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Murasaki Shikibu
The Tale of Genji
Translated by Edward G.Seidensticker
Chapter 1
The Paulownia Pavilion
In a certain reign there was a lady not of the first rank whom the emperor
loved more than any of the others. The grand ladies with high ambitions
thought her a presumptuous upstart, and lesser ladies were still more
resentful. Everything she did offended someone. Probably aware of what
was happening, she fell seriously ill and came to spend more time at home
than at court. The emperor's pity and affection quite passed bounds. No
longer caring what his ladies and courtiers might say, he behaved as if
intent upon stirring gossip.
His court looked with very great misgiving upon what seemed a
reckless infatuation. In China just such an unreasoning passion had been
the undoing of an emperor and had spread turmoil through the land. As
the resentment grew, the example of Yang Kuei-fei was the one most
frequently cited against the lady.
She survived despite her troubles, with the help of an unprecedented
bounty of love. Her father, a grand councillor, was no longer living. Her
mother, an old-fashioned lady of good lineage, was determined that mat-
ters be no different for her than for ladies who with paternal support were
making careers at court. The mother was attentive to the smallest detail of
etiquette and deportment. Yet there was a limit to what she could do. The
sad fact was that the girl was without strong backing, and each time a new
incident arose she was next to defenseless.
It may have been because of a bond in a former life that she bore the
emperor a beautiful son, a jewel beyond compare. The emperor was in a
fever of impatience to see the child, still with the mother's family; and
when, on the earliest day possible, he was brought to court, he did indeed
prove to be a most marvelous babe. The emperor's eldest son was the
grandson of the Minister of the Right. The world assumed that with this
powerful support he would one day be named crown prince; but the new
child was far more beautiful. On public occasions the emperor continued
to favor his eldest son. The new child was a private treasure, so to speak,
on which to lavish uninhibited affection.
The mother was not of such a low rank as to attend upon the em-
peror's personal needs. In the general view she belonged to the upper
classes. He insisted on having her always beside him, however, and on
nights when there was music or other entertainment he would require that
she be present. Sometimes the two of them would sleep late, and even after
they had risen he would not let her go. Because of his unreasonable
demands she was widely held to have fallen into immoderate habits out
of keeping with her rank.
With the birth of the son, it became yet clearer that she was the
emperor's favorite. The mother of the eldest son began to feel uneasy. If
she did not manage carefully, she might see the new son designated crown
prince. She had come to court before the emperor's other ladies, she had
once been favored over the others, and she had borne several of his chil-
dren. However much her complaining might trouble and annoy him, she
was one lady whom he could not ignore.
Though the mother of the new son had the emperor's love, her detrac-
tors were numerous and alert to the slightest inadvertency. She was in
continuous torment, feeling that she had nowhere to turn. She lived in the
paulownia Court. The emperor had to pass the apartments of other ladies
to reach hers, and it must be admitted that their resentment at his constant
comings and goings was not unreasonable. Her visits to the royal chambers
were equally frequent. The robes of her women were in a scandalous state
from trash strewn along bridges and galleries. Once some women con-
spired to have both doors of a gallery she must pass bolted shut, and so
she found herself unable to advance or retreat. Her anguish over the
mounting list of insults was presently more than the emperor could bear.
He moved a lady out of rooms adjacent to his own and assigned them to
the lady of the paulownia Court and so, of course, aroused new resent-
ment.
When the young prince reached the age of three, the resources of the
treasury and the stewards' offices were exhausted to make the ceremonial
bestowing of trousers as elaborate as that for the eldest son. Once more
there was malicious talk; but the prince himself, as he grew up, was so
superior of mien and disposition that few could find it in themselves to
dislike him. Among the more discriminating, indeed, were some who mar-
veled that such a paragon had been born into this world.
In the summer the boy's mother, feeling vaguely unwell, asked that
she be allowed to go home. The emperor would not hear of it. Since they
were by now used to these indispositions, he begged her to stay and see
what course her health would take. It was steadily worse, and then, sud-
denly, everyone could see that she was failing. Her mother came pleading
that he let her go home. At length he agreed.
Fearing that even now she might be the victim of a gratuitous insult,
she chose to go off without ceremony, leaving the boy behind. Everything
must have an end, and the emperor could no longer detain her. It saddened
him inexpressibly that he was not even permitted to see her off. A lady
of great charm and beauty, she was sadly emaciated. She was sunk in
melancholy thoughts, but when she tried to put them into words her voice
was almost inaudible. The emperor was quite beside himself, his mind a
confusion of things that had been and things that were to come. He wept
and vowed undying love, over and over again. The lady was unable to
reply. She seemed listless and drained of strength, as if she scarcely knew
what was happening. Wanting somehow to help, the emperor ordered that
she be given the honor of a hand-drawn carriage. He returned to her
apartments and still could not bring himself to the final parting.
"We vowed that we would go together down the road we all must go.
You must not leave me behind."
She looked sadly up at him. "If I had suspected that it would be
so--" She was gasping for breath.
"I leave you, to go the road we all must go.
The road I would choose, if only I could, is the other."
It was evident that she would have liked to say more; but she was so
weak that it had been a struggle to say even this much.
The emperor was wondering again if he might not keep her with him
and have her with him to the end.
But a message came from her mother, asking that she hurry. "We have
obtained the agreement of eminent ascetics to conduct the necessary ser-
vices, and I fear that they are to begin this evening."
So, in desolation, he let her go. He passed a sleepless night.
