A Wreath of Cloud/Introduction

by Murasaki Shikibu

Introduction

Murasaki

Murasaki Shikibu was born about 978 A.D. Her father, Tametoki, belonged to a minor branch of the powerful Fujiwara clan. After holding various appointments in the Capital he became governor first of Echizen (probably in 1004); then of a more northerly province, Echigo. In 1016 he retired and took his vows as a Buddhist priest.

Of her childhood Murasaki tells us the following anecdote^[1]: 'When my brother Nobunori^[2] (the one who is now in the Board of Rites) was a boy my father was very anxious to make a good Chinese scholar of him, and often came himself to hear Nobunori read his lessons. On these occasions I was always present, and so quick was I at picking up the language that I was soon able to prompt my brother whenever he got stuck. At this my father used to sigh and say to me: "If only you were a boy how proud and happy I should be." But it was not long before I repented of having thus distinguished myself; for person after person assured me that even boys generally become very unpopular if it is discovered that they are fond of their books. For a girl, of course, it would be even worse; and after this I was careful to conceal the fact that I could write a single Chinese character. This meant that I got very little practice; with the result that to this day I am shockingly clumsy with my brush.'

Between 994 and 998 Murasaki married her kinsman Fujiwara no Nobutaka, a lieutenant in the Imperial Guard. By him she had two daughters, one of whom married the Lord Lieutenant of Tsukushi and is reputed (very doubtfully) to be the authoress of an uninteresting novel, the Tale of Sagoromo. Nobutaka died in 1001, and it was probably three years later that Murasaki's father was promised the governorship of Echizen. Owing to the machinations of an enemy the appointment was, at the last minute, almost given to some one else. Tametoki appealed to his kinsman the Prime Minister Fujiwara no Michinaga, and was eventually nominated for the post.

Murasaki was now about 26. To have taken her to Echizen would have ended all hope of a respectable second marriage. Instead Tametoki arranged that she should enter the service of Michinaga's daughter, the very serious minded Empress Akiko, then a girl of about sixteen. Part of Murasaki's time was henceforth spent at the Emperor's Palace. But, as was customary, Akiko frequently returned for considerable periods to her father's house. Of her young mistress Murasaki writes as follows^[3]: 'The Empress, as is well known to those about her, is strongly opposed to anything savouring of flirtation; indeed, when there are men about, it is as well for any one who wants to keep on good terms with her not to show herself outside her own room. . . . I can well imagine that some of our senior ladies, with their air of almost ecclesiastical severity, must make a rather forbidding impression upon the world at large. In dress and matters of that kind we certainly cut a wretched figure, for it is well known that to show the slightest sign of caring for such things ranks with our Mistress as an unpardonable fault. But I can see no reason why, even in a society where young girls are expected to keep their heads and behave sensibly, appearances should be neglected to the point of comicality; and I cannot help thinking that her Majesty's outlook is far too narrow and uncompromising. But it is easy enough to see how this state of affairs arose. Her Majesty's mind was, at the time when she first came to Court, so entirely innocent and her own conduct so completely impeccable that, quite apart from the extreme reserve which is natural to her, she could never herself conceivably have occasion to make even the most trifling confession. Consequently, whenever she heard one of us admit to some slight shortcoming, whether of conduct or character, she henceforward regarded this person as a monster of iniquity.

'True, at that period certain incidents occurred which proved that some of her attendants were, to say the least of it, not very well suited to occupy so responsible a position. But she would never have discovered this had not the offenders been incautious enough actually to boast in her hearing about their trivial irregularities. Being young and inexperienced she had no notion that such things were of everyday occurrence, brooded incessantly upon the wickedness of those about her, and finally consorted only with persons so staid that they could be relied upon not to cause her a moment's anxiety.

'Thus she has gathered round her a number of very worthy young ladies. They have the merit of sharing all her opinions, but seem in some curious way like children who have never grown up.

'As the years go by her Majesty is beginning to acquire more experience of life, and no longer judges others by the same rigid standards as before; but meanwhile her Court has gained a reputation for extreme dullness, and is shunned by all who can manage to avoid it.

