared in January
1978. Writing a series of articles
for the Asahi Shimbun newspaper that were later
collected for publication as monographs, he authored Nihonjin no No ["The Japanese
Brain"] (Taishukan, 1978) and Uno to Sano ["The Right
Brain and the Left Brain"] (Shogakukan,
1981). For the purposes of this
paper I will concentrate on the dissertation he published in Seiron, which forms the basis for his other
writings.
Tsunoda began his research on
Japanese auditory perception after hearing the story of a Japanese man who spent
a bitter winter in Anarctica completely isolated from
civilization. This man managed to
survive by listening to the sound of the wind and the falling snow in an
environment that was otherwise silent.
The story inspired Tsunoda to explore the close relationship between the
Japanese and natural sounds from a physiological perspective. His conclusion was that "the Japanese
perceive the sound of autumn insects, the cries of animals, emotional human
voices, Japanese musical instruments, and other sounds with the left side of the
brain, which is the side that perceives language. Westerners hear these sounds with the
right side of the brain, which is the side that perceives random noise and
Western musical instruments." (Seiron, pp. 136-137.) Tsunoda conducted his experiments on 25
subjects from 10 countries, including
Although it is difficult to credit
Tsunoda's results without a more statistically viable
sample, his work is notable because he attempted to apply a scientific approach
to the question of Japanese auditory perception in a field that had previously
been dominated by subjective speculation completely divorced from experimental
data. Tsunoda's contention that "the Japanese recognize
instrumental sounds as words" (ibid., p 5.) is an
important issue I will deal with in a later section.
2) OGURA Ro
Nihon no Mimi ["The
Japanese Ear"]
(Published by Iwanami Shoten in
1977)
Composer OGURA Ro's book is well
known for its treatment of the Japanese auditory sensibility. As the title suggests, the book focuses
on various parts of the human anatomy -- the ears, hands and feet, and tongue
and lips -- and discusses how these relate to the special characteristics of
Japanese music. In his section on
the Japanese ear, Ogura makes the following observations regarding Basho's famous haiku about the sound of a frog jumping into
a pond:
In a
sense, there is no need to see either the frog or the pond. It is a purely auditory world that
contains the splash of the frog jumping into
the water, a momentary reverberation, and the limitless
silence encountered by the ear as it strains to hear a very soft, barely
perceptible
sound. (The Japanese Ear, p
2.)
Ogura's "auditory world" can be
taken to mean the way we listen to or perceive sound, and elsewhere in the book
he describes a "sensibility that passes through the traditional Japanese ear"
(ibid. p 3.) in the following terms:
(It is) an
ear that can enter into a single sound, or perhaps we should say an ear that
understands the tension of silence.
In this it differs from the European ear, which gave birth to modern
music, and also from the Oriental ear that enjoys the stimulating reverberation
of percussive instruments. It is a unique sensibility.
Ogura's assertion that the
Japanese ear is unique will seem familiar to those who have read native essays
on virtually any aspect of Japanese culture. Writings on tradtitional crafts, architecture, lifestyle, linguistic
culture, religion, and many other subjects often incorporate this theme of
uniqueness. The tendency is so
pervasive, in fact, that it has drawn the attention of many foreigners, who
wryly comment that the Japanese seem to think of themselves as a race
apart. Most Japanese who read these
essays on Japanese culture, however, find themselves naturally nodding their
heads in agreement. The authors
seek collective confirmation of their ideas on the basis of a kind of in-group
consciousness, and most readers are happy to comply.
Ogura's book fits the
"
3) KIKKAWA
Eishi
Nihon Ongaku no Seikaku
["The Nature of Japanese Music"] (Published in a revised edition by Ongaku no Tomo Sha in 1979)
Nihon Ongaku no Biteki Kenkyu ["Aesthetic Research on Japanese Music"] (Ongaku no Tomo Sha, 1984)
Kikkawa's views are often quoted by other scholars when
discussing the relationship between Japanese music and nature. The following selection from The Nature
of Japanese Music (pp 213-214) is representative:
Taking an example from the visual
arts, we see that Japanese paintings most often take natural scenes such as
mountains and rivers, flowers and birds, or wind
and moon as their subjects. In contrast, Western paintings commonly depict
people....Is it possible to believe that this evident Japanese love for and
devotion to nature would not also find expression in the world of sound?
After challenging the reader with
this rhetorical question, Kikkawa goes on to cite the
example of woodblock print artist Ando Hiroshige's
Dokanyama Mushikiki no Zu ["Listening
to Insects on Dokan Mountain."] This print, which depicts three men
sitting on a rush mat on the top of a mountain drinking sake and listening to
the calls of insects, leads Kikkawa to the conclusion
that "just as the mountains, rivers, trees, and grass pleased our ancestors'
eyes, so the voices of the spring birds and autumn insects pleased their
ears."
Kikkawa
continues this argument in his Aesthetic Research on Japanese Music. In the chapter entitled, Nihonjin no Onkan--Matsukaze, Mushi no Ne, Ashirai ["The Japanese Sense
of Sound: Wind in the Pines, Insect Calls, and Musical Accompaniment"] (pp
66-77), he extracts a single sentence from the "New Herbs, Part Two" chapter of
the Tale of Genji and makes the following observation:
There are several places in
the Tale of Genji where the
fusion or harmonizing of natural sounds with musical (instrumental) sounds is
depicted as the ideal....A representative example of the Japanese custom of
listening attentively to the sounds of nature as though they were
instrumental
musical sounds is found in Ando Hiroshige's
wood-block print, "Listening to Insects on Dokan
Mountain." (p 68)
Here again, Hiroshige makes an appearance. But this time, Kikkawa carries the argument one step further (underlined
portions my emphasis):
This is a custom that Westerners -- and
even modern Japanese -- cannot understand.
