Kōdan is a style of traditional oral Japanese storytelling. The form evolved out of lectures on historical or literary topics given to high-ranking nobles of the Heian period, changing over the centuries to be adopted by the general samurai class and eventually by commoners, and eventually, by the end of the Edo period, declining in favor of new types of entertainment and storytelling such as naniwa-bushi. It was at this time that the term kōshaku was abandoned and kōdan adopted. Today, after a failed attempt to revive the art in 1974, there are four schools of kōdan and only a very few performers between them.