'Her Majesty does indeed still constantly warn us that it is a great mistake to go too far, "for a single slip may bring very unpleasant consequences," and so on, in the old style; but she now also begs us not to reject advances in such a way as to hurt people's feelings. Unfortunately, habits of long standing are not so easily changed; moreover, now that the Empress's exceedingly stylish brothers bring so many of their young courtier-friends to amuse themselves at her house, we have in self-defence been obliged to become more virtuous than ever.'

There is a type of disappointed undergraduate, who believes that all his social and academic failures are due to his being, let us say, at Magdalene instead of at St. John's. Murasaki, in like manner, had persuaded herself that all would have been well if her father had placed her in the highly cultivated and easy-mannered entourage of the Emperor's aunt, Princess Senshi.^[4] 'Princess Senshi and her ladies,' Murasaki writes, 'are always going off to see the sunset or the fading of the moon at dawn, or pursuing some truant nightingale amid the flowering trees. The Princess herself is a woman of marked character, who is determined to follow her own tastes, and would contrive to lead at Court a life as detached as her present existence at the Kamo Shrine. How different from this place, with its perpetual: "The Empress has been summoned into the Presence and commands you to attend her," or "Prepare to receive his Excellency the Prime Minister, who may arrive at any moment." Princess Senshi's apartments are not subject to the sudden alarms and incursions from which we suffer. There one could apply oneself in earnest to anything one cared for and was good at; there, occupied perhaps in making something really beautiful, one would have no time for those indiscreet conversations which at our own Court are the cause of so much trouble. There I should be allowed to live buried in my own thoughts like a tree-stump in the earth; at the same time, they would not expect me to hide from every man with whom I was not already acquainted; and even if I addressed a few remarks to such a person, I should not be thought lost to all sense of shame. Indeed, I can imagine myself under such circumstances becoming, after a certain amount of practice, quite lively and amusing!'

While pining for the elegance and freedom of Princess Senshi's Court, Murasaki was employed by her earnest young mistress for a purpose that the world would have considered far more improper than the philandering of which Akiko so sternly disapproved. The Empress had a secret desire to learn Chinese. The study of this language was considered at the time far too rough and strenuous an occupation for women. There were no grammars or dictionaries, and each horny sentence had to be grappled and mastered like an untamed steer. That Akiko should wish to learn Chinese must have been as shocking to Michinaga as it would have been to Gladstone if one of his daughters had wanted to learn boxing. Murasaki had, as we have seen, picked up something of the language by overhearing her brother's lessons. She did everything in her power to conceal this knowledge, even pretending (as she tells us in the Diary) that she could not read the Chinese characters on her mistress's screen; but somehow or other it leaked out: 'Since the summer before last, very secretly, in odd moments when there happened to be no one about, I have been reading with her Majesty the two books of "Songs."^[5] There has of course been no question of formal lessons; her Majesty has merely picked up a little here and there, as she felt inclined. All the same, I have thought it best to say nothing about the matter to anybody. . . .'

We gather, however, that what in the long run made Akiko's Court distasteful to Murasaki was not the seriousness of the women so much as the coarseness and stupidity of the men. Michinaga, Akiko's father, was now forty-two. He had already been Prime Minister for some fourteen years, and had carried the fortunes of the Fujiwara family to their apogee. It is evident that he made love to Murasaki, though possibly in a more or less bantering way. In 1008 she writes: 'From my room beside the entrance to the gallery I can see into the garden. The dew still lies heavy and a faint mist rises from it. His Excellency^[6] is walking in the garden. Now he has summoned one of his attendants and is giving directions to him about having the moat cleared. In front of the orange trees there is a bed of lady-flowers (ominabeshi) in full bloom. He plucks a spray and returning to the house hands it to me over the top of my screen. He looks very magnificent. I remember that I have not yet powdered my face and feel terribly embarrassed. "Come now," he cries, "be quick with your poem, or I shall lose my temper." This at any rate gives me a chance to retire from his scrutiny; I go over to the writing-box and produce the following: "If these beyond other flowers are fair, 'tis but because the dew hath picked them out and by its power made them sweeter than the rest." "That's right," he said, taking the poem. "It did not take you long in the end." And sending for his own ink-stone he wrote the answer: "Dew favours not; it is the flower's thoughts that flush its cheeks and make it fairer than the rest."'

