Innocence in Madness, Common Denominator in East and West
This essay serves to delineate the connection between Kikuchi Kan’s The Madman on the Roof with William Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night and Hamlet by comparing the theme of madness and how this thematic convention comes into play in both Western and Eastern drama. This study specifically focuses on the characterization of madness within Yoshitaro, Malvolio, and Ophelia by discussing how it functions both similarly and differently in each one of them. Shakespeare uses madness in his tragedies to portray clarity and reason in a corrupt and chaotic universe — common in portrayals of Ophelia and Yoshitaro — while baseless joy is also confounded by a state of insanity in Malvolio and Yoshitaro. Therefore, Yoshitaro’s identity includes similarities to both Ophelia and Malvolio, which may explain Shakespearean theatre’s influence on Meiji Japan, a period when Kikuchi flourished as a playwright.
The specific route of influence from Europe to Japan occurred during the Meiji Japan period which started in the late 1800s until the 1910s “after the Meiji Restoration and the opening of Japan to the west, [and] the Japanese theatre underwent a series of transformations” (Wetmore 179). These ‘transformations’ developed a new theatre genre in Japan called shingeki through a constant effort from “key translators of Shakespeare and the advocate of using literature as a means to develop new drama” (Wetmore 180). The exact time period of this process is “1887–1928 [for] the establishment of modern theatre”, and Kikuchi’s The Madman on the Roof applies to this era since it was written in 1916 (Wetmore 180). “[A]s a militarized nation moved rightward politically, leftist theatre artists grew more vocal, eventually being viewed as dangerous and finally coming under government censorship” (Wetmore 180). Such a historical shift in Japan describes Kikuchi’s own political stance in the face of national change as identified by his protagonist, the ‘Madman’ Yoshitaro. According to a theatre review of The Madman on the Roof, ‘Blood, Love, and Madness,’ Yoshitaro is described as “a mad boy, a free thinker who sits on the roof motionless and without shame” who acts against the traditional status quo that dominates Japan from the past, which is represented by the Priestess who “ fakes spiritual channeling in her attempt to cure the boy of his madness” (Graham 251–252). By setting a clear distinction between good and evil through the juxtaposition of Yoshitaro and Suejiro, Kikuchi sets a clear distinction between what is right and wrong for Japan’s future and path to modernization. While the brothers, Yoshitaro and Suejiro, represent the voice of reason, the Priestess stands for Japanese rightist conservatism — the status quo that must be altered.
Despite the oddity of his personality, there is a sense of purity and innocence in Yoshitaro as he exclaims that “[t]he priest of the Konpira God is dancing in the clouds… [d]ancing with an angel in pink robes” (Kikuchi 60). Out of all the characters in The Madman on the Roof, Yoshitaro is closest to nature and speaks in natural imageries, his own selective way of communicating with the Konpira God. In this sense, he is similar to Ophelia since she also speaks her mind through floral language when describing the tragic corruption of the Danish court: “There’s rosemary, that’s for remembrance: pray, love, remember: and there are pansies, that’s for thoughts” (“Hamlet” 4.4.184–186). While Kikuchi’s universe is poisoned by the Priestess’ superstition and cruelty, a manifestation of the stubbornness in harmful yet unchanging values in Japanese tradition, Shakespeare’s world in Hamlet is plagued by the sins of the older generation, such as Claudius’ murder and usurpation.
The conflict between the older and younger generation permeates both plays, while the sins of the older generation suggest having caused lunacy in certain members of the younger generation. Yoshitaro’s father, Gisuke, remembers how he “killed every monkey on the island” which forces him to believe that “the monkey spirit is working in [Yoshitaro]” (Kikuchi 61–62). On the other hand, Ophelia’s delusions are triggered by a series of killings when her lover murders her father, which in turn has been initiated by Claudius’ original murder of Hamlet Sr. Yoshitaro and Ophelia's struggle to remain pure in such dire conditions is portrayed as madness from a societal perspective.
