GEISHA (HETAERAE)
The word _geisha_ means an "accomplished person." A geisha is invariably
a young woman who has had years of training fitting her to provide
social entertainment for men. The _gei_ acquired are skill in playing
the samisen (a three-stringed guitar), singing catching ditties, taking
part in conversation and repartee, and in "dancing," which is to the
Western mind rather a highly conventional posturing, with deft
manipulations of the inevitable fan. Years of exacting and diligent work
are required for proficiency in these "gei,"--the Geisha School in Kyoto
provides a course of six or seven years.
[Illustration: O HAMAYU (GEISHA)
Most celebrated in Tokyo]
According to the Japanese ideal, geisha singing must be shrill, and to
secure this quality the voice is purposely strained till it is
"cracked." Girls eight to ten years old are sometimes given their
"singing lessons" in the frosty air of winter mornings before sunrise,
or late at night, in order that they may take cold in the throat and
then, by persistent, vigorous use, the voice is "broken" for life.
Training in dancing and samisen playing is also prolonged and severe,
for no pains are spared in efforts to excel. These efforts however are
due, not to the will or desire of the _maiko_, the poor little girl who
is being trained, but to the persistence of her owner.
Only daughters of the very poor are secured for this outwardly beautiful
and attractive, but inwardly repulsive, soul-destroying life.
Practically speaking, geisha are the property of the old women who
support and educate them through the years of their childhood, and who
rent them out by the hour for the entertainment of men at social
functions. Such functions would, indeed, be inane without geisha to
serve the meals in their dainty ways, to fill the sake[5] cups for
guests, to share in conversation by adding the spice, to provoke
laughter, themselves laughing loudly and often, and at the proper time,
to present their music, their singing, and their dancing. Dressed in
faultless style, in richest silks and brilliant colors, geisha are
moving pictures which have charmed generations of Japanese men and, in
recent decades, many foreigners. Japanese political party dinners and
consultations are often held in restaurants, where geisha make the fun
and pour the wine. If foreign guests are to be entertained by wealthy
individuals, by companies, or even by cities, the inevitable geisha is
there, and is presented as a characteristic product of Japan--which she
truly is. But while there is about her a certain charm of manner and
dress, to one who watches her face, looking for traces of a soul, the
story is all too plain--behind the harsh laugh and stoical face it is
impossible not to recognize that there is an empty and often a bleeding
heart.
[5] Sake (pronounced sah'-ke) is the fermented liquor of Japan,
made from rice.
The lives of these girls are pitiful in the extreme. Chosen from among
the families of the poor on the basis of their prospective good looks
and ability to learn, they leave their homes at an early age and are
subjected to the severe drill already outlined. They go through their
lessons with rigid, mechanical accuracy. In public they appear in
gorgeous robes, their faces painted and powdered, artificiality
dominating everything about them,--clothing, manners, and smiles. As a
rule nothing is done to develop their minds, and of course the
cultivation of personal character is not even thought of. They are
instructed in flippant conversation and pungent retort, that they may
converse interestingly with the men, for whose entertainment they are
alone designed. The songs learned, some of the dances performed, and the
conversational repertoire acquired are commonly reported to be highly
licentious, but these are the gei that best please the men, to whom
they are open for private engagements from the time they are eighteen
years of age. If, however, a geisha is exceptionally beautiful, her
owner does not allow her to enter on such duties, for experience has
shown that her beauty is soon lost in this way, and with it her highest
earning capacity.
Many geisha undoubtedly develop considerable personal ability. The
severe drill undergone could hardly fail to call forth their powers of
mind, and intimate association with educated and quasi-cultured men
serves further to stimulate their mental faculties. In native ability
too they are not lacking, though drawn from the lowest classes of
society, for, as will soon be more fully explained, they sometimes
possess strains of high lineage. The national custom, which represses
the normal intellectual development and social instincts of cultured,
respectable women, is removed from this one class, which is favored by
many circumstances. They are not subjected to the debauching excesses
usual with the ordinary prostitute, nor to humiliating medical
inspection. They are not conscious of popular disapproval, but on the
contrary are the beauties of the town, their photographs for sale on
every street. Indeed one well-informed gentleman told me that probably
ten per cent. of the geisha enter the calling by their own choice. No
wonder that from time to time the tale is told of some Japanese man of
social position falling under the spell of an accomplished geisha, whom
he prefers to any of the silent, passive, timid, incompetent girls
selected for him, who in all probability have never talked with any man
except immediate relatives or tradesmen. The national custom which
predetermines the social incompetence of the majority of cultured women
compensates for the loss by providing this geisha class. Not until
Japanese ladies can hold their own in social life will the vocation of
the geisha be ended.
