membership of a family.
Threaded over a bamboo pole by means of loops, the noren is suspended over the shop entranceway. Depending on the width, it may be divided up into two, three or four panels (though occasionally more) and it generally reaches down to cover only about a quarter of the entrance—all this being devised to make it easier for the customer to enter. If you see a noren over the entrance, it means the shop is open. Having rolled the noren up around the pole at closing time, the staff take it away altogether before they lock up and go home. Longer noren leave only the bottom quarter of the entranceway uncovered. This kind will usually only be split into two panels. They often front cheap drinking haunts known as ippai nomiya, though traditionally these have a curtain made of hanging lengths of straw rope called nawa noren. These days nawa noren is a common expression denoting any cheap drinking dive—whether it actually has one fronting the entrance or not.
Long sought for providing cool shade in summer, noren are also a common fixture in private homes. Although they often deploy contemporary designs of a high standard, including abstract calligraphy and subtle modernist renditions of traditional designs and colours, decorative noren these days can depict anything. This includes western floral motifs, garish copies of Utamaro woodblock prints, kittens, puppies, Japanese children's cartoon characters and—yes—Mickey Mouse.
Yoshizu
Most people associate yoshizu with summer. This comes first in the television commercials, almost as soon as the last cherry blossoms have dropped from the trees, when it is still spring. Nubile beauties in teeny swimsuits luxuriate in the turquoise Okinawan shallows; bright blue arrows of coolness blast from sleek air conditioners over idealized interiors. The commercials warn too of summer setbacks. It's hot and humid; the Japanese, like the British, open conversations with remarks about the weather. In summer, "Atsui desu ne?" ("Isn't it hot?") is heard around the clock.
The commercials also warn of the approach of bug season, vividly depicting armies of gokiburi (cockroaches) and mosquitoes being effectively exterminated by chemical means. Though no less glued to TV commercials, people in the countryside often still prefer katori senkō or mosquito-removing incense. Green and shaped into a spiral, this sends pungent—though not unpleasant—smoke drifting up under the roofs of older houses.
Katori senkō is burned mainly by traditionalists, the kind of people who also put up yoshizu (marsh-reed screens) against their windows and open doors to provide shade from the harsh summer sun. Traditional restaurants generally put up yoshizu too, notably specialists in soba noodles—a year-round Japanese staple popularly eaten cold in a variety of ways in summer. Sōmen, white noodles so thin and translucid that they look ethereal, are often served in bowls floating with ice cubes. They're not exactly substantial, which is just as well, as Japan's sweltering canicular season is very debilitating and causes a loss of appetite. The term natsuyase (summer thinness) has been used to identify the effect for centuries.
Some believe the antidote lies in eating eels. Folk legend has it that the custom was initiated by a wily 18th-century scholar, who was really in cahoots with the eel merchants. Behind the yoshizu of today's traditional eel restaurants, plenty of people still seek this high-protein fish as a summer treat. Meanwhile, yoshizu go up too to provide shade as well as partitioning in beer gardens. Situated often on the roofs of department stores, one finds adepts here quaffing tankards of chilled brew from tumbler to bucket size.
Yoshizu are erected in front of traditional dessert shops too, where kids eat shaved ice topped with syrups coming in an amazing array of garish colours. There are inumerable fairs and festivals all around Japan in summer; one to look out for is Obon, the Buddhist festival of the dead. Obon is the time for lantern festivals, when families pay respect to deceased relatives and light fireworks outside their homes. In downtown Tokyo in Ueno, summer finds families dressed in yukata (see page 55) strolling through evening plant markets, the stalls being partitioned with (what else?) yoshizu. Along here too they sell insects. The lovely firefly, now vanished from polluted cities, blinks brightly in little bamboo cages along with the suzumushi (bell crickets) whose enchanting, high-pitched ringing sound can turn even the most sultry night idyllically cool. You find too the kind of insects children stalk with butterfly nets in the daytime, especially rhino beetles and, later in the season, semi (Japanese crickets).
The shrill whirring of the semi in fact heralds summer's end—stifling as it still is in late August. Everyone moans about the heat but once the insect orchestra falls silent and it's all over, most people are looking forward to saying "atsui desu ne?" again next year. And bringing out the yoshizu.
Byōbu
屏風
painted screens
No one knows when byōbu first appeared, but 8th-century Japanese historical records report that they had been presented to the emperor by a Korean ambassador in 686. Like most continental novelties, byōbu were at first used exclusively by the aristocracy. In pre-medieval times, the aristocratic dwelling was large, single-storied and, as now in the Japanese house, featured sliding panels to divide the rooms. The Japanese predilection for screens was a result of the hot, humid summer weather; sliding panels allowed air to circulate, but also provided shelter from drafts (byōbu translates as 'wind shelter'). They also provided privacy if needed.
Minimalism has always been of the essence in Japanese art, but if the walls of a dwelling were to remain pristine, one could instead decorate panels and partitions, thus several different kinds of screen developed. One was the byōbu; they served as canvasses in a kind of painting called shōheki-ga.
Mainly religious, but in some cases secular as well, early Japanese art had always been executed in the Chinese style. Then because of the increasing popularity of emaki (picture scrolls) during the Heian period, narrative, historical and naturalist themes developed relatively free of outside influences. This style was known as Yamato-e (Japanese pictures), and the Chinese style came to be known as kara-e (outside pictures). Both were used on byōbu, but in the relatively austere Kamakura era (1185-1333), byōbu were mainly decorated with Chinese-style ink paintings.
During the strife-torn Muromachi period (1333-1568), lavishly painted and gilded byōbu became fashionable among shoguns eager for ostentatious trimmings in their new villas and castles. The master of the Kanō school, notably Motonobu (1476-1559) and Eitoku (1543-1590), brought shōheki-ga to its zenith, blending elements of kara-e and Yamato-e together. Consisting usually of two, three, four, or six panels, byōbu often came in pairs; a landscape or scene with figures ran continuously from one screen to the next.
Byōbu became more common during the Edo period (1603-1868), when the Rimpa school founded by Sōtatsu and exemplified by Ogata Kōrin (1658-1716) came to the fore. It emphasized decorative composition, further developed in the 18th century by Itō Jackuchō with his remarkable animal and bird designs. In the 19th century, shōheki-ga generally became formulaic, mainly comprising pallid emulations of late medieval masterpieces. Painters
