Professor Elizabeth Oyler gives audiences an introduction to the kuruma ningyo form and the background that inspired the production.

Elizabeth Oyler is Associate Professor of pre-modern Japanese Literature at the University of Pittsburgh. Her research is motivated by a fascination with the way historical and cultural memory are represented in literature and performing arts from Japan’s medieval period, particularly the fifteenth century. She is currently working on a book-length study of Noh drama, specifically how the staging of a set of plays by early playwrights simultaneously codify and undermine spaces of the poetic and social landscapes of the early fifteenth-century.

This engagement of Hachioji Kuruma Ningyo Puppet Company and Tom Lee is made possible in part through the ArtsCONNECT program of Mid Atlantic Arts with support from the National Endowment for the Arts, and Japan Iron and Steel Federation and Mitsubishi Endowments at the University of Pittsburgh.

Kappa 河童 Sponsors

John F. and Nancy L. Oyler Charitable Trust

AKUTAGAWA is supported by Arts Council Tokyo (Tokyo Metropolitan Foundation for History and Culture) and The Osaka Community Foundation / anonymous fund No.22.