Zeami (born 1363, Japan—died Sept. 1, 1443, Kyōto?) was the greatest playwright and theorist of the Japanese Noh theatre. He and his father, Kan’ami (1333–84), were the creators of the Noh drama in its present form.

Zeami Motokiyo (世阿弥 元清) (c. 1363 – c. 1443), also called Kanze Motokiyo (観世 元清), was a Japanese aesthetician, actor, and playwright. His father, Kan'ami Kiyotsugu, introduced him to Noh theater performance at a young age, and found that he was a skilled actor. Kan'ami was also skilled in acting and formed a family theater ensemble.

After losing his successor Motomasa, Zeami mentally relied on Komparu Zenchiku, his son-in-law. In his very last years, Zeami passed down “Noh as a philosophy,” including the theory of Noh performance, to Zenchiku. During such a period, another ordeal came to Zeami.

Zeami Motokiyo (世阿弥 元清; c. 1363 – c. 1443), also called Kanze Motokiyo (観世 元清), was a Japanese aesthetician, actor and playwright. At the age of 12 he attracted the attention of Shogun Ashikaga Yoshimitsu during a stage performance.

Zeami expressed his ideas about art and stage performance in many literary volumes including “Fūshi kaden.” However, the insight implied in his words is not limited to art and Noh. In the modern context, Zeami’s position can be interpreted as the owner and the producer of the “Kanze Theatrical Group.”

Noh’s founder, Zeami, is one of the most important historical figures in Japanese theatre. A collection of his treatises on noh, “Fūshi Kaden,” was published some 200 years before Shakespeare’s theatrical debut.

This is the first full-length study of Zeami Motokiyo (1363–1443), generally recognized as the greatest playwright of Japan's classical Noh theater. The book begins with a biography based on the known documents relating to Zeami's life.

some basic noh terms, followed by preliminary chapters, based on histor-ical sources, that deal with Zeami's life and work as a playwright. The main part of the study consists of a detailed analysis of Zeami's plays, divided into separate chapters following the classificatory scheme found in Zeami's treatises-the Aged Mode (rotai), Woman's Mode ...

Dec 9, 2009 · Zeami is believed to have lived from 1363 to 1443 and was a performer during the first half of the Muromachi era. His given name was Motokiyo , and one of his aliases was Sanro . He was the eldest son of Kan’ami and the second generation of Kanze Dayu .

Yamanba (山姥) is a frequently-performed Noh play of the fifth category attributed to Zeami Motokiyo. Its central character is the legendary mountain hag, Yama-uba.