Who Is Manago (White Serpent of Ugetsu Monogatari)?
White serpent who loved Toyoo
Manago is a woman of unearthly beauty in "The Lust of the White Serpent" from Ugetsu Monogatari. She is really a huge serpent of great age. She falls desperately in love with Toyoo and follows him wherever he goes.
In Episode 4, she appears on a rainy day with her maid Maroya, borrows Toyoo's umbrella, and becomes his lover. Even after her true nature is exposed, she keeps coming back in new forms. At Yoshino, Taima no Sakahito, an old man, sees through her, and she escapes by leaping into a waterfall. When Toyoo marries Tomiko, Manago possesses Tomiko and speaks through her to plead her love. In the end Toyoo throws the kesa over her, and she is sealed in an iron bowl in the form of a white snake and buried in front of Dōjōji temple.
Combining devoted love with real terror, Manago is one of the best-known women in Japanese supernatural literature.
