Bunraku Master Retires After Spending 30 Years as Left Hand Operator, Never Got Promoted to Head

Bunraku puppeteer Takashi Mori has announced his retirement from the National Bunraku Theatre of Osaka after a thirty-year career spent exclusively as a hidarizukai — the left-hand operator — a role he entered as a young apprentice and from which he never advanced. In traditional Bunraku, each puppet is operated by three performers: the omozukai (head and right hand), the hidarizukai (left hand), and the ashizukai (legs). The hierarchy is rigid. Apprentices begin with legs, advance to the left hand, and eventually, after decades of study, may be entrusted with the head. 'I was told when I began that the path from ashizukai to omozukai takes approximately twenty to thirty years,' Mori said through a translator. 'I completed my ashizukai training in twelve years. I was promoted to hidarizukai at age thirty-two. I have been operating the left hand ever since. I am sixty-two.' Mori's left-hand work is regarded within the Bunraku community as among the finest ever performed. His manipulation of the left arm of the puppet Ohatsu in the play Sonezaki Shinju has been described by critics as 'transcendent' and 'the most emotionally articulate left hand in the 400-year history of the art form.' 'But it's still the left hand,' Mori said. 'I have spent thirty years making the left hand weep, reach, tremble, and grasp. I have never operated the head. I have never controlled the face. I have achieved mastery of approximately one-sixth of a puppet.' When asked if he harbored resentment, Mori paused. 'The left hand is essential,' he said. 'Without the left hand, the puppet has no balance. No gesture. No grace. But no one in the audience watches the left hand. They watch the face. They always watch the face.' The National Theatre plans to honor Mori's career with a special performance. He will operate the left hand.