"Life is a lying dream, he only wakes who casts the world aside." — Zeami Motokiyo (1363-1443)
The theater par excellence of "the world cast aside" is noh. Its roots are in 14th-century Japan. Its greatest practitioner — as writer, performer and theorist — is said to have been Zeami Motokiyo, who wrote, "A man's life has an end, but there is no end to the pursuit of noh."
Stately, stylized noh arose from primitive, rollicking ancestors — sarugaku (monkey music) and dengaku (rural music). Two qualities in particular define it: yūgen (mystery) and monomane (imitation).
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