From: "Preston Foerder" <preston-AT-pfpuppetry.com>
Subject: Re: PUPT: Re: Puppet types: names, + Lexicon of puppetry terms
Date: Tue, 5 Aug 2003 14:02:09 -0400


I, myself, use the term bunraku-style with no shame whatsoever.  I add the
style to indicate that it is not actual bunraku.  In my mind it refers to a
puppet visually manipulated (or a vue for our francophone friends) from
behind.  I, personally, don't like the term table-top. We don't refer to
floor-surface puppets or playboard-top puppets or floating-in-air puppets.
So there.

Referring to the message below, I have also recently met a Japanese
puppeteer who told me that Bunraku is actually the name of the particular
theater building in which that company performs and not the style of
puppetry.  So the English equivalent would be doing New Victory puppetry or
Loew's puppetry.   She actually couldn't tell me what the word was for the
style of puppet besides puppet.

Besides, I believe, that we, as Americans, have the god-given right to
bastardize anyway else's culture for our own immoral purposes (namely
puppetry).

Preston

----- Original Message -----
From: "Andrew Periale" <perryalley-AT-rscs.net>
To: <puptcrit-AT-lists.village.Virginia.EDU>
Sent: Monday, August 04, 2003 5:21 PM
Subject: Re: PUPT: Re: Puppet types: names, + Lexicon of puppetry terms


> On a mildly ironic note, I have crossed paths on a number of occasions
> with Japanese who were not puppeteers, and who spoke very little
> English. In trying to communicate with them about puppetry I used the
> word "bunraku" and got only quizzical looks, but when I said "ningyo
> joruri," they knew instantly what I was talking about. We forget (or are
> unaware) that bunraku refers to the theatre and is not a description of
> the type of pupptery it employs.
>
> A.
>
>
>
>
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