Westerners do not seem to be equipped with the
sensibility
that listens to
insect calls as if they were music. In contrast, Japanese possessed this
sensibility straight down from the Heian Period
through the
Edo Period, as shown in various
historical materials. (ibid., p 69)
While this is an amplification of
his previous writings, Kikkawa's newly concrete
references to "listening attentively to the sounds of nature," or listening to
"insect calls as if they were music" clearly demonstrate the influence of Tsunoda's work.
When we Japanese read assertions
such as these, a kind of latent collective consciousness causes us to naturally
nod our heads in agreement. But I
have begun to wonder if an ethnic group's fundamental nature can change so
drastically over time. Is it
possible for the modern Japanese sensibility to be completely divorced from the
purported traditional one? I assume
that by "various historical materials" Kikkawa refers
to literary works, haiku, and ukiyoe prints, but it is
necessary to specifically confirm each source systematically.
IV.
Previous Research, Part Two: Auditory Perception in the Pillow Book
Several people have written papers
that analyze the
Pillow Book in terms of auditory perception, including:
a) ISHIDA
Joji
Genji Monogatari ni Okeru Chokakuteki Insho ["Auditory
Impressions in the Tale of Genji"] (Published by Shibundo in the December 1949 issue of Kokugo to Kokubungaku ["Japanese
Language and Literature"])
b) KUBOKI
Tetsuo
Sei
Shonagon wa Koto ga Hikenakatta ["Sei Shonagon Couldn't Play the
Koto"] (Published by Meiji
Shoin in the May 1960 issue of Kokubungaku Gengo to Bungei ["Japanese Literature: Language and Literary
Art"]
c) Francis
MATHY, S.J.
Makura no Soshi ni Tsuite ["On the Pillow
Book"]
(Published by Gakutosha in the June 1956
issue of Kokubungaku Kaishaku to Kyozai no Kenkyu ["Japanese Literature: Research on Interpretation and
Educational Materials"].)
d) INUKAI
Ren
Makura no Soshi ni Mieru Kankakubi ["Sensuous Beauty as Seen in the Pillow
Book"] (Published by Shibundo in the specially expanded January 1956 issue of
Kokubungaku Kaishaku to
Kansho ["Japanese Literature: Interpretation and
Appreciation"]).
e) IMAI Takuji
Makura no Soshi no Shizen Byosha ["The Depiction
of Nature in the Pillow Book"] (Published by Gakutosha
in the May 1967 issue of Kokubungaku Kaishaku to Kyozai no Kenkyu ["Japanese
Literature: Research on Interpretation and Educational
Materials"]).
f) BABA Fukuko
Genji
Monogatari no Waka Hyogen ["The
Expression of Waka Poetry in the Tale of Genji"] (Published in the Kokubun
Hen ["Literary Section"] of the
1980 edition of Joshidai Bungaku ["Women's College Literature"]).
Of these papers,
a) and f) discuss the Pillow Book for comparative purposes as part of their
analyses of the Tale of Genji. I will concentrate my discussion on
papers a), b), and c), which have a direct bearing on my current topic.
1) ISHIDA
Joji, Auditory Impressions in the Tale of Genji
In this work, Ishida attempts to
delineate the "difference in literary character between the Tale of Genji and the Pillow Book" from an auditory perspective (p
25). He mentions that his views
were influenced by YAMADA Yoshio's Genji Monogatari no Ongaku ["Music in the Tale of Genji"], and makes the following observation: "To state the
matter plainly, we must agree with Yamada's observation that references to music
in the Pillow Book lack detailed specificity" (p 26). Ishida goes on to assert that there is
nothing really worth writing about in the Pillow Book in terms of auditory
perception.
Ishida takes five examples from
the Maeda Text of the Pillow Book to support his position. These examples are also found in the
Sankan Text, however, and I have given the section
numbers of the latter below.
○
Fuku mono wa yokobue imijiu wokashi. Tohou yori
kikoyuru ga chikaku nari mote yuku mo ito wokashi.
Chikakaritsuru ga
haruka ni kikoete ito honokanaru ["I love the sound of the flute: it is beautiful
when one hears it gradually approaching from the distance, and also when it is
played near by and then moves far away until it becomes very faint."] (218)
○
Kokoro nikuki mono. Mono
hedatete kiku ni....hashi, kahi nado torimazete naritaru wokashi. Hisage no e no
taoreru no mo mimi koso tomare ["Things that are attractive: the sound, heard on the
far side (of a wall or door)... of chopsticks and spoons clacking together, or
of a kettle's handle falling, stays in the ear, indeed."]
(201)
○
Tokaku uchimijiroki kudari noboru kinu no oto odoro odoroshiku wa naranedo, sananari to kikoetaru....hito no koe wa sede goishi no ke ni iruru oto no kikoetaru koso, imada okitarikeri to oboyure [....Sometimes the sound of kimonos can be heard
hurrying up and down; it's not a loud
sound, but one can tell people are moving about....Although no one speaks, the
sound of go stones being tossed into their boxes tells one that someone was
still awake."] (201)
○
Muge ni hito no nehatete nochi....hibashi wo shinobiyakani hioke ni tatsuru oto mo, nani wo shite okitaru naran.... ["After everyone
had fallen fast asleep....(I heard) the furtive sound
of hearth tongs being stuck into the brazier and wondered what (that person) was
doing."]
