Re: "Usagi to Kame"

It seems to me I heard somewhere that Bart Mathias wrote in article
<_82dnXlfnLHBYEnYnZ2dnUVZ_r2onZ2d@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>:

Don Kirkman wrote:
[...]
A short stint on Google was almost frightening--should we let our
kiddies sing songs like kagome kagome!!?? One opinion was that it
belongs to a genre of death songs, and that the imagery is of
spontaneous abortion. The "at the dawn's twilight" didn't get explained
very clearly, though.

A more interesting and IMO better thought out explanation (and a long
detailed one)

Yes! Wow! Did you notice it is even longer than some of the B.
Ito--Cindy exchanges?

I did indeed. I cheated and skipped around within the text until your
response forced me to really read it. :-).

I got so pooped reading it that I haven't found the energy to look up a
word I didn't know. What is オカルティックな(面)?

I'm willing to defer to Mr.Ito's suggestion on this one; nothing better
comes to mind and my memory is forty years out of date for Japanese
idiom. The best I could guess from random Google hits (including their
translations) is mysterious, spooky, eerie, unexplained, and--in one
translated article, "sixth sense." Usage included discussions of deaths
of famous people, imagery and poesy, and "occult scientists."

connects it to fun and games and more, the more being
related to rituals and ceremonies centering around Jizo. The page is
interesting material for the language student as well as for the
folklorist. And it does have the advantage of a good discussion of the
sunrise, sunset puzzel.
http://avantgarde0721.gozaru.jp/kagomekagome.htm

Now, if someone would just explain for my benefit what a crane and a
turtle have to do with either bird cages or blind man's buff. It must
somehow be related to their seemingly sempiternal life span--and could
they in fact be appropriate for songs about death and Jizo? :-)

I'm not looking up "sempiternal" until I rest awhile either.

Maybe I read too quickly, but I thought the turkle and crane were
explained as post-kuchiyose era changes.

That's probably among the parts I either skimmed or skipped. I may
return to it in earnest some day. (As it turns out, I'm making a stab
at it as I consider your comments, and any results are included below.
And I'm with you on the timing of the livestock in the song.)

I took "「なべ」とは一体なのでしょう。鍋？？" early in the essay to be a
typo, but is there a natural way to read it as is?

The variant reading ?????????????????? (I guess that could be something
like "hanging, hanging, slipped and fell, the kettle, the kettle's
bottom's gone") seems to suggest that sort of a reading, but natural?
Queen sabe?

"What in the world could that 'nabe' be? A kettle?" The following
paragraph suggests that associating 'nabe' with 'tsuru' easily leads to
the image of a kettle hanging above the fire. But then much later he
returns to this and cites explanations that account differently for the
tsuru and the nabe.

[Since a test suggests I posted mojibake above, I'll romaji it: tsuru
tsuru tsuppaita nabe no nabe no soko nuke. Soko nuke is the only part
in kanji.]

Anyway, if I ever try to translate the song, I'm going to go with the
Lost Tribe interpretation.

That seems to have more contemporary supporters than the others, eh?

That's an amazing piece of work for a graduation thesis, in my
unlettered opinion. Wouldn't it be great if we could examine much more
material the treat of Japanese writings, history, and language in that
depth?
--
Don Kirkman
.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: Very interesting, but not funny.....
    ... Not without Google... ... The number of varieties/breeds of dogs is quite large and ... Consider songs in mysticism, liturgy, cermony,... ... When mountain ranges and ocean can be overcome, ...
    (rec.backcountry)
  • Re: WM5 MediaPlayer
    ... Try a google for "its not a pod" and see what you find. ... I do so by making a remote connection to the downstairs computer and the ... Unfortunately, it plays one song ... Is there a way to set the player to play the songs one ...
    (microsoft.public.pocketpc)
  • Re: OT: Question about vocal style
    ... Too lazy to google. ... the notes more easily read for the songs. ... extensively in the southern U.S. in voice schools and ...
    (rec.music.makers.guitar.acoustic)
  • Re: Urban miffs
    ... the details of the celebrated court case where Werner Von Braun sued ... Was The Year That Was" and played it to my kids. ... My kids know half a dozen of his songs by heart. ... Time for a Google, ...
    (uk.rec.motorcycles)