The next reference to Michinaga's relations with Murasaki is as follows: 'His Excellency the Prime Minister caught sight of The Tale of Genji in her Majesty's room, and after making the usual senseless jokes about it, he handed me the following poem, written on a strip of paper against which a spray of plum-blossom had been pressed: "How comes it that, sour as the plum-tree's fruit, you have contrived to blossom forth in tale so amorous?" To this I answered: "Who has told you that the fruit belies the flower? For the fruit you have not tasted, and the flower you know but by report."^[7]

'One night when I was sleeping in a room which opens on to the corridor, I heard some one tapping. So frightened was I that for the whole of the rest of the night I lay dead still on my bed, scarcely daring to breathe. Next morning came the following poem from His Excellency: "More patient than the water-rail that taps upon the tree-root all night long, in vain I loitered on the threshold of your inhospitable room." To this I answered: "So great was your persistence that for a water-rail I did indeed mistake you; and lucky am I to have made this merciful mistake."'^[8]

Again, in 1010: 'To-day his Excellency had an audience with the Emperor; when it was over they came out of the Audience Chamber together, and banqueted. As usual, his Excellency became very drunk and, fearing trouble, I tried to keep out of his way. But he noticed my absence and sent for me, crying out: "Here's your mistress's papa taking dinner with the Emperor; it is not every one who gets the chance of being present on an occasion like this. You ought to be uncommonly grateful. Instead of which your one idea seems to be how to escape at the earliest possible moment. I can't make you out at all!"

He went on scolding me for some time, and then said: "Well, now you are here, you must make a poem. It is one of the days when the parent's^[9] poem is always made by a substitute. You will do as well as anybody; so be quick about it. . . ." I was afraid at first that if I showed myself he would behave in such a way as to make me feel very uncomfortable. But it turned out that he was not so extraordinarily drunk after all; indeed, he was in a very charming mood and, in the light of the great lamp, looked particularly handsome.'

It has often been observed that whereas in her commonplace book (the Makura no Sōshi) Sei Shōnagon^[10] scarcely so much as mentions the existence of the other ladies-in-waiting, Murasaki refers constantly to her companions, and to one of them at least she was evidently very strongly attached. Her great friend was Lady Saishō. 'On my way back from the Empress's rooms I peeped in at Saishō's door. I had forgotten that she had been on duty at night and would now be having her morning sleep. She had thrown over her couch various dresses with bright-coloured linings, and on top of them had spread a covering of beaten silk, lustrous and heavily scented with perfume. Her face was hidden under the clothes; but as she lay there, her head resting on a box-shaped writing-case, she looked so pretty that I could not help thinking of the little princesses in picture-books. I raised the clothes from her face and said to her: "You are like a girl in a story." She turned her head and said sharply: "You lunatic! Could you not see I was asleep? You are too inconsiderate. . . ." While she was saying this she half raised herself from her couch and looked up at me. Her face was flushed. I have never seen her so handsome. So it often is; even those whom we at all times admire will, upon some occasion, suddenly seem to us ten times more lovely than ever before.'

Saishō is her constant companion and her fellow victim during the drunken festivities which they both detested. The following is from a description of an entertainment given on the fiftieth day after the birth of the Empress Akiko's first child: 'The old Minister of the Right, Lord Akimitsu, came staggering along and banged into the screen behind which we sat, making a hole in it. What really struck us was that he is getting far too old^[11] for this kind of thing. But I am sure he did not at all know that this was the impression he was making. Next followed matching of fans, and noisy jokes, many of which were in very bad taste.

'Presently the General of the Right came and stood near the pillar on our left. He was looking at us and seemed to be examining our dresses, but with a very different expression from the rest. He cannot bear these drunken revels. If only there were more like him! And I say this despite the fact that his conversation is often very indecent; for he manages to give a lively and amusing turn to whatever he says. I noticed that when the great tankard came his way he did not drink out of it, but passed it on, merely saying the usual words of good omen. At this Lord Kintō^[12] shouted: "The General is on his best behaviour. I expect little Murasaki is somewhere not far off!" "You're none of you in the least like Genji," I thought to myself, "so what should Murasaki be doing here?" . . . Then the Vice-Councillor began pulling about poor Lady Hyōbu, and the Prime Minister made comic noises which I found very disagreeable. It was still quite early, and knowing well what would be the latter stages of an entertainment which had begun in this way, I waited till things seemed to have come to a momentary pause and then plotted with Lady Saishō to slip away and hide. Presently however the Prime Minister's sons and other young Courtiers burst into the room; a fresh hubbub began, and when they heard that two ladies were in hiding they tracked us down and flung back the screen behind which we had ensconced ourselves. We were now prisoners. . . .'