(201)
○
Mono hedatete kiku ni....ifu
koto wa kikoezu, otoko mo shinobiyaki ni uchiwaraitaru koso nanigoto naran to wokashikere ["Listening on the other side (of the wall or
door)....the words were inaudible, but the muffled laugh of what sounded like a
man made me wonder what was going on."] (201)
For the sake of brevity I have not
given the quotes Ishida provides in full, but their essential meaning is
clear. Ishida praises Sei Shonagon's writing, but notes
that such expressions as "seem" or "appear" render her descriptions flat and
lifeless. He goes on to make the
following comment:
This sensibility is based on the total rejection of anything
concrete. If we were to sum it up
in a single term, it would be "anti-corporal."
In such phrases as "hear on the other side," "stays in the ear, indeed,"
"it's not a loud sound, but one can tell," and "the
words were inaudible," we have the act of listening clearly presented. But the physical presence of the author,
which we would expect to find, is entirely missing. Nothing is expressed in concrete,
three-dimensional terms that set the scene. On the contrary, to state things
plainly, these phrases are virtually devoid of content." (ibid., p
26)
A little later on his paper, Ishida makes
an even stronger statement: "Although sounds are treated in the background, they
all return to silence." (p 27)
Ishida's contention that the
sensibility depicted in the Pillow Book is "anti-corporal" is supported by Imai
Takuji [listed in e) above] when he states: "Sei Shonagon's depiction of nature
has an intellectual cast that generally demonstrates flashes of
intelligence. For this reason she
cannot be lyrical even when she takes nature as her subject." (The Depiction of
Nature in the Pillow Book, p 98)
Ishida and Imai also share the opinion that this sensibility, which they
say objectively analyzes and verbally describes sounds that are heard, is a
personal characteristic of Sei Shonagon herself, and not representative of Heian culture as a whole.
From these somewhat critical observations by Ishida and Imai, I was able to discern one way that Japanese people listen to sounds, even if it is not the representative way. I will treat this in more depth in Section VI.
2) KUBOKI
Tetsuo, Sei Shonagon
Couldn't Play the Koto
In an amplification of Ishida's
work, Kuboki examines references to music found in the
Pillow Book. In Section 23,
Sei Shonagon lists three
activities that the aristocratic young ladies of the Heian court were expected to master: calligraphy, koto playing, and recitation of the Kokinshu poetry anthology. Kuboki notes
that "almost none of the references made to music are concerned with the music
itself" (p 29). He then goes on to
interpret a passage found in Section 158, which begins, Kotofue nado narafu mata sakoso wa madashiki hodo wato mean: "As for learning the koto and flute, it is natural for beginners to take someone
more advanced as their model and wonder when, if ever, they will be able to
play with similar skill." Kuboki draws the conclusion that Sei Shonagon was envious of the
other people's opportunity to learn the kotoand
flute, and that she in fact could not play either of them (p 23).
Speaking from a
musicological standpoint, this conclusion is difficult to accept. It is true that the Japanese flute (a
transverse flute) is a difficult instrument to master. Beginners find it hard to
produce a sound at all, and practice is needed to position the lips and fingers
correctly so that the instrument stays in tune. But the koto
is a different matter. Though
technique and musicianship are certainly required for a polished performance,
even a beginner can easily produce a satisfactory sound, and anyone with normal
intelligence can manage to play a few short pieces on the instrument. It is difficult to believe that someone
of Sei Shonagon's
intellectual stature would be unable to accomplish such a relatively easy
task. She might not have been a
good koto player, but she almost certainly had the
ability to play to some extent. It
therefore seems inappropriate to consider the flute and koto together as a set, and premature to assume on the
basis of this single passage that Sei Shonagon had no musical sensibility.
One difference between Kuboki and Ishida is in the extent they believe the sounds
mentioned in the Pillow Book have relevance to the sense of
hearing. Kuboki restricts his samples to the world of musical sounds
such as one might find in a history of Western music, claiming that the
"patently musical sounds deserve particular treatment and attention." (p 23). However,
many of his examples, including "Of things played, there is the biwa...." (Section 206), "very finekin no koto [7-string
zither]" (Section 206), and "Of songs, fuzoku [folk
tunes adopted by the aristocracy]" (Section 264) are simply listings of
instruments or musical genres, and do not to my mind qualify as genuine musical
references. Ishida, on the other
hand, discusses a wider range of sounds.
One of the most interesting
observations Kuboki makes is that: The most detailed
accounts of musical appreciation mentioned in the Pillow Book are found in the
section on the flute....but even
here, nearly half of the references are to the shape of the instruments, the
faces of the players, and other such aspects rather than to the music itself....
Yamada Yoshio has already pointed this out and expressed surprise at Sei Shonagon's visual acuity, but
can we not also infer from this that she had virtually no musical talent?
(ibid., p 23)
As both Ishida and Kuboki observed, there are few concrete references to music
as musicin the Pillow Book, and no evidence of
musical appreciation. This observation suggests an important element within the context
of the present paper.
3) Francis
Mathy, S. J., On the Pillow Book
In this work, Mathy describes some of the impressions a Western reader of
the Pillow Bookreceives concerning Sei Shonagon's depictions of
contemporary life. Regarding
Section 33, Mathy has this to
say:
The
lecturer delivering a sermon on the sutras can be given as a very modern
example....The people who come to hear him are less interested in the sermon
than in looking around at the other people in the congregation and watching the
court ladies arrive
in their carriages....In short, they do not listen to the
important explication of the holy texts, but simply do as they like. After a little
while, those of high rank and office arrive late....but
before the sermon is through, these people stand up and leave
again.
