Chikamatsu Monzaemon

Chikamatsu Monzaemon, born Sugimori Nobumori and living from 1653 to 6 January 1725, was a Japanese dramatist who wrote for two stage traditions: joruri, the form of puppet theater that later became known as bunraku, and kabuki, the theater performed by live actors. Encyclopaedia Britannica has called him widely regarded as the greatest Japanese dramatist. He is best known for plays about honor-bound lovers who choose double suicide. Of his puppet plays, about seventy are jidaimono, or historical romances, and twenty-four are sewamono, or domestic tragedies. The domestic plays, including The Courier for Hell of 1711 and The Love Suicides at Amijima of 1721, are now regarded as the core of his achievement, while his history plays are judged less favorably, although The Battles of Coxinga of 1715 is still praised.