Literary Summits

Croquet in the backyard — a favorite memory from my family’s annual trips to Iowa in the heat of summer.

Within an hour or two after piling out of the van, and after we’d had iced tea and cookies in Grandma’s kitchen, we’d tromp out back to set up the croquet with all the hoops and stakes, wooden balls and mallets.

My grandpa would mark off the playing field, his long strides measuring the distance from one hoop to the next.

Then, TOCCKK!, the first ball is struck and the game begins.

Something like this is going on in the second chapter of Tale of Genji. After a fast-paced opener, this chapter settles down and we begin to see how the game is to be played. Genji is now 17 years old and a young captain in the palace guards. He and the other palace residents are confined indoors during early summer rains.

So young Genji ends up holding court with his close friend and two older men. The four of them start talking about women — the ideal woman, women of rank they’ve observed, and women they’ve known.

I get the impression that the narrator is pacing off the course that will be run through the next 52 chapters — rehearsing what traits are attractive in a woman, which ones are dangerous, and what’s expected of a wife. And although Genji should be paying attention, the narrator points out that he’s found dozing off at intervals while the older men are spouting off conventional wisdom and sharing personal missteps.

As they talk about the ideal woman, we get an idea of how hard it is (impossible, even?) for a real woman to meet the criteria of the day.

For example, it’s the woman’s responsibility to keep her husband faithful — and if he isn’t, she’s the one who needs to fix it. As one of the older gentlemen says, “Most of the time it is the wife’s attitude that helps her husband’s fancies to pass.”

Like croquet, there are definite rules and an order to things that must be followed. Break the rules, and you’re out of luck — back to the starter’s stake. Go through the hoops, and you get to advance.

But I have a feeling that Genji will be one of those players who doesn’t like to play by the rules.

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The Tale of Genji wastes no time getting underway — in the opening pages, I’ve already heard the story of a controversial love that rocks the emperor’s court and that ends in the untimely death of a beloved mother and wife.

It seems that Alan Ball and his Six Feet Under writers were borrowing from a formula developed at least 1,000 years earlier.

And although Murasaki Shikibu, author of The Tale of Genji, wasn’t the first to use this narrative technique, she’s a master at it.

It reminds me of Six Feet Under, the HBO series about a family of undertakers that started each episode with a death — usually an accidental and quite creative death. The rest of that episode would weave in the story of that person’s funeral, and often the events leading up to their death.

So as Genji’s mother is laying on her deathbed, she composes a poem in response to the emperor’s desperate command for her to stay with him. She “was so touched that she managed to breathe:

Now the end has come, and I am filled with sorrow that our ways must part:
the path I would rather take is the one that leads to life.”

This is the first of some 795 poems in the volume (according to translator Royall Tyler’s introduction). It’s a good one to start with — talk about cutting to the quick. This little poem, which sounds to me a bit like Robert Frost’s “road less traveled,” carries a truckload of sadness.

Her death plunges the court into intrigue, and we start to find out more about her 3-year-old son, Genji. He’s much beloved by the emperor, he’s incredibly good looking, and he’s limited by his mother’s lower status that prevents him from becoming an acceptable heir to the throne.

Death in the opening act. Sounds like as good a place as any to begin. I’m ready for more…

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Since we’re in the middle of what could be our last winter storm tonight, I’m in the mood to stay up and start another big book. By happy coincidence, my next “literary mountain” arrived in the mail this week — The Tale of Genji by Murasaki Shikibu.

At 1120 pages (plus maps, diagrams, family trees and a glossary), it’s another thumper.

Why Genji? I first heard about it from East Asian Lit classmates when I was taking a graduate class on Story of the Stone, a massive Chinese novel. They raved about Genji and often compared the poetry to that of Story of the Stone. Then I read an essay by Michael Dirda about how Genji carried him, a seasoned Washington Post book reviewer, away to another world, another dimension. It sounded extraordinary but daunting.

Written in Japan in the 11th century, The Tale of Genji is reputed to be the oldest novel in world literature. Does anyone know if there’s debate on that point? I suppose it depends on your definition of the word novel.

Anyway, I’ve heard it’s incredibly insightful about human relationships, whether the author is describing intense longing for intimacy or a casual social encounters — so I’m curious to see how quickly the story takes hold.

The translation I’m reading is by Royall Tyler, first published in 2001. I’ve heard of two other translations, by Waley and Seidensticker, but I chose this one because the reviewers on Amazon suggested that although it may not be the best read in English, it provides the reference material (maps, diagrams, and so forth) and a fairly accurate translation that I think I’ll need to get through it.

Wish me luck. And if you’ve got any tips or encouragement about Genji, please feel free to share them.

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