In Kabuki Drama
Ishikawa Goemon is the subject of many classic kabuki plays. The only one still in performance today is Kinmon Gosan no Kiri (The Golden Gate and the Paulownia Crest), a five-act play written by Namiki Gohei in 1778. The most famous act is "Sanmon Gosan no Kiri" ("The Temple Gate and the Paulownia Crest") in which Goemon is first seen sitting on top of the Sanmon gate at Nanzen-ji. He is smoking an over-sized silver pipe called a kiseru and exclaims "The spring view is worth a thousand gold pieces, or so they say, but 'tis too little, too little. These eyes of Goemon rate it worth ten thousand!". Goemon soon learns that his father, a Chinese man named So Sokei, was killed by Mashiba Hisayoshi (a popular kabuki alias for Hideyoshi) and he sets off to avenge his father's death.
He also appears in the famous tale of the Forty-seven Ronin, first staged also in 1778. In 1992, Goemon appeared in the kabuki series of Japanese postage stamps.
Read more about this topic: Ishikawa Goemon
Famous quotes containing the word drama:
“We live between two worlds; we soar in the atmosphere; we creep upon the soil; we have the aspirations of creators and the propensities of quadrupeds. There can be but one explanation of this fact. We are passing from the animal into a higher form, and the drama of this planet is in its second act.”
—W. Winwood Reade (1838–1875)