The tale of Genji

THE TALE OF GENJI By LADY MURASAKI Translated from the Japanese by ARTHUR WALEY Boston and New York HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY The Riverside Press Cambridge 1925 To BERYL DE ZOETE PREFACE Readers of the _Diaries of Court Ladies of Old Japan_, translated by Madame Omori and Professor Doi, will remember that the second of the three diaries is that of a certain Murasaki Shikibu. The little that is known of this lady’s life has been set forth by Miss Amy Lowell in her Introduction to that book. A few dates, most of them very insecure, will be found in Appendix I of this volume. It is, however, certain that Murasaki was born in the last quarter of the tenth century, that she lost her husband in 1001, and that a few years later she became lady-in-waiting to the Empress Akiko. We know that she was chosen for this post on account of her proficiency in Chinese, a subject which the young Empress was anxious to study. Akiko was then about sixteen, so that Murasaki’s position in the house was what, in our parlance, we should call that of ‘governess’ rather than of lady-in-waiting. Akiko, though officially espoused to the Emperor, was still living at home, and her father soon began to pay somewhat embarrassing attentions to the new governess. From the Diary we know that on one occasion at any rate his solicitations were refused. Was the _Tale of Genji_ or any part of it already written when Murasaki came to Court? We only know that in a passage of the Diary which apparently...