Abstract
Genji Monogatari by Murasaki Shikibu (970–1031) is a work of philosophy which does not follow the traditional western format for philosophical writing: discussion, analysis, exposition, perhaps dialogue. Rather, it takes the form of an epic novel. What it recounts is of philosophic importance for aesthetics, moral philosophy, philosophy of religion, cosmology and, metaphysics. Murasaki deserves comprehensive analysis regarding each of these areas of philosophy. In this essay, however, I will focus on the metaphysical and epistemological aspects of her work, paying particular attention to existentialist issues. One reads Genji Monogatari much the way one reads Kierkegaard, Dostoyevsky, de Beauvoir, Sartre, or any other literary existentialist philosopher: there is a story (in Murasaki’s case, many stories within stories), and the story leaves us puzzled in a peculiarly philosophical way. The puzzles it gets us to pose for ourselves concern basic questions about human existence and the meaning of life. Genji Monogatari utilizes the literary form of epic novel to trace the effects of early 11th-century eastern philosophies on Japanese society and to present its author’s criticism of those philosophies. Murasaki forces us to take stock of the effects of such a culture on women’s abilities to achieve nirvana and forces us to consider existential questions about the philosophies which informed her society.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
Notes
Grant, Francis Oriental Philosophy, New York: Dial (1938 reprint of 1936 edition) p. 166.
Grant, op. cit., 166.
Sakamaki Shunzō, “Shintō: Japanese Ethnocentrism,” in Moore, Charles A., editor, The Japanese Mind, Essentials of Japanese Philosophy and Culture. Honolulu: East-West Center Press, University of Hawaii Press, (1967), p. 24.
Sakamaki, loc. cit. quoting the scholar Motoori Norinaga notes that the term kami applied to that which is to be dreaded and revered, and includes physical as well as spiritual entities.
Grant, 172–173.
Miyamoto Shōson, “Relation of Philosophical Theory to Practical Affairs in Japan,” in Moore, Charles, A., editor, The Japanese Mind, Essentials of Japanese Philosophy and Culture. Honolulu: East-West Center Press, University of Hawaii Press, (1967), p. 5–6.
Grant, op. cit., p. 166., Sakamaki, ibid.
Sakamaki, op. cit., p. 25, citing Norinaga.
I wish to thank Professor Ayako Hasebe Taneda for this point. Personal communication, May, 1984.
McCullough, William A. “Japanese Marriage Institutions in the Heian Period,” Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies (1967) no. 27.
Haruo Shirane, “The Uju Chapters and the Denial of Romance,” Ukifune: Love in The Tale of Genji, Andrew Pekarik, editor, New York: Columbia University Press (1982), p. 117.
Bowring, Richard Murasaki Shikibu: Her Diary and Poetic Memoirs. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press (1982), p. 12.
Suyematz Kenchio, transl., Genji Monogatari, second edition, revised. Yokohama, Tokyo and Osaka: Z.P. Maruya & Co., Ltd., 1881, p. x.
Bowring, op. cit. p. 7.
ibid
Introduction to Classic Japanese Literature, Kokusai Bunka Shinkoka edition, Tokyo: Kokusai Bunka Shinkoka (1948), p. 77.
ibid
Jōtō-Mon’in Shōshi is Fujiwara no Shōshi, sometimes also referred to as Fujiwara no Akiko. See Bowring, op. cit., index.
Bowring, op. cit., p. 50 ff.
Murasaki Shikibu. The Tale of Genji, Arthur Waley trans. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1936, p. ix, n. 2, hereinafter as Genji. Cf. Miner, Earl, Odagiri, Hiroko, and Morrell, Robert E. The Princeton Companion to Classical Japanese Literature Princeton: Princeton University Press 1985, p. 203.
The female author of Sarashina Nikki was also of the Fujiwara clan, and of a literary family.
Personal communication.
Fujiwara No Teika, Meigetsuki, Nanba Hiroshi, ed., Murasaki Shikibu shū no Kenkyū: Kōihen, denpon kenkyūhen, Kasama Sōsho 31 (1972).
Miner, Odagin, Morrell, op. cit., s.v. “Mumyōzōshi.”
op. cit. s.v. “Murasaki.”
I owe this observation to Professor Taneda. Cf. Kato, Shuichi, A History of Japanese Literature: The First Thousand Years, David Chibbett, translator. London: The Macmillan Press (1979), 139 ff.
op. cit., p. 24.
Miner, Earl, “The Heroine: Identity, Recurrence, Destiny,” in Ukifune: Love in The Tale of Genji. Andrew Pekarik, editor. New York: Columbia University Press (1982), p. 63.
Personal communication.
The Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Volume 3. New York and London: Collier-Macmillan, 1972 reprint of 1967 edition, s.v. “existentialism.”
op. cit., 148.
Nakamura Hajime, “Consciousness of the Individual and the Universal Among the Japanese.” In Charles A. Moore, ed., The Japanese Mind; Essentials of Japanese Philosophy and Culture, p. 179 ff.
op. cit., p. 63–64.
loc. cit.
op. cit., p. 65.
op. cit., p. 65.
Murasaki, Genji, p. 1033.
op. cit., p. 79.
Kato, op. cit., p. 145.
Kato, op. cit., p. 148.
Bowring, op. cit. p. 139.
op. cit., p. 149.
Nakamura Hajime, A History of the Development of Japanese Thought, Volume 1, A.D. 592–1868., p. 43. Hereinafter as History.
Miner, op. cit. p. 64.
Nakamura, History, p. 44.
Murasaki, Genji, p. 973.
Bowring, op. cit., p. 140.
Nakamura, History, loc. cit.
Bowring, loc. cit.
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 1989 Kluwer Academic Publishers
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Waithe, M.E. (1989). Murasaki Shikibu. In: Waithe, M.E. (eds) A History of Women Philosophers. A History of Women Philosophers, vol 2. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-009-2551-9_1
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-009-2551-9_1
Publisher Name: Springer, Dordrecht
Print ISBN: 978-90-247-3572-3
Online ISBN: 978-94-009-2551-9
eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive