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Wednesday, February 9, 2011
For Credit: The Third Act
How does this play hold the audience's interest throughout the third act? What kinds of emotions or reaction does this part of the drama seem designed to elicit from the viewer?
The third act of the play holds the reader's interest first by showing Koharu's escape from Jihei's brother (in which she and Jihei sneak out) and then by constantly throwing doubt into the lovers' minds. Koharu keeps trying to object, to convince Jihei not to abandon his kids and his wife. This makes me wonder if Koharu was doing this out of genuine concern for Jihei's family, or if it was her last ditch effort to try and save her own skin.
Jihei claiming that Osan is no longer his wife seems to dissuade Koharu from the objection of being slandered by Osan, but Koharu still manages to bring up Jihei's kids one more time. Once again, I find myself questioning her intent. How many times does Jihei have to show his commitment to this act of death until Koharu goes along? I'd like to think Koharu has genuine feelings of empathy for his kids (she apparently knows what it's like to be abandoned), but at some point I found myself unsure of this. Maybe her resolve was just wavering a little bit because she was so close to the long thought of act of suicide, and when she saw that Jihei was finally going to go through with it no matter what, she just dropped her objections and rolled with it.
It's these kinds of questions and doubts in the reader's and crowd's mind that keep us attentive throughout the third act. There may be a little poetic imagery about crows and haircuts (page 66), but mostly we keep with the show to see if Koharu will stick to the plan and hope that this move is what's best for them.
The third act of the play holds the reader's attention in that it is the culmination of the plot; it holds the climax and the finale. The third act shows that Koharu feels nothing for anyone, whatever she pretends before this, by committing suicide with Jihei. The third act also holds the reader's attention with Jihei showing that he really does not care anything for his family or business, only for Koharu. In order to further, hold the readers’ interest by introducing us to Jihei’s brothers’ concern for Jihei’s son whom the family intends to use a way to lure Jihei back from insanity. Mainly, however, Jihei and Koharu’s machinations to be together and to commit suicide together despite the odds against them and the refusal of all of their acquaintances and relations to sanction their relationship hold the readers’ interest during the third act. Partly the reader’s interest is also held by the gruesome way in which Jihei murders Koharu, he cannot even do that correctly.
Before Jihei and Koharu even escape to Amijima, Mon’zaemon leaves little doubt that the two lovers will die. In addition to the title of the play, the chanter alludes to the imminence of death for Jihei and Koharu. When describing Jihei’s dirk in act two, the chanter says, “Buddha surely knows that tonight it will be stained with Koharu’s blood” (59). And as the servant in act three leaves the doorway of Koharu’s quarters, the chanter remarks that this action scatters “the seeds that before morning will turn Jihei and Koharu to dust” (61).Therefore, the climax of the work is not in the death of the lovers but the emotional turmoil depicted in the final act. Yet while Jihei and Koharu are the central characters in this act, Osan, who does not appear in this part of the play, is still a significant figure. Although Jihei and Koharu are preparing to leave their earthly existence and join each other as souls in the afterlife, Koharu’s thoughts and the reader’s attention return to Osan.
Koharu describes her unresolved relationship with Osan and the likelihood that she will blame her for the suicide. Readers are given a sense of the frustration that Osan experiences as her marriage is ruined. Jihei tries to remain composed and assuage Koharu’s remorse but he too begins “weeping so profusely that he cannot control the blade” (68). As part of the suicide, Jihei and Koharu must confront the thought of leaving relationships with others that are unresolved.
The difficulty for the two lovers is that they cannot easily escape “the inconstant world” and their “profane past” (66). These experiences dominate their psyches and Koharu still cannot refrain from thinking “it’s my fault!” (67). Throughout the play, readers are conscious of impending death. Yet the emotional energy of the final act is not a result of the character’s perceptions that death is an unknown state. Rather, apprehension about death arises from the irresolution and hardship that it leaves for those still alive.
The third act has a tight rope to tread in keeping the reader's attention, for the Chanter basically foretells the deaths of the lovers, saying "scattered at the doorway the seeds that before morning will turn Jihei and Koharu into dust" (61). With their fate basically assured to us in the very beginning of Act 3, the play challenges itself to keep the suspense taught even with the end already known. The dialogue between the lovers, full of questioning and relenting during their journey to die, confronts the challenge, at every turn casting doubt on the impending act and how the shadow of it will affect those they abandon for another world.
Another interesting element of suspense is the actual planning of the suicides at the very end. Usually hashing logistics isn't very interesting to listen in on, Koharu and Jihei figuring out their suicide is a special matter. Just them talking about the act, confronting it explicitly to each other's faces with minor details, carries inherent suspense with its unique circumstance. Every little decision they agree upon in those moments will determine the actual action of them dying later, and thus every word concerns us as readers. We hear the foretelling of the means of death by those who will die by there own hands, all while the suspense of waiting for the actual scene to end it all builds.
The third ties everything together; it’s like the ending of a drama where the audience finds out what happens. After all of the excitement in the previous two acts where Koharu is constantly changing her mind as well as the action-packed second act where Jihei attacks Koharu. The third act is what gives us the conclusion of the story; it creates the suspense that the audience feels. The third act of the play acts as the climax, all of the events leading up to the suicide are the rising actions and as the scene progresses the suspense increases.
Following on from Dema's comment, especially his point about the inevitability of the suicide, I'm reminded of catharsis. Of course, when Aristotle introduced the idea of catharsis he was talking about Ancient Greek tragedy, but the term has become used much more broadly so I think it is fair. In Greek tragedy the tragedy is inevitable, just as it is in Amijima. It is also a release of emotional energy - it is the only time when they are honest with each other and express their feelings. They know that they are going to go through with it.
I thought they dealt with the irresolvability of their personal relations and pasts in an interesting way. It is done symbolically through their choice of location. At some point Jihei declares, "No matter how far we walk, there'll never be a spot marked "For Suicides." Let us kill ourselves here." (p. 66) It is true also, that there is never a time in a life that is marked "For Suicide". There are always obligations, relationships and considerations that mean it will never be a good time to commit suicide. Their solution is to accept it and to execute their plan as best they can given their abilities and circumstances (as an aside, I can forgive Jihei for not killing Koharu cleanly - he was a pretty poor paper merchant at best, not exactly a trained soldier).
The most charitable reading I can come up with towards Jihei is that this third act, for better or worse, is where he pulls himself together and goes through with his plan to be with the woman he loves. He can't do things as he should - "a mountain for one, a river for the other" - so he just decides to "pretend that the ground above this sluice gate is a mountain... I shall hang myself by this stream." (p. 66)
I agree with Vivian. When I read Act 3, I felt all the desperation and hopelessness Jihei and Koharu were feeling. It got exciting at the beginning of the Act, when Jihei was hiding from his brother and his brother was frantic with worry. When authors convey that strong of emotion, it is difficult for the audience to stop reading.
Act 3 is a total 180 from the previous acts, when the audience was unsure about the relationship between the two; was it real or was Koharu as heartless as Jihei believed?
As I mentioned before, the feelings the author conveys are difficult to ignore. "He whips out his dirk and slashes off his black locks at the base of the topknot...'I am a priest, unencumbered by wife, children...'" (III.68).
I thought this passage was the best for showing their hopelessness. They knew they were in a dilemma. They were not going to go to heaven, and they were going to leave people who had no way to care for themselves (Osan, Jihei's children, Koharu's mother). So Jihei wants to make both of themselves feel better by saying he is a new person because he has a new haircut, signifying that he is a monk.
In agreement with most of my classmates, the last act held my interest for the simple fact that I wanted to see the way that it was going to play out. We seen Koharu being detained and Jihei's wife telling him to go and help her because she got involved and didn't want to let her down as a woman. In my perspective this was a well planned out to throw a kind of curve ball into the storyline. I felt that Jihei wasn't going to go through with it, even after Koharu was trying to tell him to go back to his wife but they did. The ending gives you a sense of release because the author did a good job of setting up the ending with good and vivid scenes that didn't reveal the conclusion of the story.
In the third Act, similar to the emotions of other students we not only were excited about discovering how the play was going to end, but can agree that Act 3 was different than the other acts as Moon states, when the audience has a "speechless" sense as to the true feelings of the relationship between Jihei and Koharu.
In the third act, we see that Jihei is leaving for the trip to Kyoto. However, there happens to be relief when Jihei realizes that his brother is still trying to help him save his own life regardless of his ungrateful ways through the sitituation and all. I was surprised to even think that he is still going to go forth with the suicide and then this is where they end up leaving on their way to Amijima, at the Daicho Temple and I read the lines in the beginning of this act, "No matter how far we walk, there'll never be a spot marked "For Suicides." Let us kill ourselves here. These lines set the tone for what was about to occur although it gave me a sense of sympathy because it was a kind of sad ending to see two lovers actually going through a suiucide together despite the circumstances.
In conclusion, it seems that Koharu is questioning going through with the suicide but we are anxious to find out if its really going to go through with the plan because of whats seems to be best for both of them in the end.
The third act keeps the reader's interest because it is the climax or the high point of the story. It tells the reader how everything in the story relates to each other and completes the story. It is the conclusion and the reason you have been reading is finally realized. The main character's minds are finally made up and a decision is made.
