Japanized Modern Dance “Bikkono Odori”(Crippled Dance) in Kawabata Yasunari’s <i>Waltz of Flowers</i>(1936)

Abstract

Kawabata Yasunari’s <i>Waltz of Flowers</i> (1936) is a novel that was originally a screenplay for a movie in which several popular female dancers were going to perform. Although the plan to make this film was abandoned, the screenplay of <i>Waltz of Flowers</i> is a good example of modernist work in the early Showa period, and the subsequent novel displays the crossover characteristics that result from combining film and dance with narrative fiction.</br>However, in previous research on Kawabata’s work little attention has been paid to <i>Waltz of Flowers</i>. Instead, much critical work has been done on <i>Snow Country</i> (1935), which was serialized at the same time, so it must be said that there is a bias in the history of this research. To redress this deficit, this paper firstly presents the critical literature on dance in the 1930s, and emphasizes the cultural context of modern dance, as a basis for reading <i>Waltz of Flowers</i>. In particular, it focuses on the three dance scenes in the novel：Suzuko and Hoshie’s duet at the beginning, Hoshie’s solo dance in the middle, and “Bikkono Odori” (crippled dance) near the end. The paper argues that “Bikkono Odori” was a form of Japanized modern dance which connected the styles of Japanese modern dancers in the 1930s.