Transformations of Love Suicide Plays in Modern Kabuki: Okamoto Kidō's Adaptations and Creations

This study examines six of Okamoto Kidō's love suicide plays (shinjūmono) from Minowa no shinjū (1911) to Miedo shinjū (1922), in order to clarify how he constructed new forms of kabuki (Shin kabuki) suited to the modern era. The distinguishing features of Kidō's love suicide plays lie in his choice of unconventional subjects that diverged from typical shinjū incidents, while still retaining the factualist style of earlier drama and incorporating traditional jōruri music. Furthermore, in his representation of female protagonists, Kidō portrayed both idealized and pessimistic images of women in modern society. He also departed from the early modern Buddhist notion of the afterlife by depicting shinjū not as the consummation of love, but as a means of escaping reality, and presented events with an air of objective detachment rather than sympathetic identification. Through this balance of tradition and innovation, Kidō's love suicide plays contributed to easing the canonization of modern kabuki.