10 comments:
The third act of the play holds the reader's interest first by showing Koharu's escape from Jihei's brother (in which she and Jihei sneak out) and then by constantly throwing doubt into the lovers' minds. Koharu keeps trying to object, to convince Jihei not to abandon his kids and his wife. This makes me wonder if Koharu was doing this out of genuine concern for Jihei's family, or if it was her last ditch effort to try and save her own skin.
Jihei claiming that Osan is no longer his wife seems to dissuade Koharu from the objection of being slandered by Osan, but Koharu still manages to bring up Jihei's kids one more time. Once again, I find myself questioning her intent. How many times does Jihei have to show his commitment to this act of death until Koharu goes along? I'd like to think Koharu has genuine feelings of empathy for his kids (she apparently knows what it's like to be abandoned), but at some point I found myself unsure of this. Maybe her resolve was just wavering a little bit because she was so close to the long thought of act of suicide, and when she saw that Jihei was finally going to go through with it no matter what, she just dropped her objections and rolled with it.
It's these kinds of questions and doubts in the reader's and crowd's mind that keep us attentive throughout the third act. There may be a little poetic imagery about crows and haircuts (page 66), but mostly we keep with the show to see if Koharu will stick to the plan and hope that this move is what's best for them.
The third act of the play holds the reader's attention in that it is the culmination of the plot; it holds the climax and the finale. The third act shows that Koharu feels nothing for anyone, whatever she pretends before this, by committing suicide with Jihei. The third act also holds the reader's attention with Jihei showing that he really does not care anything for his family or business, only for Koharu. In order to further, hold the readers’ interest by introducing us to Jihei’s brothers’ concern for Jihei’s son whom the family intends to use a way to lure Jihei back from insanity. Mainly, however, Jihei and Koharu’s machinations to be together and to commit suicide together despite the odds against them and the refusal of all of their acquaintances and relations to sanction their relationship hold the readers’ interest during the third act. Partly the reader’s interest is also held by the gruesome way in which Jihei murders Koharu, he cannot even do that correctly.
Before Jihei and Koharu even escape to Amijima, Mon’zaemon leaves little doubt that the two lovers will die. In addition to the title of the play, the chanter alludes to the imminence of death for Jihei and Koharu. When describing Jihei’s dirk in act two, the chanter says, “Buddha surely knows that tonight it will be stained with Koharu’s blood” (59). And as the servant in act three leaves the doorway of Koharu’s quarters, the chanter remarks that this action scatters “the seeds that before morning will turn Jihei and Koharu to dust” (61).Therefore, the climax of the work is not in the death of the lovers but the emotional turmoil depicted in the final act. Yet while Jihei and Koharu are the central characters in this act, Osan, who does not appear in this part of the play, is still a significant figure. Although Jihei and Koharu are preparing to leave their earthly existence and join each other as souls in the afterlife, Koharu’s thoughts and the reader’s attention return to Osan.
Koharu describes her unresolved relationship with Osan and the likelihood that she will blame her for the suicide. Readers are given a sense of the frustration that Osan experiences as her marriage is ruined. Jihei tries to remain composed and assuage Koharu’s remorse but he too begins “weeping so profusely that he cannot control the blade” (68). As part of the suicide, Jihei and Koharu must confront the thought of leaving relationships with others that are unresolved.
The difficulty for the two lovers is that they cannot easily escape “the inconstant world” and their “profane past” (66). These experiences dominate their psyches and Koharu still cannot refrain from thinking “it’s my fault!” (67). Throughout the play, readers are conscious of impending death. Yet the emotional energy of the final act is not a result of the character’s perceptions that death is an unknown state. Rather, apprehension about death arises from the irresolution and hardship that it leaves for those still alive.
The third act has a tight rope to tread in keeping the reader's attention, for the Chanter basically foretells the deaths of the lovers, saying "scattered at the doorway the seeds that before morning will turn Jihei and Koharu into dust" (61). With their fate basically assured to us in the very beginning of Act 3, the play challenges itself to keep the suspense taught even with the end already known. The dialogue between the lovers, full of questioning and relenting during their journey to die, confronts the challenge, at every turn casting doubt on the impending act and how the shadow of it will affect those they abandon for another world.
Another interesting element of suspense is the actual planning of the suicides at the very end. Usually hashing logistics isn't very interesting to listen in on, Koharu and Jihei figuring out their suicide is a special matter. Just them talking about the act, confronting it explicitly to each other's faces with minor details, carries inherent suspense with its unique circumstance. Every little decision they agree upon in those moments will determine the actual action of them dying later, and thus every word concerns us as readers. We hear the foretelling of the means of death by those who will die by there own hands, all while the suspense of waiting for the actual scene to end it all builds.
