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Zeami's conception of freedom(5)

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     The existential as well as axiological status of our mind and body in our everyday mode of experience is ambiguous, and it is based on this ambiguity or bifurcation that "freedom of will" has been discussed. In light of this bifurcation, our body exists as something "heavy," resisting the dictates of our mind. However, the body gradually becomes "lighter" by the process of appropriating various techniques in such a way that its movement becomes autonomous, independent from the striving consciousness to achieve a "flower." To put it differently, the body as that which is perceived is gradually turned, as it were, into that which does the perceiving; that is, the body becomes a true initiator of action. The primordial identity between the mind and body is restored, resulting in a harmonization of the disparity that is
 


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p. 408

experienced in our everyday mode of existence. A practical demand for dissolving the ambiguous mode of our everyday existence is most acutely felt in the case of Noh drama where an intricate, spontaneous flow of the bodily movements accompanied by a graceful agility is essential for the expression of beauty. Obviously, this cannot be achieved if one were to think how to coordinate his body and mind during the time of performance. It has to be carried out "without thinking" [hishiryō p], as Dōgen might put it.35 It is an "identity of body―mind in action" [shin shin ichi  nyoq].36 If considered philosophically, the practical demand for dissolution of the preceding ambiguity, then, means the effecting of a transformation from the everyday mode of experience to the non-everyday mode of experience, through which a "harmonization" of the respective movements of the mind and body takes place. When this transformation is achieved fully, then, the body is no longer an object to be "ordered around" by the mind, but rather is completely appropriated through "training."

     In the foregoing, we have briefly described Zeami's theory of theatrical art insofar as it pertains to his notion of "training." We can now briefly represent its structure in the diagram below;

                  

                 C:the identity of body-mind in action

                

 

 

 

 

non-everyday mode of experience

                    

 

 

 

B : everyday mode of experience

 

         Zeami's Theory of Training
 

In this diagram the line AB represents an everyday mode of experience in which the existential and axiological status of the mind and body are not equal to each other and the respective functions of the mind and body are separated. We have seen that in the process of appropriation qua imitation, there occurs a transformation from the everyday mode of experience to the non-everyday mode of experience. This process is represented by the ascent from point A to point C. Indicated is an aspect of the bodily modalities that change by virtue of the training, that is, appropriation qua imitation. Along this line we can topographically indicate the different kinds of "flowers" relative to the degree of the achievement of the actor's performing techniques, such as "timely
 


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P.409
 

flower' and "temporary flower." Also, the nine artistic ranks" can be plotted along this line. When the ascending movement reaches the apex C, an actor is said to have achieved the ultimate state of expression, the "true flower." Prior to this point, what distinguishes different kinds of "flowers" is the degree of perfection of the performing techniques, that is, a process of appropriation qua imitation with the "style without mastery."

     A realization of the "true flower" as the ideal of Noh cannot be preceded, according to Zeami's reflection upon his own experience, by a relative degree of achievement of performing techniques. He says: