Sheppard Ranbom is a poet and writer whose latest book, The Love Suicides at Takayama, is now available from Finishing Line Press.
Thoughts on Writing
The Love Suicides
at Takayama
A budding foreign playwright returns to Japan for one last attempt to free his Japanese artist girlfriend from seclusion in a farming village near the mountain resort of Takayama. To rescue Kimiko, the playwright Daniel Singer enlists a well-known film director and a high-spirited character actress to serve as go-betweens. But the pretext for the gathering at the Miyagawa’s home is no pretext: they are working on a f ilm script about doomed lovers called The Love Suicides at Takayama. The couple have no peace and no privacy until the final scene where they follow the rituals of love suicide to its liberating end. A take-off on the double suicide, domestic tragedy plays of Japan’s most revered playwright, The Love Suicides at Takayama is a screwball comedy, a type of cinema known for its farcical situations and fast-paced dialogue that, in this case, satirizes courtship and social dynamics in Japan.
Read the Foreword
Advance Praise for The Love Suicides at Takayama
“Sheppard Ranbom has crafted a fascinating play set in contemporary Japan that echoes Chikamatsu Monzaemon’s (1653-1725) dramas of the early 18th century,” says professor C. Andrew Gerstle, author of Chikamatsu: Five Late Plays and other books. “The dialogue is witty and engaging; the plot is realistic and ends with a surprising twist. Kimiko—caught in a web of conflicting demands—and Daniel—self-aware and frustrated that he cannot be with her—add modern, psychological and irreverent elements to the domestic tragedy,” says Gerstle, professor emeritus at the University of London.