In Western countries puppetry is a form of entertainment aimed at children. From Punch and Judy to the Muppets, Western puppet theater has been small scale, emphasizing broad, slapstick humor and simple, if any, plots.

A scene from "Keisei Awa no Naruto"

In Japan, however, puppetry has always been a serious form of drama, with roots in religious observances and a long history of mutual influences with live-actor drama. The bunraku puppet plays of Osaka have become known around the world, and as every student of Japanese drama knows, many of Japan's greatest plays were written first for the puppet stage.

The word "bunraku" itself is relatively recent, derived from the 19th-century theatrical producer Uemura Bunrakuken, whose Bunraku-za was the most important Osaka puppet theater. More generally known as ningyo joruri, puppet theater has a number of folk traditions scattered around the country, local variations descended from the itinerant puppeteer troupes who played at planting and harvest festivals in past centuries.

The oldest such tradition, it is generally agreed, is that of Awaji, the large island which faces Osaka and closes off Osaka Bay from the Inland Sea. Awaji takes pride in its local puppet tradition as the source of all the rest. More than 40 theaters are reported to have been in operation there in the 18th century; they dwindled to 14 in the Meiji Era, then to three just before World War II, and the art looked likely to die out altogether (like so many other Japanese arts) in the postwar chaos.

Local patriotism came to the rescue. The Awaji Ningyo Kyokai (Awaji Puppetry Association) was formed, and as a result of their efforts, in 1971 Awaji puppetry was formally designated a National Intangible Folk-Cultural Resource by the Agency for Cultural Affairs. Today it is performed daily at the Awaji Ningyo Joruri-kan in Fukura, overlooking the new Naruto Ohashi Bridge.

As with most such things, the beginnings of Awaji puppetry are obscure and difficult to document. It is clear that in the 16th century Awaji saw a rapid development of puppetry as a local specialty, and in the 17th and 18th centuries the island was the main source of puppeteers for both the Osaka theaters and the traveling troupes.

Puppeteer Hironosuke Yoshida

Awaji tradition assigns its origins to the Ebisu Shrine in Ninomiya, Hyogo Prefecture, where a priest named Dokunbo performed puppet dances for the entertainment of the jolly divinity Ebisu. After Dokunbo's death a number of natural disasters occurred, and local people, supposing the god's disappointment to be responsible, engaged a traveling puppeteer named Momodayu to carry on Dokunbo's art. Momodayu took the puppet performance to other Ebisu shrines, and while on tour in Awaji married a local girl and thereafter made the island his base. This tradition is commemorated by statues of Dokunbo and Momodayu at the Sanjo Hachiman Shrine.

Momodayu's son Judayu, a puppeteer of genius, played before Emperor Ogimachi and the warlord Hideyoshi, and was granted the family name of Uemura by Imperial patent, a name that became synonymous with puppetry. Subsequently the Hachisuka lords of Tokushima, whose domains included Awaji Island, gave official support to the art, a branch of which survives in Tokushima today, though the administration of the island has shifted to Hyogo Prefecture.

The development of Awaji puppetry has proceeded in parallel with Osaka's. What were originally small puppets manipulated from out of sight below the stage grew in size; the black-clad puppeteer emerged into view, and by the mid-18th century each puppet, by now quite large, was manipulated by three puppeteers, while the story was narrated by a Gidayu-bushi singer accompanied by a thick-necked shamisen.

The Awaji puppets do nonetheless have some differences from their Osaka colleagues. Awaji puppetry, as a folk art patronized by villagers, was frequently performed at outdoor stages in village festivals, where distraction and noise were a problem. The better to hold the audience's attention, Awaji's puppets came to be somewhat larger than Osaka's, and their gestures and poses more exaggerated and emphatic. Moreover, certain plays which have dropped from the repertory in Osaka are still performed in Awaji.

The problem of succession, of carrying on the old arts into the future, dogs every branch of Japanese art. Awaji puppetry is no exception, but the answer they have found should be a model for the entire country.

Through the vigorous activity of the Awaji Ningyo Kyokai, both the puppetry itself and the joruri narration are taught as school club activities in the island's public schools. From elementary school through middle and high school, dozens of students take part, learning to sing, to play the shamisen, to manipulate the puppets or work the stage properties.

The young full-time professionals who perform daily at the Ningyo Joruri-kan in Fukura are, indeed, all graduates of these school programs. Beyond this hard core, however, the members of the school clubs all acquire an appreciation for the art, a familiarity with its conventions and subtleties, and a sense of commitment to its continuation. Many keep up their practice as adult amateurs, winning master's diplomas as Gidayu singers or players. They provide support for the school clubs in organizing and fundraising.

The result is that that one remaining professional theater with its typical daily audiences of incurious, uninformed tourists (for whose benefit an explanatory lecture precedes each performance) is not the real heart of Awaji ningyo joruri, important though it is.

The real heart of this real folk art is the young players of the school clubs, whose regular appearances at school fairs and town festivals, hospitals and retirement homes and other informal venues are guaranteed to find every seat filled with enthusiastic listeners -- patrons who grew up with this art themselves and appreciate every nuance.

If the Awaji experience could be duplicated in all Japan's school districts, there might be hope for Japanese performing arts yet.