The Diary contains a series of notes chiefly upon the appearance but also in a few cases upon the character of other ladies at Court. Her remarks on Lady Izumi Shikibu, one of the greatest poets whom Japan has produced, are of interest: 'Izumi Shikibu is an amusing letter-writer; but there is something not very satisfactory about her. She has a gift for dashing off informal compositions in a careless running-hand; but in poetry she needs either an interesting subject or some classic model to imitate. Indeed it does not seem to me that in herself she is really a poet at all.

'However, in the impromptus which she recites there is always something beautiful or striking. But I doubt if she is capable of saying anything interesting about other people's verses. She is not intelligent enough. It is odd; to hear her talk you would certainly think that she had a touch of the poet in her. Yet she does not seem to produce anything that one can call serious poetry. . . .'

Here, too, is the note on Sei Shōnagon,^[13] author of the famous Makura no Sōshi: 'Sei Shōnagon's most marked characteristic is her extraordinary self-satisfaction. But examine the pretentious compositions in Chinese script which she scatters so liberally over the Court, and you will find them to be a mere patchwork of blunders. Her chief pleasure consists in shocking people; and as each new eccentricity becomes only too painfully familiar, she gets driven on to more and more outrageous methods of attracting notice. She was once a person of great taste and refinement; but now she can no longer restrain herself from indulging, even under the most inappropriate circumstances, in any outburst that the fancy of the moment suggests. She will soon have forfeited all claim to be regarded as a serious character, and what will become of her^[14] when she is too old for her present duties I really cannot imagine.'

It was not likely that Murasaki, who passed such biting judgments on her companions, would herself escape criticism. In her diary she tells us the following anecdote: 'There is a certain lady here called Sayemon no Naishi who has evidently taken a great dislike to me, though I have only just become aware of it. It seems that behind my back she is always saying the most unpleasant things. One day when some one had been reading The Tale of Genji out loud to the Emperor, his Majesty said: "This lady has certainly been reading the Annals of Japan. She must be terribly learned." Upon the strength of this casual remark Naishi spread a report all over the Court that I prided myself on my enormous learning, and henceforth I was known as "Dame Annals" wherever I went.'

The most interesting parts of the Diary are those in which Murasaki describes her own feelings. The following passage refers to the winter of 1008 A.D.: 'I love to see the snow here,^[15] and was hoping from day to day that it would begin before Her Majesty went back to Court, when I was suddenly obliged to go home.^[16] Two days after I arrived, the snow did indeed begin to fall. But here, where everything is so sordid, it gives me very little pleasure. As, seated once more at the familiar window, I watch it settling on the copses in front of the house, how vividly I recall those years^[17] of misery and perplexity! Then I used to sit hour after hour at this same window, and each day was like the last, save that since yesterday some flower had opened or fallen, some fresh song-bird arrived or flown away. So I watched the springs and autumns in their procession, saw the skies change, the moon rise; saw those same branches white with frost or laden with snow. And all the while I was asking myself over and over again: "What has the future in store for me? How will this end?" However, sometimes I used to read, for in those days I got a certain amount of pleasure out of quite ordinary romances; I had one or two intimate friends with whom I used to correspond, and there were several other people, not much more than acquaintances, with whom I kept up a casual intercourse. So that, looking back on it now, it seems to me that, one way and another, I had a good many minor distractions.

'Even then I realized that my branch of the family was a very humble one; but the thought seldom troubled me, and I was in those days far indeed from the painful consciousness of inferiority which makes life at Court a continual torment to me.