The distinction between sanity and insanity is highly ambiguous in both plays since the Priestess’ method to “[h]ang Yoshitaro up on the branch of a tree and purify him with the smoke of green pine-needles” is not completely sane and logical either as questioned by Yoshitaro’s mother: “It is too cruel, even if it is the command of the God” (Kikuchi 69). Rather than judging Yoshitaro and Ophelia’s craziness in a negative light, their creators, Kikuchi and Shakespeare, shed a sympathetic light on them. Instead of rebuking their eldest Son, Yoshitaro’s parents’ reaction to his antics verge more on genuine concern than contempt and shame. As for Ophelia, Horatio mentions that “[h]er mood will needs be pitied”, and even her brother, Laertes, who is usually in a tempestuous mood speaks gently with compassion towards her: “Dear maid, kind sister, sweet Ophelia!” (“Hamlet” 4.4.3,168). As a result, the tender perception of supposedly sane characters towards the insane ones allows the “offstage audience to respond to [Ophelia and Yoshitaro] as an emblem of… grief” (Bloom).
While Yoshitaro is similar to Ophelia in personality, the situation he is faced with reminds us of Malvolio’s traumatic experiences in Twelfth Night. There is a certain incomparable bliss shared between Yoshitaro and Malvolio in their skewed perception of reality. Yoshitaro may be insane, but according to Suejiro’s insight, “as long as [Yoshitaro] can climb up on the roof, he is happy from morning till night. There is no one in the whole country as happy as he is” (Kikuchi 72). In the case of Malvolio, he remarks, “I thank my stars, I am happy. I will be strange, stout, in yellow stockings, and cross-gartered,” as a reply to Maria’s forged letter that depicts Olivia’s adoration for Malvolio which initiates his series of eccentric actions (“Twelfth Night” 2.5). Therefore, Yoshitaro’s happiness is dependent on his insanity, as much as Malvolio’s glee can only prevail through the false belief that Olivia is in love with him.
Moreover, madness is perceived as being possessed by “evil spirits”, repeatedly emphasized by the Priestess when she justifies her torture to Yoshitaro: “It is the voice of the fox within him. And it is only the fox that suffers”(Kikuchi 61, 70). The same logic is applied by Malvolio’s antagonizers since they “have him in the dark room and bound”, which is condoned because “all the devils of hell [are] drawn in little, and Legion himself possessed him” (“Twelfth Night” 3.4). The demonization of the insane is a repetitive thematic device used in both Western and Eastern drama, and Kikuchi, influenced by Shakespeare, opposes such barbaric and illogical deeds. Both writers are similar in their opinion that those who are psychologically different from the majority should not be dealt with the insidious facade of healing since it is pure torment for the receiver. Suejiro conveys this message by declaring: “If [Yoshitaro] were cured, he would be conscious of being crippled, and would be the most miserable man in the country”, and his claim is proven to be correct in Shakespeare’s parallel universe of Twelfth Night since Malvolio, once he realizes the ugly truth that Olivia’s adoration was all a delusion, spews out in anger: “I’ll be reveng’d on the whole pack of you!” (Kikuchi 72) (“Twelfth Night” 5.1). Yoshitaro is granted a happy ending, graciously granted by Kikuchi because his madness is based on different means from Malvolio. “Malvolio… directs his indulgence outward to gratify his ego, and to expand his ego-centered world” while Yoshitaro’s character trait is not based upon “selfishness” for “the estate of [his] family” (Krieger 24) (Kikuchi 72–73). Malvolio foolishly desires to become “Count Malvolio”, an impossible aspiration, when Yoshitaro’s wants are plausible and have already been attained because all he desires is to share a deep connection to his God (“Twelfth Night” 2.5).
To sum up, it is not absolutely certain that Kikuchi has read Hamlet and Twelfth Night, but knowing the fact that “[t]he boundary between New Drama that was established at the end of Meiji period (about 1910) and traditional Noh and Kabuki plays is clear”, it is reasonable to assume that Western influence, particularly that of Shakespeare, has shaped Kikuchi’s characterization style as a modern playwright (Kojima 107). “Japanese New Drama rarely introduced a fateful tragedy whose theme derived from mythology and legends, [and since] [s]uch a theme was considered suitable only for Noh or Kabuki plays”, Kikuchi, as a shingeki writer, may have focused on characterizing the sympathetic lives of common folk instead of divine, mythological individuals by deriving traits from Shakespeare’s relatable, victimized characters such as Ophelia and Malvolio (Kojima 107).