Although Mathy finds such behavior strange, it can still be commonly
observed at Buddhist services given in Japanese temples today. Mathy's
surprise, however, points to a difference in the Western European and Japanese
attitudes toward sound in general, and toward musical expression through the
medium of the human voice in particular.
With this last element, it seems we can now explain the musicological
phenomena observed in the Pillow Book by Ishida and Kuboki, and also dispel the contradictions inherent in the
"shared consciousness" of the Japanese put forth by Kikkawa and Ogura.
V. Sounds in the Pillow
Book
The sounds depicted in the Sankan Text of the Pillow Book include those heard at
Buddhist and Shinto religious ceremonies, natural sounds, artificial sounds,
and the musical sounds of instruments, dance, chanting, and poetry
recitation. Artificial sounds
include those made by people moving, by machines, carriage wheels, and by other
man-made means. The following
headings serve as a guide to sound categorization. Specific examples from the text are not
presented under the headings here because of space limitations, but the number
of examples found from each category is given in parentheses. I have only counted references that have
some specific connection to sound; the simple mention of a musical instrument,
for example, is not included in the given numbers. Some of the examples are discussed in
detail later.
1) Sounds of
a. References to the expression or timbre
of human voices singing or reciting Buddhist sutras or Shinto
services.
b. Sounding objects (rosary beads, bell,
and conk shell)
2) Natural
Sounds
a. Weather (rain, wind and
thunder)
b. Running water (rivers,
waterfalls)
c. Birds
d. Insects
e. Animals
3) Artificial
Sounds
a. Machines, tools, and clothing
(carriages, shoes, chopsticks, canes, axes, robes, knocks on the gate,
etc.)
b. Sounds directly related to
people (clamor, speech, footsteps, voices, etc.)
4) Musical
Instruments, Dance, Chanting, and Singing
a. Instruments (flute, hichiriki, biwa, koto, etc.)
b. Music performance (tuning up,
disordered notes, etc.)
c. Dance sounds (steps, keeping time by
beating a fan, stamps, etc.)
d. Song, chant, and
voice
Examining the above references to
sound in more detail, I found that two basic generalizations can be made: first,
references to human voices, artificial sounds, and natural sounds tend to
describe timbre and expression in more concrete terms than is the case for
instruments or musical performances; second, references to natural,
instrumental, and other abstract sounds are often made empathetically, that is,
with an emotional tone provided by the author. Each of these observations is
discussed with specific examples below.
Section numbers in the Sankan Text of the
Pillow Bookare given in
parentheses.
1) Relatively
concrete descriptions are given of human voices, artificial sounds, and natural
sounds.
Example
1
○Semi no koe shibori idashite ["Strained like the voice of a cicada"]
(28);
○Semete
shibori idashitaru koegoe no ["....voices straining with great difficulty"]
(120)
These discriptions of the voices of priests chanting or reading
sutras are both concrete and, in the case of the cicada, entirely apt. Literary scholars are still in debate
about the meaning of semi ["cicada"], but from a musical point of view the
meaning couldn't be clearer. The
sound of a cicada shrilly buzzing and humming on a summer's day is very similar
to the voices used by priests when they perform their shomyo ["chanting of scriptures"]. In fact, the many high overtones that
characterize shomyo have led ordinary people to
describe it in just that way: semigoe, or "cicada
voice." The sound is similar to
that of the shoin the gagaku
ensemble or the buzzing sawari effect on the shamisen, and can be considered a representative timbre in
Japanese music. Concerning the
phrase ‘shibori idashite’
translated here as "strained," but literally meaning "wrung out"), we can say
that it accurately describes the gravelly tone quality of the priests' voices,
which contrasts so dramatically with the open-throated, clear tones of the
Western singing voice.
Example
2
○
Okyou wo, ito araarashiu tafutoku uchiide yomitaru nizo["The priests were
reciting (the sutras) loudly and raucously...."] (120)
Sutras are recited or chanted by
priests in a wide variety of voices.
The shomyo of the Kegon sect at Todaiji Temple in
Nara (dating to the 6th century), or that of the Shingon sect at Koyasan, remain as
examples of a rough, raw-boned chanting style. Sei Shonagon's use of the adverb araarashiu ["raucous"] reflects her distaste for a
self-important priest, but it also accurately and concretely describes one
aspect of shomyo. In Section 33, she speaks of priests
chanting shomyo "to convey their voices with all their
might" (ikade katari tsutafu bakari ni), which again can be interpreted as "strongly" or "as if
forced out." In this and other
cases, Sei Shonagon's
sensitivity to tone color is apparent.
Example
3
○
Uchisoyomeku koromo no otonai ["The sound of robes rustling"]
(201)
The adverb soyosoyo, which is the base form of uchisoyomeku, usually describes both the sound and the
visual image of a light breeze or the fluttering of leaves in a tree. Here, however, it is used to describe
the sound made by people's clothing when they move. The word appears in other sections also,
including: soyomekite irase
tamaeba ["because they entered with a rustle"] (104),
and soyosoyoto amata orikite ["many (people) coming rustling down"]
(120).