Among the surprises one meets in studying the geisha question is the
fact that not a few of the girls have features which indicate
distinguished ancestry. My explanation for this fact is the further fact
that for ages the standards of moral life in Japan have allowed large
freedom of sexual relations. The result is that in the lowest classes,
from which geisha are recruited, there run strains of gentle blood. It
thus comes to pass that now in the midst of coarse surroundings and in
deep poverty there are born of parents manifestly belonging to the
lowest class, children of exceptional beauty, fitted, so far as
individual appearance indicates, to belong to the highest ranks of
society. Whether or not this suggested explanation is correct as a
matter of historic fact I am not able to say, but I offer it as the most
plausible that has occurred to me.
Parents in this class of society much prefer daughters to sons, for they
are likely to become valuable sources of income. At eight or nine, those
destined for the "accomplished" calling are put into the care of some
experienced geisha and a mutual contract is given for a specific period
(five or six years), during which the child is termed a _maiko_
(dancing girl). As a rule the parents receive a small sum at the
beginning of this first period. The owner undertakes to support and
train the girl, and expects to profit by her earnings. By the time the
girl is fifteen or sixteen she has finished her apprenticeship, when, if
she has exceptional graces and charms likely to win her a place in the
highest social gatherings, she will secure quite a competency (many
hundreds of yen, and in some cases even a few thousand) for the keeper
and parents. On the expiration of the first contract a new one is made,
and so on, until the girl has passed her prime and is no longer sought
for entertainments. If in the interval she has not become the concubine
of some rich man, she then either returns to her poor home or, what is
more usual, becomes a servant in a hotel or tea-house. If her ability is
exceptional, she may set up as geisha keeper, train other maiko, employ
younger geisha, and so make her living.
The great ambition of a geisha is to "catch" some wealthy man of rank
with her charms and become his concubine. My informant estimates that
this is what happens to perhaps one half of the geisha. In such cases
the man pays down a handsome sum to the owner, who sends part of it to
the parents. Thus he buys his concubine, whom he usually keeps in a
villa, not his home. I have asked if geisha ever become true, legal
wives and am told "only very rarely." But, if they do, are they
cordially received by the man's kindred? "Oh, no! that is not possible,"
is the repeated answer. The effects of her training can never be
obliterated, and the new relatives cannot forget the despicable class
from which she comes, and the calling by which she has gained her
husband. She may become indeed refined and altogether correct in manner,
but the taint of her origin as a rule adheres to her. Then too the years
of immoral life before she won her husband make it a rare thing for a
geisha to have children, and childless wives in Japan are not at a
premium, for the prime purpose of marriage is the maintenance of the
family line.
Foreigners commonly say that geisha are not prostitutes. It is true they
are not licensed, that is to say, professional, prostitutes in the eye
of the law, nor are they procurable, as are regular prostitutes, by the
average man, for the expense is too great. But the chief of police
already referred to, and many Japanese of whom I have inquired, insist
that a large proportion of geisha are corrupt--two geisha keepers have
estimated the proportion as high as ninety per cent. Geisha who decline
engagements leading to immorality are rare indeed, and for that very
reason are unpopular.
But better than generalized statements is the story of an actual life.
There lives to-day in Hyogo a paralytic whose influence through her
words, newspaper articles, and books is widely felt throughout central
Japan. She is one of the few girls who, though trained as a geisha,
refused to follow the calling. The story of her life is worthy of more
than passing mention.
Her father died in her infancy, and shortly after the death of her
mother, who had married, her stepfather likewise married again. These
stepparents, deciding to have her become a geisha, expended much time
and money on her training.
