Haseo and the Gambling Stranger

Haseo and the Gambling Stranger (Haseo sōshi) is not a tale for the faint of heart. The historical Ki no Haseo (845–912) was an aristocratic scholar known throughout the Heian court for his literary and artistic achievements. In 876, at the age of thirty-one, he assumed a position in the Faculty of Letters at the university. In 898, he participated in an imperial procession to Yoshino (Nara) headed by Retired Emperor Uda (867–931, r. 887–897). Haseo is believed to have forged an intimate friendship with Sugawara no Michizane (845–903), a leading scholar-poet and one of the most influential politicians of his time. The two would have traveled to China as imperial emissaries had the practice not been abolished in 894.1

Although previously thought to be a product of the fifteenth century, this tale is now believed to have been composed around the end of the Kamakura period (1185–1333), in the late thirteenth or early fourteenth century,2 making it one of the earliest texts in this anthology. A slightly older version of the story is included in a treatise on court music, Zoku kyōkunshō (Abridged Teachings, Continued, 1270). That, in turn, seems to have been based on even earlier accounts in a number of twelfth- and thirteenth-century commentaries on Wakan rōeishū (Chinese and Japanese Poems to Be Sung, ca. 1012). A comparison of Haseo and the Gambling Stranger with these older texts suggests that it was derived from the commentaries on Chinese and Japanese Poems to Be Sung (or some related work) rather than from the more contemporaneous Abridged Teachings.3 This is significant insofar as the story can be understood to have roots in both setsuwa (anecdotal literature) storytelling and traditional poetic discourse.

Considering its brevity and early origin, which comes before the rise of the otogizōshi in the Muromachi period (1337–1573), Haseo and the Gambling Stranger may be best understood as an illustrated setsuwa in picture scroll (emaki) format, in the manner of the tengu tale Zegaibō emaki (The Tale of Zegaibō) and some other early works, rather than a typical otogizōshi, which are generally longer.

Middle Councilor Haseo, prolific in learning and skilled in all manner of arts, was a man of high renown. One evening on his way to the palace, he was approached by a stranger whose crafty gaze suggested that he was no ordinary man.

“Having nothing much to do,” the stranger began, “I thought it might be nice to play a little backgammon. It occurred to me that you’re the only one I could play, so I came over.” Haseo, finding this rather suspicious, was nevertheless intrigued.

“What an entertaining proposition!” he replied. “Where shall we play?”

“It’s no good here. Come to my place.”

“Fine,” he said. And with neither carriage nor servant, Haseo followed the lone stranger until they came to the foot of the Suzaku Gate.4

“Climb up to the top of this gate,” the stranger instructed. Haseo did not see how it was possible, but with the stranger’s help, he went right up. Producing a backgammon board,5 the stranger faced Haseo and said, “I wonder what I should wager? If I lose, I will give you a woman to satisfy your every desire in looks, form, and disposition. What will you give me if you lose?”

“I will give you every last treasure in my possession,” he said.

“Splendid!” the stranger replied. As they played, Haseo won one round after another. The stranger appeared to be an ordinary man for a while, but as he continued to lose, he clutched at the dice and racked his brains, and as he did so, his true form emerged: that of a terrible demon. Haseo was terrified, but he thought to himself, “Still, if I can only win, he’ll be no more than a mouse.” With this one thought in mind, he continued to play, until he finally came out on top.

Haseo and the stranger play backgammon in the Suzaku Gate. (From Haseo sōshi, courtesy of the Eisei Bunko Museum, Tokyo)

Assuming his former human guise, the demon said, “There’s no point in saying it now, but still, I really thought … And what a wretched loss! I’ll settle up on such-and-such a day.” With that, he put Haseo back down on the street.

Haseo was filled with dread, but the appointed day soon arrived, and he prepared a suitable room and awaited his guest with anticipation. As the night grew deep, the stranger appeared with a woman of shimmering beauty, whom he presented to Haseo. The Middle Counselor could hardly believe his eyes. He asked, “Can I have her, just like that?”

“Naturally,” replied the stranger. “Seeing as how I lost to you, you don’t have to give her back. But you must wait one hundred days from tonight before indulging your desire. If you lay hands on her before a hundred days, things won’t go at all as you wish.”

“I shall do just as you say,” Haseo replied, and seeing off his guest, he kept the woman behind. When he saw her in the light of dawn, he could not believe his eyes and wondered with utter astonishment how such a fair creature could appear in this world.

As the days passed, he grew ever fonder of the woman. He did not want to leave her side for even a moment. Eighty days came and went, whereupon he thought to himself, “It’s been a long time already. Surely the stranger didn’t mean one hundred days exactly.” Unable to restrain himself any longer, he pulled her close. The woman instantly turned into water and trickled away. Haseo lamented what he had done a thousand times over, but all in vain.

Haseo’s “prize” melts away. (From Haseo sōshi, courtesy of the Eisei Bunko Museum, Tokyo)

Three months later, as Haseo was leaving the palace in the dead of night, the stranger approached him on the road. Striding up from the front of Haseo’s carriage, he said, “You failed to keep your word! It’s despicable!” His expression souring, he continued closing in on the Middle Counselor. “Oh, god of Kitano Shrine,” Haseo prayed in his heart, “save me, please!” whereupon a voice echoed in the sky, “Worthless pest! Be gone from here!” No sooner had Haseo heard this furious command than the stranger vanished into the air.

This man was the demon of Suzaku Gate. The woman had been pieced together from the finest parts of various corpses, and after one hundred days had passed, she would have become a real woman with a soul of her own. However, much to his chagrin, Haseo forgot his promise, and because he touched her, she melted away and disappeared. How he must have regretted it all!

TRANSLATION AND INTRODUCTION BY KRISTOPHER L. REEVES

 

 

The translation and illustrations are from the Haseo sōshi picture scroll (late thirteenth or early fourteenth century) in the collection of the Eisei Bunko Museum, typeset and photographically reproduced in Komatsu Shigemi, ed., Haseo sōshi, Eshi sōshi, Nihon emaki taisei 11 (Tokyo: Chūō Kōronsha, 1977), 2–39, 117–19. The translator also consulted the annotated version of a later manuscript of Ki no Haseo in the National Diet Library, in Kuwabara Hiroshi, Otogizōshi (Tokyo: Kōdansha, 1982), 242–56.

  1. Murashige Yasushi, “Haseo sōshi no seiritsu to sakufū,” in Haseo sōshi, Eshi sōshi, ed. Komatsu, 76.

  2. Kuwabara, Otogizōshi, 243; Tokuda Kazuo, “Haseo sōshi,” in Otogizōshi jiten (Tokyo: Tōkyōdō Shuppan, 2002), 391.

  3. Tokuda, “Haseo sōshi,” 391; Harada Kōzō, “Haseo-kyō no sōshi,” in Nihon koten bungaku daijiten (Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 1984), 5:72.

  4. The Suzaku Gate was the southern entrance to the imperial palace complex.

  5. The passage reads はむてうと々り, which Kuwabara renders as ban chōdo tori (taking [out] a board and pieces), in Otogizōshi, 245. Komatsu interprets this as hanchō to tori (taking odds and evens), in Haseo sōshi, in Haseo sōshi, Eshi sōshi, ed. Komatsu, 117.