Example
4
○
Uguisu wa....natsu aki no sue made oigoe ni nakite ["The warbler....sings from summer through the end of
autumn in a hoarse voice"] (41)
○
Uguisu no oitaru koe ["The hoarse voice of the warbler"]
(222)
○Hototogisu
mo....morokoe ni nakitaru koso....yo fukaku uchiidetaru
koe no, rauraujiu aigeuzukitaru["And the cuckoos....singing
together....(their) voices crying out deep in the night with touchingly elegant
love and respect"] (41)
These references to bird calls are
highly subjective descriptions that contain considerable concrete detail.
Examples of this kind, referring to both birds and insects, are numerous in the
Pillow Book.
In contrast, this kind of
concreteness does not appear in references to musical sounds or
instruments. There are, of course,
many references that fall in the musical category, but only the following six
refer to the music itself; the rest are simple listings of instruments or visual
descriptions of performances.
Example
5
○
Kagura no fue no omoshiroku wananaki fuki sumasarete ["....the clear,
delicate, charmingly tremulous sound of the flute...."]
(142)
○
Takaku fukase owashimase ["....playing loud and clear...."]
(245)
○
Hichiriki wa ito kashigamashiku....kutsuwamushi nado no kokochi shite utate keijikaku kiki mahoshi karazu ["The hichiriki is a very
shrill instrument, the autumn insect it most resembles being the long cricket.
It makes a terrible noise, and is not something one wants to hear near by."]
(218)
○Ito yoku naru biwa no okashigenaru ga aru wo monogatari no
mama ni ne mo tatezu tsumabiki ni kakinarashitaru["....the
beautiful sound of lute music. The player plucks the strings so gently that even
when the murmur of conversation dies down one can barely make out the notes."]
(193)
○Katahara
itaki mono....yokumo hikitodomenu koto wo yokumo shirabede
kokoro no kagiri hikitatetaru ["Irritating things: an unskillful koto player playing out of tune
with a self-satisfied air."] (96)
The most concrete of the above
five examples describes the sound of the hichiriki, a
double-reeded instrument with a distinctive, sharp,
oboe-like timbre. In likening its
sound to the long cricket (a type of katydid), Sei
Shonagon clearly reveals her dislike for the
instrument. It is interesting that
her disapproval stems from the hichiriki's tone color,
especially when we consider her comment about the transverse flute used in the
kaguraensemble, which hada
"clear, delicate, charmingly tremulous sound." She apparently enjoyed the breath
control peculiar to the instrument.
This preference was not limited to Sei Shonagon.
Despite its central role in musical ensembles on the continent, the hichiriki was strictly confined to the gagakuensemble in Japan. In contrast, the transverse flute
enjoyed great popularity in many Japanese performance arts, including noh, kabuki, and various folk forms. Even today, many Japanese have a special
place in their hearts for the Western flute, perhaps because it suits their
traditional sensibilities.
The references to the biwaand koto are less
concrete. In most cases, they
concentrate on the use of the instruments in official court functions and on the
appearance of the performers. This
fact probably provided Kuboki with the basis for his
assertion that Sei Shonagon
couldn't actually play herself. I
have already pointed out that the koto(probably the
13-string instrument known today as a gakuso) offers
few challenges that a person of Sei Shonagon's intelligence could not overcome. Only a few techniques are needed to
permit ensemble playing, and the pitch is stable. The same can be said for the biwa: there are relatively few performance techniques
involved, and the frets ensure that the proper pitch is produced. If a person can manage to support the
instrument firmly in his lap, he should have no difficulty learning the
fundamentals of performance. This
relative ease of performance is precisely why the amateur aristocrats were able
to play with professional sho, hichiriki, and ryuteki (flute)
performers who were hired from outside the court for that purpose. (This is not to say, of course, that
there were no professionals among the aristocrats, as well.) In any case, it is difficult to believe
that Sei Shonagon couldn't
manage to play these string instruments.
The lack of concreteness in her references might instead be interpreted
to mean that she found little of musical interest in the strings' delicate,
attenuated timbre.
The lack of musical concreteness
in the Pillow Bookis used by Ishida and Kuboki to support the claim that Sei Shonagon had no musical
aptitude; but this alone does not really provide sufficient evidence to
judge. If, as these scholars claim,
Sei Shonagon and here
contemporaries were not trained to "appreciate musical compositions," what could
we expect them to make of the musical atmosphere at court, which differed so
drastically from the native sound world that the Japanese enjoyed in their daily
lives? We must remember that the
court music of the period had been imported from the T'ang court of China relatively recently, and was probably
still considered new and exotic. It
might be too much to expect concrete comments under such
circumstances.
2) Abstract
sounds are often discribed as a reflection of the
author's moods. A distinction is
made between ne ["sound"] and koe ["voice"], the latter indicating an empathetic
relationship.
Example
1
○Zukyo
no kane no ne nado waga na nari to kikumo tanomoshiu oboyu["I feel reassured to think that the bell accompanying
the recitation of the sutras is ringing for me."] (120)
○Kane no koe hibikimasarite["....the
booming of the temple bell became louder and louder...."]
(120)
The use of nein the first quote serves as a simple description of an
acoustical event. In contrast, the
use of koe in the second quote reflects Sei Shonagon's mounting curiosity about who had asked
for the sutra readings, as the subsequent context makes clear. In other words, ne is used to describe physical, acoustical events
that exist apart from the author in the outside world. Koe, on the
other hand, is used for subjective, psycho-acoustical events occurring in the
author's mind.
Example
2
○
Ame
nado sawagashiki hi
["....days
when the rain and weather are loud and disturbing....]
