Kabuki

From the tourists who rated the Japanese pavillion one of the most impressive buildings at the 1964-1965 New York World's Fair, to the jet-setter flying to Fujiyama for the week-end, to the G.I. on furlough in a Tokyo he finds more exciting than New York, Americans by the thousands are rediscovering Japan - its people, traditions, and art. One of the most vivid impressions a Westerner takes away with him is of the immensely rich and varied Japanese theatre, whether it is the classic, aristocratic Noh drama, the Bunraku puppet theatre, or the Kabuki, the theatre of the people. Of these three forms of drama, it is the Kabuki which is most readily understood, for Kabuki is the popular theatre, with a repertory of plays based on actual history, portraying the lives of the people and the values they live by, in scenes of brilliant theatricality.