Let me explain… I love comedy and I’ve been studying Japanese for 5 months. Recently, I heard about 落語 and I watched a couple of videos of it. I got so fascinated that now I would really like to learn as much as possible about its history, components, old and contemporary exponents, etc.
I know that I maybe could learn about it from Google by searching in English, but I really want to combine my interest on this with my Japanese learning. I’ve heard that it’s really good to learn (about) something new through your target language.
If there’s any playlist or source you guys know about, I would really appreciate your help. Thanks in advance!!
5 comments
入門 is a good search term for this sort of thing
落語の入門 got me here:
https://youtube.com/@Hayashiya_Hanahei
Slightly off-topic: Tiger & Dragon (a j-drama) recently got added to a bunch of Netflix regions. It’s a comedy all about Rakugo. Years ago it got me interested in it so I think it’s worth a look. 🙂
Weekly Shonen Jump has been serializing a manga about 落語 as well! It’s called あかね噺 (Akane-banashi), and it’s my favorite of all the titles currently in Jump. You can buy digital copies of the manga on BookWalker’s Japanese site [here](https://bookwalker.jp/series/355453/list/), but if you’re overwhelmed you can also read it for free in English on Shueisha’s Manga Plus. The first chapter is also voiced by father-daughter duo Yamaguchi Kappei and Yamaguchi Akane on the Jump Comics Channel on YouTube.
It gives you a basic overview of rakugoka ranks and some of the popular stories in an exciting, Jump-worthy format that follows young Osaki Akane on her quest to make rakugo master Arakawa Issho acknowledge her father’s rakugo after he was banished from the Arakawa rakugo school. There was an event to celebrate one year of serialization, and some rakugoka (including Akane-banashi’s rakugo supervisor Hayashiya Keiki, who did 寿限無 [Jugemu]) performed popular rakugo stories for it. The full YouTube playlist for Akane-banashi is [here](https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMyQxaghEY1FGzfmapJw3m5CLBExJ5cQA).
Anyway, I’m so glad you’re getting into rakugo! I got to watch it live last month during my Tokyo trip, and it was well worth it.
The anime Joshiraku and Showa Genroku Rakugo Shinju are both about rakugo, although Joshiraku draws on a lot of topics and might be a bit difficult.
How good is your current listening comprehension (in CEFR terms)?
Depending on that I would recommend different artists and stories.
For an easy hanashi (story), try search YouTube for 饅頭怖い or まんじゅう怖い. Easy to understand.
For rakugo beginners who speak native-level English, I recommend Tatekawa Shinoharu, he is a Yale grad, also does rakugo in English and has his own YouTube channel. The Japanese language hanashi he does there are shinsaku, i.e. his own creations. Vocabulary wise they should be easy to understand.
Once I have more of an idea about your Japanese level, I will suggest more!