ARTicles vol. 1 i.4: The Witch in the Woods

In the thousands of Japanese ghost stories compiled between the ninth and fourteenth centuries, some of the most dangerous and deceitful spirits are women. In some tales, a wronged or jealous female apparition returns from the dead to exact her revenge on an adulterous or murderous husband. In others, demons masquerade as comely mountain maidens or weeping women who lure traveling samurais, merchants, or monks into their deadly traps. Not all of these female ghosts are malevolent–a few are playful and others are even kind. But many of the phantasms and demons who take the shape of women are malicious or, at the very least, sexually manipulative spirits.

The woman in The Sound of a Voice is not an authentic Japanese oni (demon), but an amalgam of spirits and goblins that David Henry Hwang invented after reading Japanese ghost stories. (He was particularly influenced by Lafcadio Hearn’s Kwaidan, or “Weird Tales,” written in 1904.) She partly resembles the wily kitsune, or fox spirit, who tricks its human victims by toying with their sexual desire. The fox frequently transforms itself into a woman to seduce a wanderer in the forest. In his introduction to his Japanese Tales, Royall Tyler writes: “Foxes are famous in Japan for masquerading as beautiful women – so much so that if a man runs across a pretty girl alone, especially at twilight or in the evening, he is a fool if he does not suspect her of being a fox.”

Hwang’s woman in the woods is also derived from the Yama-onna, a demon that pretends to be a submissive, beautiful maiden who refuses food. When left alone, however, the Yama-onna opens a mouth on the back of her neck and devours rice balls, mackerel, and even human beings, if she catches them spying on her. Another source for the character is the tengu, a beaked mountain or forest goblin that can transform itself into a woman.

The Sound of a Voice also borrows some of its structure from the Japanese stories. In Hwang’s libretto, an aging samurai attempts to kill an infamous witch who is a source of fascination and detestation for the outside world. She lives in a remote corner of the forest, where she cultivates her exotic flowers and plays her shakuhachi–a Japanese bamboo flute. A recurring ghost story tells of a woodcutter or monk who discovers a splendid house and beautiful woman in the forest. She forbids the wanderer to look into her bedroom, but he inevitably peeks inside, only to find a hidden treasure that vanishes immediately or a pile of decaying corpses. In The Sound of a Voice, the samurai looks into the woman’s chamber twice. Both times he is devastated by what he sees.

Although Hwang was influenced by these stories, the differences between his libretto and the traditional tales are as intriguing as the similarities. “The woman in The Sound of a Voice is certainly influenced by Japanese stories about women who turn into foxes or evil spirits,” said the librettist in an interview for ARTicles. “But what makes this woman different from the Japanese character is that she confronts and is conscious of the perceptions people have of her. She’s also aware of how those perceptions oppress her. She is treated as if she has powers, so for all intents and purposes she is a witch. I suppose I created a metaphor for the way men and women relate to one another in general. We go into relationships with certain preconceptions, and often those preconceptions become somewhat self-fulfilled. So I suppose I’ve put a modern psychological and social spin on the traditional Japanese figure.”

Hwang’s ending also diverges from the familiar conclusions of the Japanese tales. In many of the witch-in-the-woods stories, the woman escapes by turning into a fox or bird, or attempts to destroy the man. In The Sound of a Voice, however, the transformation is more complicated. After the samurai looks into the woman’s chamber, he picks up the shakuhachi and attempts to play it. Has the woman finally managed to imprison him along with the rest of her visitors? Has she turned herself into one of the flowers she cared for so assiduously? Or has the samurai now become the witch in the woods, preparing to enchant future conquerors with the sound of the shakuhachi?

Ryan McKittrick is the A.R.T.’s Associate Dramaturg