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Pre-Modern Japanese Literature

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Pre-Modern Japanese Literature Pre‐modern Japanese Literature July 31, 2014 Saeko Shibayama Japanese Literature? Big Names? Haruki Murakami (1949‐) KenzaburōŌe (1935‐, Nobel 1994) Yukio Mishima (1925‐1970) Yasunari Kawabata (1899‐1972, Nobel 1968) Jun’ichirō Tanizaki (1886‐1965) Ryūnosuke Akutagawa (1892‐1927) Sōseki Natsume (1867‐1916) Ōgai Mori (1862‐1922) Chikamatsu Monzaemon (1653‐1725) Matsuo Bashō (1644‐1694): haiku poems Ihara Saikaku (1642‐1693) Zeami (ca. 1363‐1443) Kamo no Chomei (1153‐1216) Murasaki Shikibu (Lady Murasaki, d. ca. 1014) Genji monogatari Sei Shōnagon (b. 965?) Pillow Book Kokinshū (905) Man’yōshū (ca, 785) Kojiki (Record of Ancient Matters, 712) Pre‐modern Literature Goethe, Faust (1808, 1832) (Meiji period, 1868‐1912) Dream of the Red Chamber (China, 18th Century) Jean‐Jacques Rousseau, Confession (1782‐89) Laurence Sterne, Tristram Shandy (1759) Miguel de Cervantes, Don Quixote (1605‐1615) Edo period, 1603‐1868 William Shakespeare (1564‐1616) Nō play, “Lady Aoi” (Muromachi period, 14‐16th c.) Geoffrey Chaucer, The Canterbury Tales (1380s) Giovanni Boccaccio, The Decameron (ca, 1348‐53) Beowulf (ca. 975‐1025) Genji monogatari (Heian period, ca.1000) Augustine, Confessions (397‐8) Nara period, 710‐794 ★ Why do we read pre‐modern literature/”classics”? • to learn about the society/historical period • to learn about (historical) language • to learn about “humanities” (universal values and ideas, “literature”) • to learn about deeper and more nuanced aspects of human life • to acquire personal “cultivation” (教養, kyōyō) • to enjoy; entertain oneself (i.e. Tsurezuregusa 徒然草, Essays of Idleness); new realms of knowledge experience Brief History of Japan up to Edo period c.f. William Wayne Farris, Japan to 1600: A Social and Economic History (University of Hawaii Press, 2009) • 35,000‐15,000 BP: The Paleolithic • 15,000 BP‐900 BCE: Jōmon Age (“the most materially affluent hunter‐gatherer society,” Jōmon=“rope‐pattern”) • 900 BCE‐250 CE: Yayoi Period (agrarian, rice producing, metallurgical techniques—weapons) • 250‐600 CE: The Tomb Era (10,000 tumuli, burial mounds, • ca. 538 CE: transmission of Buddhism via Korea (→ importation of Chinese characters) • late 7th CE: the first name “Japan” (nihon 日本)/new centralized state emerged • 712 Kojiki (Records of Ancient Matters) Oldest Extant Manuscript of The Chronicle of Ancient Matters (712→1371, NT) Phonograph and Logograph あいうえお (hiragana) アイウエオ (katakana) 亜伊羽枝尾 羽‐‐‐phonographically, “u”; logographically, hane (“feather”) Man’yōshū (Collection of Myriad Leaves, ca. 785) Kokinshū (Collection of Ancient and Modern Poems, 905) Kokinshū (Collection of Ancient and Modern Poems, 905) waka (lit. “Japanese songs”): 5/7/5/7/7 hana no iro wa The color of the flowers utsuri ni keri na has faded—in vain itazura ni I grow old in this world, waga mi yo ni furu lost in thought nagame seshi ma ni as the long rain falls. (Ono no Komachi, Spring 2, 113) Kokinshū (Collection of Ancient and Modern Poems, 905) • first imperially redacted anthology of Japanese poems • manuscript written in predominantly kana (Japanese syllabary) • established poetic topics and associations: four seasons (spring, summer, autumn, winter); love (different stages of love); travel, celebration and miscellaneous, etc. c.f. haiku • 5/7/5 (first half of waka poem) • waka → renga → haiku • must contain seasonal words (kigo) and cutting words (kire‐ji) furuike ya An old pond‐‐ kawazu tobikomu a frog leaps in, mizu no oto the sound of water. (Matsuo Bashō) Heian Court Literature (around 1000) • Fujiwara regency politics • Empress’ literary salons→ talented ladies‐in‐ waiting Sei Shōnagon (b. 965?) Pillow Book: essay/diary Murasaki Shikibu (Lady Murasaki, d. ca. 1014) Genji monogatari The Tale of Genji (Genji monogatari, 源氏物語, ca. 1001‐1010) • Author: Murasaki Shikibu (d. ca. 1014) ‐Daughter of a scholar of Chinese literature and poet, a court official, a provincial governor ‐in 970‐978, spent time in Echizen (Present‐day Fukui prefecture) ‐married Fujiwara no Nobutaka, had a daughter; Nobutaka died in 1001 ‐summoned to the imperial court around 1005 or 1006 to serve Empress Shōshi (彰子), the daughter of Fujiwara no Michinaga The Tale of Genji (Genji monogatari, 源氏物語, ca. 1001‐1010) • 54 Chapters • some 800 waka poems (5/7/5/7/7) c.f. haiku (5/7/5) • 3 parts • Main themes: the protagonist Genji being an amorous man (iro gonomi), forbidden love, and transgression (mono no magire) • Influence of Chinese literature → Chinese Tang dynasty poet, Bo Juyi’s ballad, “The Song of Everlasting Sorrow” (Chōgonka 長恨歌) • comparable to the modern “psychological” “novel”? c.f. Virginia Woolf on the Genji • a kind of multiple bildungsroman (“a novel dealing with one person’s formative