Kamishibai

Kamishibai demonstrator in Tokyo 2011

Kamishibai ( Japanese 紙 芝 居 'paper theater' ) is a Japanese paper theater or "fairy tale picture showcase on the street".

overview

The origins of the Kamishibai can be found among the Buddhist wandering monks of the 10th century. They used the method of picture-assisted storytelling with picture scrolls ( emaki ) to spread Buddhist teachings. The form of Kamishibai known today developed into a popular culture of the Japanese prewar period . The demonstrators of the Kamishibai tell with short texts about changing pictures that are pushed into a stage-like frame. The texts and images are specially developed for this narrative form .

This form of public theater arose at the beginning of the 20th century. Candy sellers rode bicycles through the villages and towns. A wooden frame was attached to the luggage rack in which they placed the story boards to tell their stories. Kamishibai is a wooden stage model for guided sociable storytelling in which a child-oriented story is presented in a scenic sequence of images. The performances were free of charge, the narrator earned his living by selling sweets.

After the Pacific War , until 1953 when television was first broadcast, there were about 10,000 Kamishibai narrators and five million viewers daily in Japan. In Tokyo, there were over twenty companies producing Kamishibai images in the late 1940s and early 1950s. For example, Sanpei Shirato and Shigeru Mizuki worked in such companies; both later became well-known comic artists. Mizuki's best known work, Ge Ge Ge no Kitarō , is based on a Kamishibai piece that was popular in the 1930s.

literature

• Ellen Rudolph: The smallest theater in the world. In: Die Grundschulzeitschrift, 22 (2008) 218/219, pp. 36–39
• Elvira Wrensch: Kamishibai. Storytelling, reading and playing with a Japanese picture theater. In: The primary school magazine, issue 12/2011, pp. 24-27
• Holm Schüler: Language skills through Kamishibai . Dortmund: Verlag KreaShibai.de ​​4th expanded edition 2018. ISBN 978-3-00-028118-1 .
• Stephan Köhn: Traditions of visual storytelling in Japan. A paradigmatic investigation of the lines of development from the folding screen to the narrative manga. Harrassowitz Verlag, Wiesbaden 2005, ISBN 978-3-447-05213-9 .
• Gruschka, Helga: My Kamishibai. Don Bosco Verlag, ISBN 978-3-7698-1957-1 .
• Allen Say (text and illustration), Gabriela Bracklo (translation into German): Der Kamishibai-Mann , Edition Bracklo 2015

Web links

Commons : Kamishibai  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Wiktionary: Kamishibai  - explanations of meanings, word origins, synonyms, translations

• Yasunoshiki kamishibai. 国際 紙 芝 居 協会 , July 28, 2010, accessed December 13, 2012 (Japanese). 
• Discover Kamishibai - Traditional Story Cards. Kamishibai for Kids, accessed December 13, 2012 . 
• Kamishibai narrative theater in language and reading promotion. Retrieved November 23, 2016 . 
• Stephan Köhn: Japan as image (er) culture. Narrative traditions between visual narrativity and narrative visuality. Retrieved November 23, 2016 . 

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Schinzinger, Robert; Yamamoto, Akira; Nanbara, Noboru (ed.): Dictionary of the German and Japanese languages, Sanshusha 1980. S. 483.
2. ↑ The Kamishibai Paper Theater , description of structure and use.
3. ↑ Kamishibai as a form of visual and active storytelling
4. ↑ ^{a b c} Frederik L. Schodt: Manga! Manga! The World of Japanese Comics . P. 62.
5. ↑ Jaqueline Berndt : Phenomenon Manga . edition q, Berlin 1995. p. 66. ISBN 3-86124-289-3 .