The Emergence of Japanese Literature (Fourth Draft) - With a Focus on Religious Exposition

How did ritual words become literature? In this searching essay, Orikuchi Shinobu traces a path from the speech of gods and blessings for life and harvest to the songs, gestures, and narratives carried by traveling performers.

Court liturgies, ancient poems, village rites, and Okinawan practices illuminate the connections between sacred visitors, female mediums, divination, mimetic dance, and puppets. Orikuchi then asks how wandering performers disseminated epics and how inherited narratives were reshaped around named people and events, sometimes acquiring the appearance of history.

First published across three volumes of Nihon Bungaku Kōza in 1927, The Emergence of Japanese Literature (Fourth Draft) presents an influential strand of Japanese folklore scholarship. This complete English translation preserves all five major divisions, twenty-six numbered sections, and the physical lines of verse quotations. Detailed notes explain ritual terms, historical names, recovered Japanese readings, and the author’s uncertain or disputed claims. AI-assisted translation.