years or spiritual education” OED) Genji, Murasaki, etc. Genji Chapter Titles Genji Manuscripts a late Kamakura (14th c) manuscript: 3.2 million USD Genji monogatari emaki (Picture scrolls, 12th century, NT) Genji kokagami (Small Mirror of the Genji, ca. 15th century, a medieval “handbook/digest” of the Genji Various Genji‐e (Genji Pictures) Influences of the Genji monogatari: Beyond Genres, Genders, Time and Place • More than 500 commentaries written on the Genji by the end of the Edo period • First received by waka poets (mostly male) of the medieval period → warrior elites, Edo literati: the Genji as a guidebook for poetry composition • Constant female readership: the Genji as a romance (readership especially expanded during the Edo period with the introduction of movable types and other print technology) • Adaptations in various nō plays during the Muromachi period (14‐16th c.) • English Translation: Arthur Waley 1921‐33; Edward Seidensticker 1976; Royall Tyler 2001 + more than 6 modern Japanese tr. (i.e. Tanizaki Junichirō) • Virginia Woolf (1882‐1941), “The Tale of Genji” (1925) • numerous modern film adaptations Michael Emmerich, The Tale of Genji: Translation, Canonization, and World Literature (Columbia UP, 2013) Asaki yumemishi (The Tale of Genji, by Yamato Waki, 1979‐93, 13 vols.) English Translations of the Genji Arthur Waley (1889‐1966), 1925 (1921‐33, 6 volumes) Edward Seidensticker (1921‐ 2007), 1976 Royall Tyler (1936‐), 2001 c.f. Donald Keene (1922‐) • literary genres: poetry (waka, kanshi), diary (nikki), essay (zuihitsu), anecdotal tales (setsuwa), poem‐tales (uta‐gatari) • monogatari (“tale”): c.f. Taketori monogatari (The Tales of the Bamboo Cutter, ca. 909) • Genji monogatari: one of the world’s first “novels?” • What’s so “novelistic” about the work? • omniscient narrator (opinionated) • character developments (bildungsroman) • plot structure (foreshadowing) • frequent switching of scenes • the overall length and structure Genji, “Heartvine” (Aoi) Chapter • Fujitsubo • “Genji, he [his father—the emperor] said, must be the boy’s adviser and guardian. Genji was both pleased and embarrassed.” (330) • “You should treat any woman with tact and courtesy, and be sure that you cause her no embarrassment. You should never have a woman angry with you.” (331) [Genji’s father] • What would his father think if he were to lean of Genji’s worst indiscretion? The thought made Genji shudder. He bowed and withdrew. • At Sanjō, his wife and her family were even unhappier about his infidelities, [...] • the Kamo festival in the Fourth Month • Quite aside from her natural distress at the insult, she was filled with the bitterest charging that, having refrained from display, she had been recognized. (p. 332.) • Genji presently heard the story of the competing carriages. He was sorry for the Rokujō lady and angry at his wife. It was a sad fact that, so deliberate and fastidious, she lacked ordinary compassion.(p. 333) • his Nijō mansion • Murasaki • For the Rokujō lady the pain was unrelieved. [...] A hope of relief from this agony of indecision had sent her to the river of lustration, and there she had been subjected to violence. • At Sanjō, Genji’s wife seemed to be in the grip of a malign spirit (mononoke). • There was something very sinister about a spirit that eluded the powers of the most skilled exorcists. (335) ★ medical‐religious‐magic rites ★ Shingon esoteric Buddhism “No, no. I was hurting so, I asked them to stop for a while. I had not dreamed that I would come to you like this. It is true: a troubled soul will sometimes go wandering off.” The voice was gentle and affectionate. (337) “Bind the hem of my robe, to keep it within, the grieving soul that has wandered through the skies.” It was not Aoi’s voice, nor was the manner hers. Extraordinary— and then he knew that it was the voice of the Rokujō lady. (338) • Ceremonies honoring a boy baby are always interesting. [The scene switches] • The Rokujō lady received the news with mixed feelings. [...] The strangest things was that her robes were permeated with the scent of the poppy seeds burned at exorcisms. She changed clothes repeatedly and even washed her hair, but the odor persisted. (338) [The scene switches] • He [Genji] gazed down at her [Aoi=his wife], thinking it odd that he should have felt so dissatisfied with her over the years. (339) • “Might these clouds be the smoke that mounts from her pyre? They fill my heart with feelings too deep for words.” [The scene switches→ End of the chapter] Virginia Woolf, “The Tale of Genji by Lady Murasaki” in Vogue, July 1925. • “Since her book was read aloud, we may imagine an audience; but her listeners must have been astute, subtle minded, sophisticated men and women.” [...] (265) • [...] there are two kinds of artists, said Murasaki: one who makes trifles to fit
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