The World полностью

A few days after Lady Murasaki’s diary entry, Michinaga – whom Murasaki always calls His Excellency – was visiting his daughter, the empress Shoshi, when he noticed that she was reading a chapter of Murasaki’s novel The Tale of Genji, the story through which she invented the novel. These circulated chapters were parts of a narrative in prose that explore human experience through imagined characters in a new way pioneered by Murasaki. ‘Out came the usual comments,’ wrote Murasaki, meaning flirtatious admiration, ‘and then on a piece of paper that held some plums’ the regent scribbled this poem:

She is known for her tartness

So I am sure no one seeing her

Could pass without a taste.

‘I am shocked,’ she said, in response to his pun on tastiness, a proposition in front of his daughter to her literary mentor. But Murasaki was capable of teasing him back, noting in a poem of her own, ‘You have neither read my book nor won my love.’ Learning that every writer expects their lovers to have read their books, the regent crept into her room and stole a new chapter – and kept chasing her: ‘One night as I lay asleep, there came the sound of someone tapping at the door. I was so frightened that I kept quiet for the rest of the night.’ It is hard to tell if this was the harassment of an ageing sex pest or the flattering attention of a charismatic potentate.

She never admitted to becoming Michinaga’s lover, but it is possible she did. Murasaki,^* lady-in-waiting, novelist and poet, found herself at the very centre of the court in Heian-kyo – Kyoto – during the time of her older suitor, Fujiwara Michinaga, ruler of Japan for thirty years. She too was a Fujiwara, a distant poor cousin grateful for the favour of her relative. Yet her words are still read today.

Murasaki had married late but happily and had a daughter, but her husband died in an epidemic and she did not remarry. From the earliest age, her intelligence and learning had impressed her father, who exclaimed, ‘What a pity she wasn’t born a man!’

Hearing of her talents, Michinaga hired her as an attendant to discuss literature with his daughter Empress Shoshi. In 794, some 200 years earlier, Emperor Kanmu had consolidated a confident state, Nihon – meaning Root of the Sun – based at Heian-kyo. Arriving from Korea, Buddhism had fused with the Japanese system of deities – kami – later known as Shinto. Japan was much influenced by China, but a newly confident Japanese culture now developed.

The Fujiwara were already the leading clan when in 729 one of their daughters became the first non-royal to receive the title empress. In 850, Fujiwara Yoshifusa managed to arrange the imperial succession of Montoku his nephew. After that, the Fujiwara ruled as ‘regents’ for young emperors and ‘spokesmen’ for older ones. Their paramountcy was based on their vast wealth and constant marriage into the royal family, from whom they frequently chose child emperors. Michinaga’s father married three of his daughters to emperors. Michinaga himself introduced his daughter Shoshi into Emperor Ichijo’s harem. There was usually only one empress and many concubines, and Ichijo already had an empress, Teishi, who had delivered a son. But Michinaga demanded that Shoshi also became empress – and he got his way.

The best way to understand their world is through the writings of Michinaga’s protégée, Murasaki. It was male-dominated, calibrated strictly by rank and centred around the Great Imperial Palace compound in a grid-system capital that was similar to the Tang capital Chang’an. Life in the compound was divided between the emperor’s palace and the Court of Government where Michinaga governed. His daughter Shoshi, the empress, lived in the rear palace with her ladies-in-waiting, and lesser consorts, perhaps a thousand women altogether.

Men had more than one wife, while women could have only one husband. In The Tale of Genji, the wives all lived around the courtyard of the husband’s mansion, though more often different wives lived in different houses. Women whitened their faces, rouged their cheeks, painted their eyebrows, scented their hair and blackened their teeth, and they dressed in multilayered robes of silk, damask and brocade, dyed and changed according to the occasion. They shared in the property of their parents. Women had considerable freedom even for sexual trysts, as recounted by Murasaki: ‘All these ladies-in-waiting must have been approached by senior courtiers at one time or another. If anyone is careless there is no hiding the fact but somehow, by taking precautions, they do seem to keep their affairs secret.’ When Michinaga learned Murasaki was sharing a room with another girl, he asked (hopefully), ‘What happens when you entertain someone the other doesn’t know?’

‘A tasteless remark,’ Murasaki notes.