(44)
○
Ame
no ashi yokozama ni sawagashiu fukitaru ni
["The rain blustering in
sideways...."] (198)
○
Kaze
no ito sawagashiku fukite
["....the
wind blowing clamorously...."] (199)
○
Yoru
wa kaze no sawagi ni nerarizarikereba
["Because the
noise of the wind kept me from sleeping...."] (200)
○
Kaze
itau fukite
[....the wind blowing strongly...."]
(44)
○
Ame
no itau furu
hi
["....days when the rain falls
heavily...."] (138)
○
Kami
no itau naru wori ni
["....when the god of thunder roars
loudly...."] (296)
A similar objective/subjective
distinction can be found in the use of the adjective sawagashi ["noisy, raucous"] (44, 198, 199, 200, etc.) and
the adverb itau ["strongly, roughly"] (44, 138, 296,
etc.). Of the examples cited in 3-b
above, which concern sounds related directly to people, six incorporate the word
sawagi ["commotion"] or its variant forms, including
sawagashi.
In addition, sawagi is used in three references
to the weather (44, 199, 200).
Itau, on the other hand, is most commonly
employed to describe the weather, and is less often used to indicate
people.
All the references given above are
concerned with strong rain and wind.
Their difference lies in the distance, both physical and psychological,
between the noise and power of the elements and the listener. Sawagashi
indicates close proximity, with a corresponding degree of mental agitation. Itau
indicates a certain amount of distance between the noise and the listener, with
a corresponding degree of objectivity.
By distinguishing between these two usages, Sei
Shonagon transforms the objective noise of a
thunderstorm into a subjective statement of her feelings.
From these observations it becomes
clear that the objective, physical phenomenon of sound often serves as a vehicle
to convey human emotion or to describe psychological states in the Pillow
Book. This is particularly true of
natural sounds, but even instrumental sounds are occasionally treated in an
empathetic manner. Other examples
will be discussed along with other aspects of Sei
Shonagon's attitude toward sound in the next
section.
VI. The
Attitude Toward Sound as Depicted in the PillowBook
1) The
Visual Perception of Sound
This aspect is especially apparent
in references to instrumental and dance music, and to the instruments
themselves. As both Kuboki and Ishida have pointed out, references are made to
the koto, biwa, flute, and
other instruments, but their sound is rarely described. To cite some
examples:
○
Michikata no Shonagon, biwa ito medetashi.
Narimasa so no koto,
Yukinari fue, Tsunefusa no Shosho, sho no fuenado
["Michikata, the Minor Counsellor,
played splendidly on the biwa, Lord Narimasa played the so no koto,
Yukinari the flute, and Captain Tsunefusa the sho."]
(80)
○
Biwa no okoto wo tatazama ni motase tamahete
["....(the Empress) holding her biwa upright (in front of her face)."]
(94)
○
Ito kurou tsuyayakanaru biwa ni onsode wo uchikakete torahesase tamaheru da ni medetashi
["Just the
sight of (the Empress) with her sleeve draped over the glossy, black biwa was splendid....] (94)
○
Batou
wa kami furiagetaru. Mami nado wa utomashi keredo, gaku wa naho ito omoshiroshi
["In the batou
dance, the hair was tossed up.
Their glances were horrible, but the music was most engaging."] (216)
In this last example, Sei Shonagon describes the hair of
a demon mask being tossed up in concrete detail, but her reference to the music
gets no further that a vague "engaging."
An extreme example of this tendency to emphasize visual experiences is
found in Section 33:
○
Sekkyo
no koji wa kaoyoki. Koji no kao wo tsuto mamoraetaru koso, sono toku koto no tafutosa mo oboyure.Higame shitsureba futo wasururu ni
["A preacher
should be good-looking. For, if we are
properly to understand his worthy sentiments, we must keep our eyes on
him while he speaks; should we look
away, we might forget to listen."] (33)
Physical appearance is given
precedence over sound. This
particular example is related to a Buddhist ceremony, but the same tendency to
emphasize the visual can also be observed in references to
nature:
○
Karasu
no nedokoro e yuku tote,
mitsu yotsu, futatsumitsu nado tobiisogu sae
["....the crows fly hurriedly back to
their nests in threes and fours, two and threes...."] (1)
2) Sounds
Heard Empathetically
This aspect is especially
noticeable in references to the sound of bells and other percussive instruments,
and tonatural sounds, including the cries of
animals. I have already discussed
the distinction betweenne["sound"] and koe["voice"], and between sawagashi["noisy, raucous"] and itau ["strongly, roughly"]. Other examples of Sei Shonagon's empathetic
treatment of sound include the following.
○
Hototogisu no....tadotadoshiki kikitsuketaran wa
["Listening for the first time to
the uncertain call of the
cuckoo...."] (5)
○
Kono itaru inu no furui wananakite
["....how such a dog trembled and
wimpered...."] (9)
○
Hototogisu no nanorite wataru
["The cuckoo announcing his name
as he passes...."] (39)
○
Uguisu wa....aki no sue made oigoe ni nakite
["....until the end of autumn the
warbler sings in a hoarse voice...."] (39)
○
Minomushi....chichiyo, chichiyo to hakanage ni naku
["Bagworms....desperately crying
chichiyo, chichiyo (father,
father!)"] (41)
○
Hiyohiyo to kashigamashiu
nakite
["....cheeping clamorously...."]
