- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- June 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780804759755
- eISBN:
- 9780804771061
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Stanford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.11126/stanford/9780804759755.003.0008
- Subject:
- Literature, World Literature
This chapter sums up the key findings of this study on the grotesque in setsuwa tales, which, it suggests, embodies the tensions between individuals and groups competing for power as well as between ...
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This chapter sums up the key findings of this study on the grotesque in setsuwa tales, which, it suggests, embodies the tensions between individuals and groups competing for power as well as between the dominant and the suppressed. It also argues that, unlike their western counterparts, the grotesque representations in setsuwa are connected to Buddhism and other Asian religions, and that they supplement the sense of beauty apparent in Japanese poetry, in Genji, and in other Japanese classics in which language regarding the body or bodily functions tends to be absent or indirect.Less
This chapter sums up the key findings of this study on the grotesque in setsuwa tales, which, it suggests, embodies the tensions between individuals and groups competing for power as well as between the dominant and the suppressed. It also argues that, unlike their western counterparts, the grotesque representations in setsuwa are connected to Buddhism and other Asian religions, and that they supplement the sense of beauty apparent in Japanese poetry, in Genji, and in other Japanese classics in which language regarding the body or bodily functions tends to be absent or indirect.