When she was prepared at sixteen years of age, she was entrusted to a
woman whose business it was to find employment for geisha in hotels and
tea-houses. This woman took her to a house in Osaka, where there were
already many geisha and regular prostitutes. Learning the nature of the
duties expected of her, she positively refused to comply. In spite of
the fact that it was twenty miles to her home and that there were but
two sen in her pocket, she escaped from the hotel, spent one sen on
bridge toll, one sen on a lunch, and succeeded in walking all that
distance alone, reaching home after midnight, the home from which she
had been sent out with hopes that she should win for her stepparents an
ample support. The reception accorded her can be fancied. She held
firmly however to her resolve, preferring poverty and hard toil to
luxury and fine clothing along with that service on which these were
conditioned. Work was found for her in a factory, then as a family
servant, and finally at a small tea-house, where during the winter she
was especially exposed to the cold. An attack of rheumatism developed
into paralysis. With no hope of recovery she longed for death, for her
stepparents, considering the case hopeless, neglected to care for her
properly, although she was so helpless. She could not feed herself, nor
even crawl to the well in which she wished to drown herself,--the final
resource of many a despairing Japanese woman. But, by a strange series
of circumstances, or should we not say by a merciful Providence? a
Christian man discovered and befriended her, told the story of Jesus,
and revealed the Savior. Her faith soon became so strong and her words
proved so thoughtful and helpful to those Christian friends who came to
see her, that her influence began to spread. She found she could manage
to write with her crippled hand, and as what she wrote was like her
spoken words, simple and strong, it soon found its way into print. She
was finally led to write the story of her life, and this book, with
other articles written by her, has afforded a small income, which with
additional help from friends has secured a comfortable home for herself
and the family of which she is now the center. Her name is Zako Aiko,
and she lives in Hyogo.
A few geisha, coming under Christian influences, have been converted,
and so far as I know, such persons leave the calling altogether, as
incompatible with Christian principles. But condemnation of the whole
geisha system is not confined to Christians. Many Japanese, entirely
outside our Christian circles, regard it as a disgrace to the country,
and wish the whole business, along with licensed prostitution, concealed
from public view. For instance, a man of high official rank, president
of a large institution, tells me he regrets that there is no first-class
Japanese hotel in Kyoto at which he may entertain foreign guests in
Japanese style, except where geisha serve the meals. Rather than
countenance the geisha system, he prefers to take his guests to a hotel
where the service is not so perfect but where the women employed are
above suspicion. He deplored the fact one day that all foreigners coming
to Kyoto in the spring visit the _Miyako odori_, commonly known in
English as the "Cherry Dance." I myself have seen this performance more
than once, and found nothing objectionable in either the so-called
dancing, its setting, or its accompaniments. It nevertheless affords
opportunity for the display of something like eighty or ninety geisha,
and helps to maintain the business and the system. As indicating the
status of geisha in the best Japanese society, it is significant that
all geisha are rigidly excluded from every entertainment where any
member of the Imperial household is present.
It is often said by foreigners that geisha and prostitutes not
infrequently make happy matches, and by legal marriage escape from their
unhappy lives of shame. This is one of those pretty fables one would
like to believe, but the facts do not seem to support the theory. There
are, no doubt, rare instances where such has been the case. I have known
two women who had been geisha and who married men of some position. In
one case the man was a physician. When I knew the family the ex-geisha
had been in the home a number of years and was a lovely, modest, capable
woman, a regular member of my wife's cooking class. But it was
noticeable that she always took a "back seat" among the ladies; she was
tolerated by them and treated not unkindly, but it was clear that they
looked down on her. The man's kindred never favored the match, and would
not let him marry the woman legally, so she lived in his house, took
excellent care of his first wife's children, and was to them all that a
stepmother could be, yet, so far as I know, she has never gained her
full position in the home of her husband nor among his relatives.
The other case I knew but slightly, as she died but a few weeks after I
made her acquaintance, but she must have been a woman of exceptional
character. She was a Christian and highly respected in the church.
Such cases, however, are rare. A geisha may be in high favor during the
decade or more when at the height of her physical charms, though even
then her inner life is empty and loveless; but when no longer attractive
she is cast aside as a faded flower, to spend the rest of her life
forlorn, unloved, and uncared for. Truly, the way of the geisha is hard!
Geisha naru mi to;
Michi tobu tori wa
Doko no idzuko de
Hateru yara,
is a popular ditty regarding the final disappearance of geisha from
sight. It may be roughly translated: "What becomes of geisha, do you
ask? I ask in turn, where end their lives the birds that fly along the
road?"
In regard to the number of geisha, Mr. Murphy's statistics show that
from 1887 to 1897 they increased throughout Japan from 10,326 to 26,536,
and since then the increase has been relatively small, the number being
now in the vicinity of 30,000.
So far as is known to me, no regular Christian or philanthropic work is
done for this class.