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Aesthetic terminology
Zeami and Zenchiku describe a number of distinct qualities that are thought to
be essential to the proper understanding of Noh as an art form.
* Hana (花, flower): the true Noh performer seeks to cultivate a rarefied
relationship with his audience similar to the way that one cultivates flowers.
What is notable about hana is that, like a flower, it is meant to be appreciated
by any audience, no matter how lofty or how coarse his upbringing. Hana comes in
two forms. Individual hana is the beauty of the flower of youth, which passes
with time, while "true hana" is the flower of creating and sharing perfect
beauty through performance.
* Yūgen (幽玄): an aesthetic term used to describe much of the art of the 13th and
14th centuries in Japan, but used specifically in relation to Noh to mean the
profound beauty of the transcendental world, including mournful beauty involved
in sadness and loss.
* Kokoro or shin (both 心): among the most difficult of the conceptual elements
of Noh, kokoro describes the internal state of mind in which the self is thought
to be both formless and total. It appears to be related to the more mainstream
Japanese notion of mushin.
* Rōjaku (老弱): the final stage of performance development of the Noh actor, in
which as an old man he eliminates all unnecessary action or sound in his
performance, leaving only the true essence of the scene or action being
imitated.
* Myō (妙): the "charm" of an actor who performs flawlessly and without any sense
of imitation; he effectively becomes his role.
* Monomane (物真似, imitation or mimesis): the intent of a Noh actor to accurately
depict the motions of his role, as opposed to purely aesthetic reasons for
abstraction or embellishment. Monomane is sometimes contrasted with yūgen,
although the two represent endpoints of a continuum rather than being completely
separate.
* Kabu-isshin (歌舞一心, "song-dance-one heart"): the theory that the song
(including poetry) and dance are two halves of the same whole, and that the Noh
actor strives to perform both with total unity of heart and mind.
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