(151)
These examples all reflect Sei Shonagon's subjectiveinterpretations of objective acoustical
events. She describes them
empathetically, imbuing them with her own emotions. The same treatment is also given to
artificial sounds and human voices, and this provides a contact point with Tsunoda's work on the Japanese brain. Tsunoda's
claim that the Japanese perceive natural sounds with the same side of the brain
with which they perceive language might be explained by this tendency to listen
empathetically. The cuckoo's
"uncertainty," or its crying out as if "calling outits
name," or the bagworms "crying desperately, father, father!" all suggest what we
might call a literary, or at any rate, a linguistic approach to natural
sounds.
In a Japanese children's song
about crows, there is a line that says, Kawai, kawai
to karasu wa naku no ["The crow caws kawai,
kawai (cute, cute!)"] Many similar examples come easily to
mind. I will discuss this
phenomenon of sounds as words in Section VII below.
3) Sounds
Picked Out Among Other Sounds
The aural world of the Pillow Book
is anything but silent. Constant
references are made to clamorous and confused conditions in which sounds are
perceived. in this respect Mathy was correct in his observations concerning the
Buddhist sermon. Other examples
include:
○Mitsu
bakari made wa sukoshi mono mo kikoyubeshi
["....and even people in the third
row were close enough to hear the service."] (35)
○Sabakari
yusurimichitareba, torihanachite kikiwaku bekini mo araneba
["So many people were bustling
about that it was hard to make out
what (any particular priest) was saying...."] (120)
Despite her inability to sort out
what she wanted to hear amid the noise, however, she goes on to
say:
○
Shibori idetaru koegoe no, sasugani magirezunamu
["....(but) occasionally I could
distinguish strained voices pronouncing some phrase...."]
(120)
Another
example of Sei Shonagon's
ability to pick out
specific sounds in a field of aural distractions is found in
Section 72:
○Yogarasu
domo no ite, yonaka bakari ni ine sawaguOchimadoi, kizutahite, neokitaru koe ni nakitaru koso
["Then, towards the middle of the
night, the crows in one of the trees suddenly wake up in a great flurry and
start flapping about. Their unrest
spreads to the other trees, and soon all the birds have been startled from their
sleep and are cawing in alarm."] (72)
Here again, Sei Shonagon singles out one set
of voices among many, and distinguishes changes in the nature of the crows'
noise in the middle of darkness. In
this passage, at least, she displays considerable aural
sensitivity.
The musicologist TANAKA Naoko, in
her thesis on the suikinkutsu, a traditional Japanese
sound instrument, points out that the Japanese of past eras did not necessarily
listen to the instrument with intense and undivided attention. Further, she speculates that Japanese
listeners have long been characterized by the ability to hear one specific sound
while ignoring others. Her
observations further back up the tendency we have already seen in the Pillow
Book.
4) Listening
to Sounds Indirectly
Many of the references to sound are described as indirect listening
experiences. Examples
include:
○Uzumore
fushite kiku ni
["....(one) lies buried under the
bedclothes listening...."] (73)
○Kagenagara
suberi yorite kiku
["....(the woman) slips furtively
(towards the door) where she can listen...."] (76)
○Oji chikanaru tokoro nite kikeba
["....listening near a large
thoroughfare...."] (194)
○
Kokoro nikuki mono mono hedatete kiku ni
["Things that are attractive: the
sound, heard on the far
side (of a wall or door)...."]
(201)
○Mono no ushiro shoji nado hedatete kiku ni
["Behind things, listening on the
far side of the sliding paper doors...."] (201)
○Sho
no fue wa tsuki akaki ni, kuruma nado nite kiki etaru, ito wokashi
["The sho is delightful when one hears it in a carriage on a
bright, moonlit night."] (218)
These and other examples reveal a
haphazard approach to listening.
Things heard are not central in the listener's consciousness, but remain
somewhere on the periphery: while lying down with a lover, from the shadows,
from far away, or behind some intervening barrier. Ishida points this out when he says,
"the physical presence of the author, which we would expect to find, is entirely
missing. Nothing is expressed in
concrete, three-dimensional terms that set the scene." If, as this quote suggests, the Japanese
tend to express themselves indirectly and with a lack of concreteness, can we
not also postulate that they display an indirect attitude toward the sounds they
hear? This is a question with far
wider ramifications than the simple assertion that Sei
Shonagon herself was unmusical. It points to a way of perceiving sound
that is fundamentally different from the attentive listening that characterizes
music appreciation in the West.
Further research using other literary sources is needed before a clear
answer to this question can be formulated.
5) Listening
While Doing Something Else
○Kasukani
juzu oshimomi nado shite kiki itaru wo
["Toying with their rosaries while
listening...."] (33)
○Ukon
no Naishi ni biwa hikasete....korekare monoii, warai nado suru ni
["...while Ukon no Naishi played the biwa for her. The other ladies in attendance sat together,
talking and laughing...."] (100)
○
Hito no uedomo iiawasete uta nado katarikiku mama nineirinuru
["...discussing (the visitor) with
one's companions, and exchanging
poems; then gradually one falls asleep."](179)
○
Katawara ni ito yoku naru biwa no wokashigenaru ga aruwo, monogatari no himahima ni, oto mo tatezu, tsumabikini kaki narashitaru
koso
["From one side of the hall comes
beautiful biwa music. the player plucks the strings so
gently that even when the murmur of conversation dies down one can barely make
out the notes."] (193)
○
Fue
wa. tohou yori kikoyuru ga, yauyau chikaku nariyukumo wokashi
["....the sound of the flute is beautiful
when one hears it gradually approaching from a distance...."]