'To-day I picked up a romance which I used to think quite entertaining, and found to my astonishment that it no longer amused me at all. And it is the same with my friends. I have a feeling that those with whom I used to be most intimate would now consider me worldly and flippant, and I have not even told them that I am here. Others, on whose discretion I completely relied, I now have reason to suspect of showing my letters to all and sundry. If they think that I write to them with that intention they cannot know very much of my character! It is surely natural under such circumstances that a correspondence should either cease altogether or become formal and infrequent. Moreover, I now come here so seldom that in many cases it seems hardly worth while to renew former friendships, and many of those who wanted to call I have put off with excuses. . . . The truth is I now find that I have not the slightest pleasure in the society of any but a few indispensable friends. They must be people who really interest me, with whom I can talk seriously on serious subjects, and with whom I am brought into contact without effort on my side in the natural course of everyday existence. I am afraid this sounds very exacting! But stay, there is Lady Dainagon. She and I used to sleep very close together every night at the Palace and talk for hours. I see her now as she used to look during those conversations, and very much wish that she were here. So I have a little human feeling, after all!'

A little later in the same winter Murasaki sees the Gosechi dancers^[18] at the Palace, and wonders how they have reached their present pitch of forwardness and self-possession: 'Seeing several officers of the Sixth Rank coming towards them to take away their fans, the dancers threw the fans across to them in a manner which was adroit enough, but which somehow made it difficult to remember that they were women at all. If I were suddenly called upon to expose myself in that fashion I should completely lose my head. But already I do a hundred things which a few years ago I should never have dreamed myself capable of doing. So strange indeed are the hidden processes which go on in the heart of man that I shall no doubt continue to part with one scruple after another till in the end what now appears to me as the most abandoned shamelessness will seem perfectly proper and natural. Thus I reflected upon the unreality of all our attitudes and opinions, and began sketching out to myself the probable course of my development. So extraordinary were the situations in which I pictured myself that I became quite confused, and saw very little of the show.'

The most direct discussion of her own character comes in a passage towards the end of the diary: 'That I am very vain, reserved, unsociable, wanting always to keep people at a distance—that I am wrapped up in the study of ancient stories, conceited, living all the time in a poetical world of my own and scarcely realizing the existence of other people, save occasionally to make spiteful and depreciatory comments upon them—such is the opinion of me that most strangers hold, and they are prepared to dislike me accordingly. But when they get to know me, they find to their extreme surprise that I am kind and gentle—in fact, quite a different person from the monster they had imagined; as indeed many have afterwards confessed. Nevertheless, I know that I have been definitely set down at Court as an ill-natured censorious prig. Not that I mind very much, for I am used to it and see that it is due to things in my nature which I cannot possibly change. The Empress has often told me that, though I seemed always bent upon not giving myself away in the royal presence, yet she felt after a time as if she knew me more intimately than any of the rest.'

The Diary closes in 1010. After this we do not know one solitary fact concerning Murasaki's life or death; save that in 1025 she was still in Akiko's service and in that year took part in the ceremonies connected with the birth of the future Emperor Go-Ryōzen.

The Composition of Genji

It is generally assumed that the book was written during the three or at the most four years which elapsed between the death of Murasaki's husband and her arrival at Court. Others suggest that it was begun then, and finished some time before the winter of 1008. This assumption is based on the three references to The Tale of Genji which occur in the Diary. But none of these allusions seem to me to imply that the Tale was already complete. From the first reference it is evident that the book was already so far advanced as to show that Murasaki was its heroine; the part of the Tale which was read to the Emperor^[19] was obviously the first chapter, which ends with a formula derived directly from the early annals: 'Some say that it was the Korean fortune-teller who gave him the name of Genji the Shining One.' Such 'alternative explanations' are a feature of early annals in most countries and occur frequently in those of Japan. Lastly, Michinaga's joke about the discrepancy between the prudishness of Murasaki's conduct and the erotic character of her book implies no more than that half-a-dozen chapters were in existence. It may be thought odd that she should have shown it to any one before it was finished. But the alternative is to believe that it was completed in seven years, half of which were spent at Court under circumstances which could have given her very little leisure. It is much more probable, I think, that The Tale of Genji, having been begun in 1001, was carried on slowly after Murasaki's arrival at Court, during her holidays and in spare time at the Palace, and not completed till, say, 1015 or even 1020. The middle and latter parts certainly give the impression of having been written by some one of comparatively mature age. In 1022 the book was undoubtedly complete, for the Sarashina Diary refers to the 'fifty-odd chapters of The Tale of Genji.' In 1031 Murasaki's name is absent from a list where one might expect to find it, and it is possible that she was then no longer alive.^[20]

The Empress Akiko lived on till 1074, reaching an even riper age than Queen Victoria, whom in certain ways she so much resembled.

