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JapaneseAesthetics
Genji has been read through the lenses of some of the following terms:
• miyabi (“courtly elegance”; refers to the aristocracy’s privileging of a refined aesthetic sensibility and an indirectness of expression): mikayo = the capital.
• mono no aware (the “poignant beauty of things;” describes a cultivated sensitivity to the ineluctable transience of the world): resigned to tragic romance/beauty
• wabi-sabi (wabi can be translated as “rustic beauty” and sabi as “desolate beauty;” the qualities usually associated with wabi and sabi are austerity, imperfection, and a palpable sense of the passage of time.
• yûgen (an emotion, a sentiment, or a mood so subtle and profoundly elegant that it is beyond what words can describe)
54 chapters in total, three parts.
The first 33 chapters describe Genji's career through birth to exile and eventual return to court. Chapters 34-51 center on Genji's dark years, ending with Murasaki's death and Genji's death. The remaining chapters move to the countryside, decline of politics.
Draws on conventional tale called monogatari (aristocrat finds a woman of humble origins and falls in love, like Genji's mother or Murasaki). Fantasy over reality.
Pursuit of love in unexpected places (exile) .
Inclusion of beautiful poems and letters exchanged between lovers, and adept use of intertextuality (especially references to Chinese poetry - Bo Juyi's "The Song of Lasting Regret").
Murasaki Shikibu: The Tale of Genji (978-1014 CE)
Considered first great novel in world literature.
Originally written for small-circle of courtiers in Kyoto. Read in installments (not in its entirety=1000 pages).
Centers on a former prince Genji (he dies 2/3 through the book) and his descendents.
The success of her writing, gained her an invitation by Empress Shoshi in 1006 to serve as a lady in waiting. Gave her the finanical support to write.
Gives the reader a crucial insight into Japanese court life and gives the loves and lives of men and women the status and interest of history.
Master at poetry as well as prose.
Capital became Heian-kyo Kyoto) in 794. A golden age in Japan. Literature produced mostly for the elite and focused on the city (capital). Chinese style writing recorded official business, women's diaries an insight into every day life. Men often had many wives and simultaneous romantic affairs. Women wore dozens of layers of clothing, hidden from view, spending most time indoors (festivals or pilgrimages might break the monotony). Women were educated in music, dance, Chinese Classics, and waka poetry (set pattern of 5-7-5-7-7 syllables - first anthology The Kokinshu (905). Use of poetry in courtship. Example: Murasaki Shikibu's The Tale of Genji.
Murasaki Shikibu served in the Fujiwara household (an extremely female-centered powerful political clan)
Chinese histories describe Japanese islands as mulitple clans, including the Yamato (lead by a female monarch). Over the centuries, the Yamato clan increased in power and used writing as a critical tool in their success. Thus two of the earliest writings in Japanese, Records of Ancient Matters (712) and Chronicles of Japan (720) are historical chronicles tracing the Yamato back to the sun goddess (Amaterasu) and in the latter yin/yang cosmology for explaining the Japanese archipelago.
Early Japanese writing, merged three belief systems: Shinto ("Way of the Gods," a folk "religion" dedicated to sacred sites in nature, exorcism of evil spirits, and purification from illness and death); Buddhist law (promised salvation from human suffering and desire and the impermanence of material things, karma, and reincarnation); and Confucian political ethics.
Zen Buddhism (school of Mahayana) follows Bodhidharma, a Chinese Buddhist monk (5-6 c. CE) known for kung fu and de-emphasizing scripture: "the face to face transmission of dharma outside the sutras." Importance of teachers and meditation.
No split between kenkai (visible world)
and yukai (invisible world)
No split between body/spirit, physical/transcendent world
Kami= sacred and material gods and spirits exist, include storms, oceans, mountains, and earthquakes
The Man' yoshu (Collection of the Myriad Leaves) includes a range of poets (i.e., Kakinomoto no Hitomaro) and a range of subjects (rituals, divine imperial lineage, laments, praises and pleas).
6th to 4th C BCE teachings attributed to Siddhartha "awakened"; Theravada Buddhism (School of Elders) and Mahayana Buddhism (Great Vehicle)
Three Jewels: The Buddha, Sangha (community), Dharma (Teachings),
Samsara: repetitive birth and death cycle
Karma: "action" drives the cycle of suffering, birth and death cycle. Cultivation of positive actions. Mental intent.
Rebirth: beings go through succession of lifetimes as one of many possible forms of sentient life - no eternal soul.
Dharma Buddhism dharma Hinduism
teachings of the Buddha natural law/order
(no punishment for not following) devotion, specific
reality as nothingness rules to reach glorious divinity -imp. of Vedas
The Classical Age
Non-violent adoption and adaptation of Korean and Chinese culture (Chinese writing system, institutions and cultural practices (divine monarch), Buddhism (state religion founded by Prince Shotoku in 6th century CE), music and rituals, painting, calligraphy, and tea.
Produced literature in two languages:
one vernacular (female, domestic sensibility) and the other Chinese style (Sino Japanese) and official language of government, religion, and aristocracy (male).