(218)
These examples amplify Mathy's observation that sound is often perceived while the
listener's are engaged in some other activity. Like the examples in 4) above, these
extracts suggest that listening is not an independent act engaged in with a
person's full attention. Such a
conclusion is further supported by the pictorial scrolls I discussed in the
introduction, in which no one appears to be listening to the performers. Though it is premature to generalize, we
can say with confidence that at least as far as the Pillow Book is concerned, no
clear distinction is made between those who make the sounds and those who
listen.
VII. Abstract Sounds as
Words
One important question arising
from the analysis conducted in Section VI deserves closer scrutiny. It concerns the tendency for sounds to
be depicted (perceived) empathetically, and this tendency's relationship to
Tsunoda's observations on the Japanese ear. As we've seen, Tsunoda's research suggests that the Japanese perceive
natural sounds with the left side of the brain, the same side with which people
of all nationalities process language.
The empathetic attitude toward sound in the Pillow Book offers a striking
parallel to this theory. Time and
time again, we see abstract, objective acoustical events such as the cries of
birds and insects or the sounds of musical instruments interpreted with
concrete, subjective meaning. This
tendency is further backed by the thought-provoking paper by YAMAGUCHI Nakami introduced below.
1)
YAMAGUCHI Nakami
Torigoe
no Keifu ["A Geneology of
Bird Calls"] (Published in 1985 by
Pelican in the Japanese Art Series,
Vol. 4, pp
52-67)
This paper examines how the
Japanese of earlier eras perceived the voices of birds, drawing on examples from
classical literature. As one
example, Yamaguchi discusses the cawing of a crow, which is described
onomatopoeically as
kaka in Section 97 of the Pillow Book:
The
depiction of the crow's caw as kaka gradually changes by the Kamakura and Muromachi Periods (1185-1568) to koka-koka or kokaa-kokaa.
By
the Edo Period (1615-1867) we see the introduction of such variants as kaa-kaa and gaa- gaa. Also
during this period, these onomatopoeic words beginning with the sounds ka or ga start to extend
beyond the mere imitation of the crow's caw: they begin to acquire human
meaning as words, and give birth to a new kind of literature. (p
57)
The practice
described here is known as kikinashi["listen and
make"]. Yamaguchi defines it as a
"transcription of the sensibilities or environment of a person engaged in the
act of transforming bird or insect cries into human language." He goes on to examine various concrete
examples found in literature. It is
interesting to see how Yamaguchi's work backs up Tsunoda's research from a literary point of view. In addition, the phenomenon of kikinashi might explain why Sei
Shonagon's references to natural sounds are more
detailed and concrete than her references to musical ensembles or instruments:
natural sounds are somehow easier to transform into words.
Taking all this into
consideration, we come to the conclusion that the interest Japanese of the past
have shown in the sounds of nature stems not from a refined sensitivity to
delicate sounds, but from the fact that such sounds can be readily given
subjective meaning as words.
2) The
meaning of shoga mnemonic syllables
In many forms of Japanese
traditional music, nonsense syllables are assigned to different pitches or drum
timbres as an aid to memorization.
Known variously as shoga ["chant song"], kuchi-jamisen["mouth shamisen"],
shofu ["chant notation"] and others, this method of
learning music permits rapid and accurate memorization of fairly complex
material. It becomes possible, for example, to "sing" a drum pattern, with
different syllables assigned to each drum timbre. Might there be a connection between
this mnemonic system and kikinashi, which also
involves turning abstract sound into speech? Are the consonents often used in shoga :
k, g, t,
d, r, h, b, and p -- also commonly used in the verbal
equivalents of natural sounds? If
so, we have perhaps clarified one distinguishing characteristic of the Japanese
perception of timbre.
VIII.
Conclusion
Summarizing the analysis of the
Pillow Book presented above, we
come up with five major points:
1)
There are many references to natural sounds such as rain, wind, birds, and
insects, and a tendency to listen to those sounds
empathetically.
2)
Interest in musical performances centers not on the music itself but rather on
the shape, beauty, or other physical attributes of the instruments or
performers, or on stories or anecdotes connected with
them.
3)
Surrounded as they are by many simultaneous sounds, the people depicted in the
Pillow Book focus their attention on the particular sound they wish to hear
while ignoring others.
4)
There is a tendency to enjoy musical performances or poetry recitations
indirectly, with a wooden or paper door, screen, or bamboo blind providing an
intervening barrier. In other
words, people tend to listen passively rather than
actively.
5) There is a
strong tendency to transform both natural and instrumental sounds into words
with concrete meanings.
These characteristics lead to the
conclusion that there was no concept of a musical concert, as defined in Western
terms, among the aristocrats of Heian Japan. Listening to instrumental music was not
considered an independent activity that absorbed a person's total
concentration. When we add to this
the strong tendency to transform abstract sounds into human language, it is easy
to see why such imported instrumental genres as gagakunever enjoyed widespread acceptance. The history of Japanese music is
essentially a history of vocal music.
However, it must be emphasized
that a single literary source is not enough to completely substantiate these
generalizations. In future papers I
hope to conduct similar analyses on other works of Heian literature, including H Murasaki Shikibu Nikki ["Diary of
Murasaki Shikibu"], the Tale
of Genji, and Utsubo Monogatari ["The Tale of Utsubo"].
Notes
1)
The present paper is a revision of a paper in Japanese published in Volume 6 of
the Joetsu Kyoiku Daigaku
Kenkyu Kiyo ["Bulletin of Joetsu University of
Education Research"] in March 1987.
2)
English translations of material quoted from the Pillow Book rely heavily on the
translation by Ivan Morris published in the Penguin Classics
series.