The search for the rising sun: Nationalism, national identity and the post-war Japanese stage (Mishima Yukio, Satoh Makoto, Simizu Kunio)

This dissertation, prepared toward completion of a PhD in Theatre and Performance Studies at the University of Pittsburgh examines issues of nationalism and national identity as they appeared in the dramatic literature of selected post-World War II Japanese playwrights. The authors under consideration include Mishima Yukio, Satoh Makoto and Shimizu Kunio. These writers were selected due to their shared concern with issues of nationalism and identity in post-war Japan. The post-war period has been a time of great social upheaval in Japan, with the presence of an occupying force, the Cold War and the growth of the economic bubble creating new societal pressures and forcing many Japanese to question the constructs which created their identity as "Japanese." Discussions of Japanese nationalism invariably illustrate numerous interactions and cultural appropriations between Japan and other nations, especially China and the West. This dissertation examines selected theories of the role of culture in the manufacture of nationalism and identity as well as the application of these theories to the historical construction of Japanese nationality. Theatre is a vehicle of cultural nationalist thought, as it both reflects and promotes the author's idea of the nation. The three playwrights studied here represent a variety of responses to the issues of theatre and nationality; these responses range from a desire to return to the Emperor to a desire to escape from nationalism altogether. Mishima, Satoh and Shimizu's dramatic responses to the issue of nationalism illustrate the great diversity of theatrical writing on the subject. This dissertation involves the study of Japanese dramatic literature through textual and historical discourse, literary and performance theory, critics observations as well as interviews with playwrights, critics and theatre directors.