Notes

On Genji's Household.

Polygamy in Japan as elsewhere was confined to the upper classes, who alone were able to support the expense of so costly an institution. The actual wife (kita no kata, 'north side') of a man in Genji's position had to be of the same social class as the husband, a condition fulfilled by Aoi, but not by Murasaki, who was never strictly speaking a kita no kata, but merely a tai no uye ('lady of the wing'). It will be remembered that Murasaki's mother was not of noble birth. Falling Flowers, Akashi and the rest were theoretically on the same footing as Murasaki. The number of ladies in an establishment was limited not by law or religion, but by expense and above all (in a case such as that of Genji) by the difficulty of dealing with the emotional situation that arose from large households. Did polygamy create different emotional situations from those to which we are accustomed—if, for example, it were so much taken for granted that jealousy ceased to exist—a novel dealing with a polygamous society would make very little appeal to us. It is because in Genji the re-actions of the characters are precisely the same as ours would be under similar circumstances, that the book holds our attention.

Another point concerning Genji's household that perhaps requires comment is the apparent ability of persons to live years in the same house without ever having met. But such a thing happens frequently at English University Colleges, and we must envisage Genji's palace as more like a college than a house,—consisting, in fact, of separate courtyards and cloisters, joined by covered galleries. Hence it comes about that, in the story, Genji's various favourites tend to be isolated from one another in a way which is not always advantageous to the construction of the book. Later on the authoress realizes the danger of the tale falling into a series of disconnected episodes, in which the personality of Genji is the only common factor—and takes pains to bring her heroines into relation with one another.

On the Time-scheme in Genji.

A pamphleteer has recently shown how complete and elaborate is the time-scheme that underlies Emily Brontë's Wuthering Heights. It is obvious that Genji is based upon an equally precise scheme. Here is no 'Oriental vagueness'; indeed it is inconceivable that Murasaki had not prepared for herself some species of chronological chart, which she kept constantly by her when at work. If it has appeared to any reader that her sense of time is vague, the fault is entirely mine. In one case, indeed, I am conscious of having created this impression by translating inappropriately a phrase about the young Emperor Ryōzen, whereby I make him seem much older than the chronology warrants. But there is never a moment in the story at which the authoress has not got a precise idea about the age of every character in it.

1. Diary, Hakubunkwan text, p. 51.
2. Died young, perhaps about 1012, while serving on his father's staff in Echigo.
3. Diary, p. 51.
4. 963–1035. Vestal at Kamo during five successive reigns. One of the most important figures of her day; known to history as the Great Vestal.
5. The third and fourth body of Po Chü-i's poetical works, including Magic, The Old Man with the Broken Arm, The Prisoner, The Two Red Towers, and The Dragon of the Pool, all of which are translated in my '170 Chinese Poems.'
6. Michinaga.
7. 'You have neither read my book nor won my love.' Both poems contain a number of double-meanings which it would be tedious to unravel.
8. Kui-na means 'water-rail' and 'regret not.'
9. The parent of the Empress.
10. Lady-in-waiting to the Empress Sadako, Akiko's predecessor.
11. He was now 64.
12. Fujiwara no Kintō (966–1041), famous poet; cousin of Michinaga.
13. See p. 22. Shōnagon was about ten years senior to Murasaki. She was lady-in-waiting first to the Empress Sadako (died, 1000 A.D.); then to Sadako's sister Princess Shigesa (died, 1002 A.D.); finally to the Empress Akiko.
14. Murasaki suggests that Shōnagon will lose Akiko's confidence and be dismissed. There is indeed a tradition (Kojidan, vol. ii) that when some courtiers were out walking one day they passed a dilapidated hovel. One of them mentioned a rumour that Sei Shōnagon, a wit and beauty of the last reign, was now living in this place. Whereupon an incredibly lean hag shot her head out at the door, crying 'Won't you buy old bones, old rags and bones?' and immediately disappeared again.
15. At the Prime Minister's.
16. Her parents' house.
17. After the death of her husband.
18. See below, p. 125.
19. For the Emperor's remark, see above, p. 25.
20. Murasaki was outlived by her father, so that it is improbable that she reached any great age.