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Basic Research into the Corpus
of Kabuki Playbills (banzuke) |
> Director
WADA Osamu
> Research Organization
| Researcher |
Affiliation |
| WADA Osamu |
Waseda University School of Letters, Arts and
Sciences Associate Professor |
| KANEKO Takeshi |
The Tsubouchi Memorial Theatre Museum Research
Assistant |
> The Objectives
of the Study
Kabuki playbills issued for productions during
the Tokugawa period can be classified into several different types,
including opening-of-the-season playbills (kaomise banzuke), street
playbills (tsuji banzuke), cast playbills (yakuwari banzuke), and
picture book playbills (ehon banzuke). Alternate versions of each
of these different types of playbills would be printed for each
production, and the complexity of the relations between them makes
it difficult to create a chronological chart of when all the playbills
appeared. The Theater Museum at Waseda University has a large collection,
but this is still only the tip of the iceberg. The first step toward
opening up the field of playbill studies is to gather and compare
the various playbills scattered in different locations. This is
the goal of our project.
> Studies
for This Year
The Center for Theatrical and Visual Research
in the Literature Department of Waseda University has a collection
of microfilm copies of playbills from many other institutions. We
have made it possible to search these playbills using handwritten
card catalogues. The digitalization of these data is an urgent task.
Considering our budget and the amount of time this project will
require, we cannot expect to realize our goal immediately. We hope
to start working towards it step by step, scanning and digitizing
the copied microfilm images and also transferring the card catalogue
into text data.
As we work on digitalizing the playbill collection, we will choose
a specific period to focus on and strive to clarify the complex
process by which these playbills were created, taking advantage
of the new searches that will become possible. We hope this comparative
study of various editions will provide a standard for the study
of playbills.
The results of our project will be released in a cooperative effort
with NII and Yagi Press. Most of the research for this project will
take place at the Center for Theatrical and Visual Research.
> Activity
Report
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