The very
The third ties everything together; it’s like the ending of a drama where the audience finds out what happens. After all of the excitement in the previous two acts where Koharu is constantly changing her mind as well as the action-packed second act where Jihei attacks Koharu. The third act is what gives us the conclusion of the story; it creates the suspense that the audience feels. The third act of the play acts as the climax, all of the events leading up to the suicide are the rising actions and as the scene progresses the suspense increases.
Following on from Dema's comment, especially his point about the inevitability of the suicide, I'm reminded of catharsis. Of course, when Aristotle introduced the idea of catharsis he was talking about Ancient Greek tragedy, but the term has become used much more broadly so I think it is fair. In Greek tragedy the tragedy is inevitable, just as it is in Amijima. It is also a release of emotional energy - it is the only time when they are honest with each other and express their feelings. They know that they are going to go through with it.
I thought they dealt with the irresolvability of their personal relations and pasts in an interesting way. It is done symbolically through their choice of location. At some point Jihei declares, "No matter how far we walk, there'll never be a spot marked "For Suicides." Let us kill ourselves here." (p. 66) It is true also, that there is never a time in a life that is marked "For Suicide". There are always obligations, relationships and considerations that mean it will never be a good time to commit suicide. Their solution is to accept it and to execute their plan as best they can given their abilities and circumstances (as an aside, I can forgive Jihei for not killing Koharu cleanly - he was a pretty poor paper merchant at best, not exactly a trained soldier).
The most charitable reading I can come up with towards Jihei is that this third act, for better or worse, is where he pulls himself together and goes through with his plan to be with the woman he loves. He can't do things as he should - "a mountain for one, a river for the other" - so he just decides to "pretend that the ground above this sluice gate is a mountain... I shall hang myself by this stream." (p. 66)
I agree with Vivian. When I read Act 3, I felt all the desperation and hopelessness Jihei and Koharu were feeling. It got exciting at the beginning of the Act, when Jihei was hiding from his brother and his brother was frantic with worry. When authors convey that strong of emotion, it is difficult for the audience to stop reading.
Act 3 is a total 180 from the previous acts, when the audience was unsure about the relationship between the two; was it real or was Koharu as heartless as Jihei believed?
As I mentioned before, the feelings the author conveys are difficult to ignore. "He whips out his dirk and slashes off his black locks at the base of the topknot...'I am a priest, unencumbered by wife, children...'" (III.68).
I thought this passage was the best for showing their hopelessness. They knew they were in a dilemma. They were not going to go to heaven, and they were going to leave people who had no way to care for themselves (Osan, Jihei's children, Koharu's mother). So Jihei wants to make both of themselves feel better by saying he is a new person because he has a new haircut, signifying that he is a monk.
In agreement with most of my classmates, the last act held my interest for the simple fact that I wanted to see the way that it was going to play out. We seen Koharu being detained and Jihei's wife telling him to go and help her because she got involved and didn't want to let her down as a woman. In my perspective this was a well planned out to throw a kind of curve ball into the storyline. I felt that Jihei wasn't going to go through with it, even after Koharu was trying to tell him to go back to his wife but they did. The ending gives you a sense of release because the author did a good job of setting up the ending with good and vivid scenes that didn't reveal the conclusion of the story.
In the third Act, similar to the emotions of other students we not only were excited about discovering how the play was going to end, but can agree that Act 3 was different than the other acts as Moon states, when the audience has a "speechless" sense as to the true feelings of the relationship between Jihei and Koharu.
In the third act, we see that Jihei is leaving for the trip to Kyoto. However, there happens to be relief when Jihei realizes that his brother is still trying to help him save his own life regardless of his ungrateful ways through the sitituation and all. I was surprised to even think that he is still going to go forth with the suicide and then this is where they end up leaving on their way to Amijima, at the Daicho Temple and I read the lines in the beginning of this act, "No matter how far we walk, there'll never be a spot marked "For Suicides." Let us kill ourselves here. These lines set the tone for what was about to occur although it gave me a sense of sympathy because it was a kind of sad ending to see two lovers actually going through a suiucide together despite the circumstances.
In conclusion, it seems that Koharu is questioning going through with the suicide but we are anxious to find out if its really going to go through with the plan because of whats seems to be best for both of them in the end.
The third act keeps the reader's interest because it is the climax or the high point of the story. It tells the reader how everything in the story relates to each other and completes the story. It is the conclusion and the reason you have been reading is finally realized. The main character's minds are finally made up and a decision is made.
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