Includes bibliographical references and indexes.

Introduction. Of Stories and Fragments -- 1. In the Shape of a Person: The Varieties of Ritual Uses of Effigy in Japan -- 2. Kadozuke: The Outsider at the Gates -- 3. A Crippled Deity, a Priest, and a Puppet: Kugutsu and Ebisu-kaki of the Nishinomiya Shrine -- 4. A Dead Priest, an Angry Deity, a Fisherman, and a Puppet: The Narrative Origins of Awaji Ningyo -- 5. Puppets of the Road, Puppets of the Field: Shiki Sanbaso, Ebisu-mai, and Puppetry Festivals on Awaji -- 6. Puppets and Whirlpools: Icons, Nostalgia, Regionalism, and Identity in the Revival of Awaji Ningyo.

Jane Marie Law describes the "life, death, and rebirth" of awaji ningyo shibai, the unique form of puppet theater of Awaji Island that has existed since the sixteenth century. Puppetry rites on Awaji helped to maintain rigid ritual purity codes and to keep dangerous spiritual forces properly channeled and appeased. Law conducted fieldwork on Awaji, located in Japan's Inland Sea, over a ten-year period. In addition to being a detailed history and ethnography of this ritual tradition, Law's work is, at a theoretical level, a study of the process and meaning of tradition formation, reformation, invention, and revitalization. It will interest scholars in a number of fields, including the history of religions, anthropology, cultural studies, ritual and theater studies, Japanese studies, and social history. Focusing on the puppetry tradition of Awaji Island, Puppets of Nostalgia describes the activities of the island's ritual puppeteers and includes the first English translation of their performance texts and detailed descriptions of their rites. Because the author has lived on Awaji for extended periods of research, the work includes fine attention to local detail and nuanced readings of religious currents in Japan that affect popular religious expression.