159 Church Street

Mobile, Alabama

Nov. 25th

Dear Ezra;--

Please don't get discouraged at the ragged way
this manuscript is coming to you. As I said yesterday,
it will all get there in time,--which is the most important
thing.

For instance, chronologically, the lectures taken down
hastily by my husband, from old Umēwaka Minoru are so rough,
and so many abbreviations are used, that I can't send them
until I have time to make quite copious notes to help you
understand. It is going to be something of a puzzle, at
best.

In these notes the initials, "U. M" are constantly
used. Sometimes they are put "M. U.", for, to this day the
Japanese are a little undecided whether to place the family
name first, according to their own custom, or last. In
any case, whenever you see these initials together they mean
the old lecturer. He was brought up in the last Shōgun's
court, and comes from a long line of famous Nō players.
He had all the costumes, masks, literature and traditions.
I had thought, if ever I attempted editing the book, to be-
gin it with this personal note of old U. M. and the Profes-
sor. (Whenever I say "Professor" I mean E. F. F., )
He had two beautiful young sons,--whether real or adopted I
am not sure, but that doesn't matter in Japan. The son who
is adopted for reasons of fitness, talent, and capability of
carrying on an artistic tradition is considered more real
than a son who is merely of the flesh. All the great ar-
tists of old times adopted successors this way.

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These sons, also very often referred to in the notes, and
in the studies of the Nōh plays, were Manzaburo Umēwaka
and Takeyo Umēwaka. Both were beautiful,--the former, a
tall and rather stout youth, did not look unlike a picture
of a cavalier by Franz Hals, and the younger, our teacher in
the singing of Nōh, was more like a soulful and very handsome
East Indian poet than a Japanese. I hope I come across
a photograph of him, but I haven't yet. However I have an
excellent one of the old Umēwaka to send.

I shall go over these notes of his lectures, and wherever
you see new ink writing you will know that I put it.

I must explain at more length the recurring term "cats".
This would surely be a puzzler. At the back of the stage
in many,--in fact most, of the pieces, there are always two
queer old, old musicians that come in with funny little fold-
ing stools, sit facing each other for a moment, and then
turn themselves and the stools so that they face the audience.

They have weird little drums, and at intervals, during the
perfromance, they utter the most astonishing sounds, suppres-
sed wails, throaty gurgles, and muted banshee howls. These
sounds are more like the noises of back-yard fence cats
than anything else on earth, and the Professor and I got
into the way of calling them "cats". I didn't realize that
he had accepted the term seriously enough to put it all
through the notes. In rare cases there are sometime four
cats, or even more; but, as I remember it, always there were
two. I don't believe they were ever used in the comic
interludes, or "Kiyogen". You will see also frequent
reference to "Mr. H." This always means little Mr. Hirata
a pupil of my husband's, who always went to the Nōh perfor-
mances with us, and did the translations. I don't think

3

much of his literary style. Neither will you. I should
suggest that the examples you wish to present in full
should be taken only from those pieces where the Professor
has written out the Japanese words too, and given the liter-
al translation.

Please remember, from the first, that when-
ever I say "suggest", I mean just that thing, and nothing
more stringent. What I am hoping is that you will become
really interested in the material, absorb it in your own
way, and then make practically new translations from the
Japanese text as rendered into Romanji. It seems going
ahead of myself a little, but I might as well tell you the
Nōh pieces that have seemed to us most beautiful. I think
that first I would place "Kinuta" Old U. M. considered
it so, and also said that it took nearly a life-time, and
much prayer and fasting, to learn to sing properly. Another
that the Professor specially loved was "Nishi ki gi ".
"Yōroboshi was the first I heard, really to understand, and I
care a lot for it. "Hagoromo" is perhaps the favorite of
all, with the average Japanese Nōh lover, and is a legend
strangely like the old Celtic one of the mermaid who had her
magic sea-garments stolen by a mortal. "Sumidagawa" is
another wonder. Most, if not all of these, are carefully
translated.

This is a big enough dose for one day.
When you get into it, please don't hesitate to ask me ques-
tions. I only wish I were there with you and Yeats, working
on it. I am homesick for London already.

Mary Finvelosa