He sent off a messenger and was beside himself with impatience and
apprehension even before there had been time for the man to reach the
lady's house and return. The man arrived to find the house echoing with
laments. She had died at shortly past midnight. He returned sadly to the
palace. The emperor closed himself up in his private apartments.<N 5> He would
have liked at least to keep the boy with him, but no precedent could be
found for having him away from his mother's house through the mourn-
ing. The boy looked in bewilderment at the weeping courtiers, at his father
too, the tears streaming over his face. The death of a parent is sad under
any circumstances, and this one was indescribably sad.
But there must be an end to weeping, and orders were given for the
funeral. If only she could rise to the heavens with the smoke from the pyre,
said the mother between her sobs. She rode in the hearse with several
attendants, and what must her feelings have been when they reached
Mount Otaki? It was there that the services were conducted with the
utmost solemnity and dignity.
She looked down at the body. "With her before me, I cannot persuade
myself that she is dead. At the sight of her ashes I can perhaps accept what
has happened."
The words were rational enough, but she was so distraught that she
seemed about to fall from the carriage. The women had known that it
would be so and did what they could for her.
A messenger came from the palace with the news that the lady had
been raised to the Third Rank, and presently a nunciary arrived to read the
official order. For the emperor, the regret was scarcely bearable that he had
not had the courage of his resolve to appoint her an imperial consort, and
he wished to make amends by promoting her one rank. There were many
who resented even this favor. Others, however, of a more sensitive nature,
saw more than ever what a dear lady she had been, simple and gentle and
difficult to find fault with. It was because she had been excessively favored
by the emperor that she had been the victim of such malice. The grand
ladies were now reminded of how sympathetic and unassuming she had
been. It was for just such an occasion, they remarked to one another, that
the phrase "how well one knows" had been invented.
The days went dully by. The emperor was careful to send offerings
for the weekly memorial services. His grief was unabated and he spent his
nights in tears, refusing to summon his other ladies. His serving women
were plunged into dew-drenched autumn.
There was one lady, however, who refused to be placated. "How
ridiculous," said the lady of the Kokiden pavilion, mother of his eldest son,
"that the infatuation should continue even now."
The emperor's thoughts were on his youngest son even when he was
with his eldest. He sent off intelligent nurses and serving women to the
house of the boy's grandmother, where he was still in residence, and made
constant inquiry after him.
The autumn tempests blew and suddenly the evenings were chilly.
Lost in his grief, the emperor sent off a note to the grandmother. His
messenger was a woman of middle rank called Myo~bu, whose father was
a guards officer. It was on a beautiful moonlit night that he dispatched her,
a night that brought memories. On such nights he and the dead lady had
played the koto for each other. Her koto had somehow had overtones
lacking in other instruments, and when she would interrupt the music to
speak, the words too carried echoes of their own. Her face, her manner--
they seemed to cling to him, but with "no more substance than the lucent
dream."
Myo~bu reached the grandmother's house. Her carriage was drawn
through the gate--and what a lonely place it was! The old lady had of
course lived in widowed retirement, but, not wishing to distress her only
daughter, she had managed to keep the place in repair. Now all was
plunged into darkness. The weeds grew ever higher and the autumn winds
tore threateningly at the garden. Only the rays of the moon managed to
make their way through the tangles.
The carriage was pulled up and Myo~bu alighted.
The grandmother was at first unable to speak. "It has been a trial for
me to go on living, and now to have one such as you come through the
dews of this wild garden--I cannot tell you how much it shames me."
"A lady who visited your house the other day told us that she had to
see with her own eyes before she could really understand your loneliness
and sorrow. I am not at all a sensitive person, and yet I am unable to control
these tears."
After a pause she delivered a message from the emperor. "He has said
that for a time it all seemed as if he were wandering in a nightmare, and
then when his agitation subsided he came to see that the nightmare would
not end. If only he had a companion in his grief, he thought--and it
occurred to him that you, my lady, might be persuaded to come unobtru-
sively to court. He cannot bear to think of the child languishing in this
house of tears, and hopes that you will come quickly and bring him with
you. He was more than once interrupted by sobs as he spoke, and It was
apparent to all of us that he feared having us think him inexcusably weak.
I came away without hearing him to the end."
"I cannot see for tears," said the old lady. "Let these sublime words
bring me light."
This was the emperor's letter: "It seems impossibly cruel that although
I had hoped for comfort with the passage of time my grief should only be
worse. I am particularly grieved that I do not have the boy with me, to
watch him grow and mature. Will you not bring him to me? We shall think
of him as a memento."
There could be no doubting the sincerity of the royal petition. A poem
was appended to the letter, but when she had come to it the old lady was
no longer able to see through her tears:
"At the sound of the wind, bringing dews to Miyagi plain,
I think of the tender hagi upon the moor."
"Tell His Majesty," said the grandmother after a time, "that it has
been a great trial for me to live so long.'Ashamed before the Takasago
pines I think that it is not for me to be seen at court. Even if the august
invitation is repeated, I shall not find it possible to accept. As for the boy,
I do not know what his wishes are. The indications are that he is eager to
go. It is sad for me, but as it should be. please tell His Majesty of these
thoughts, secret until now. I fear that I bear a curse from a previous
existence and that it would be wrong and even terrible to keep the child
with me."
"It would have given me great pleasure to look in upon him," said
Myo~bu, getting up to leave. The child was asleep. "I should have liked to
report to his royal father. But he will be waiting up for me, and it must
be very late."
"May I not ask you to come in private from time to time? The heart
