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The Tale of Genji- A Visual Companion

Page 25

by Melissa McCormick

near a vibrantly patterned red and white standing

  For his part, Kashiwagi only married Ochiba curtain, which is out of keeping with the funereal because he failed to win her half sister, the Third

  atmosphere described in the tale. She is represented

  Princess, before she was wed to Genji. The marriage

  by a mere corner of her dark gray mourning robe,

  was thus not an ideal one for either party, but the

  and a single curl of long hair. Such partial images of

  young widow and her mother still mourn him as

  female characters appear elsewhere in the album in

  they attempt to recover f rom the unexpected turn

  ways that refl ect the meaning of a scene (Chapters

  of events. Yūgiri’s attentions are not unwelcome,

  Eight and Ten). Here, the minimal representa-

  especially given the Major Counselor’s stature, but

  tion of Ochiba through a mere sliver of her robe

  the Princess’s mother remains vigilant and keeps

  refl ects her guardedness and hesitation to meet with

  Yūgiri at a distance, on this occasion restricting Yūgiri, the man waiting for her. It also complements him to the veranda, where he must communicate

  the way the painting stages the ventriloquism of

  through an intermediary.

  the poem’s delivery; the Princess is nearly absent,

  Until the scene depicted in the album painting,

  while the female attendant acts as her proxy reciting

  Yūgiri had only spoken with Ochiba’s mother, but

  the verse to Yūgiri on her mistress’s behalf. In the

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  poem, Ochiba uses the word kashiwagi (oak tree),

  suggesting that the maple (the Second Princess) still

  which gives her deceased husband his name, and

  clings to the oak tree.

  the chapter its title, to assert that the “deity of the

  Chapter Thirty-Six is part of a subplot within

  leaves” (Kashiwagi) does not grant his consent to

  the larger story that essentially tells the tale of

  the relationship Yūgiri desires. She refuses to be the

  two sisters: the Second Princess (Ochiba), married

  “welcoming branches” ( narashi no eda) of Yūgiri’s

  to Kashiwagi, and the Third Princess, ravaged by

  poem, instead asking rhetorically whether “branch

  him. Neither sister fares well after their father takes

  tips” ( kozue) should shelter a stranger.

  Buddhist vows and retires f rom the world. The naive

  In the painting, the oak tree dominates the right

  Third Princess, with no female relatives to rely on at

  side of the composition, with its slender but sturdy

  Rokujō, is manipulated by her soubrettish attendant

  trunk and its broad leaves, the veins of which are

  Kojijū, who fl irted with Kashiwagi and granted him

  outlined in gold pigment. The image of the oak tree

  access to her lady’s chambers. In Chapter Thirty-Six,

  announces the title of the chapter and the impor-

  the Second Princess, with her mother as a bulwark,

  tance of the character of Kashiwagi, as both the

  and her attendants largely under control, manages

  individual being mourned over in the household

  to keep Yūgiri, sent by Kashiwagi, temporarily at

  and as the link between Yūgiri and Ochiba. The

  bay. From the Retired Emperor Suzaku’s point of

  branches of oak and maple trees are interwoven, as

  view, however, both of his daughters’ lives have

  in the poetry, but they are not equally represented.

  taken a tragic turn, with one woman having become

  The maple leaves are faint in comparison, rendered

  a nun and the other widowed by Kashiwagi, pro-

  in a lighter shade of green, with branches overlaying

  tected only by her mother and thus susceptible to

  those of the oak in a tentative manner. The image of

  rumor and scandal no matter how well she com-

  the trees pictorializes the metaphors in the poems,

  ports herself.

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  I’ve not forgotten

  That painful segment of our life,

  But the black bamboo

  Grows this time in a tender shoot

  I should fi nd it hard to cast aside.

  cranston, p. 876

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  37

  The

  Transverse

  Flute

  Yokobue

  Ukifushi mo

  Wasurezu nagara

  Kuretake no

  Ko wa sutegataki

  Mono ni zo arikeru

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  Genji is absent f rom the painting for Chapter Suzaku’s poem, and one that his daughter writes in Thirty-Seven, but the scene in the tale is narrated

  response, both use coded language to suggest that

  f rom his perspective and his words appear in the

  a departure f rom Rokujō might be best in order

  adjacent calligraphy in the album. He converses to pursue her Buddhist devotions in earnest—a with the Third Princess, who as a Buddhist initiate

  suggestion that annoys Genji when he discovers

  is off limits to her husband Genji sexually, but who

  the exchange.

  at Genji’s insistence still resides at the Rokujō Estate.

  In crawls the son of the Third Princess and

  On entering the Third Princess’s room, Genji is sur-

  Kashiwagi, the character who later becomes known

  prised to see an unusual tray of bamboo shoots. It

  as Kaoru, thought by the world to be Genji’s son.

  is a gift f rom her father, Retired Emperor Suzaku,

  In the tale, the two-year-old boy’s appearance and

  now referred to in the original text as “the mountain

  behavior are described in great detail in the mind

  emperor” ( yama no mikado) after his current abode

  of Genji, whose attitude toward the boy is at once

  at a temple in the western hills. The Third Princess

  jovial and fraught with ambivalence given his knowl-

  is referred to as the “Princess Initiate” ( nyūdō no

  edge of Kashiwagi’s betrayal. Genji’s mixed feelings

  miya), which resonates with the epithet now applied

  are perfectly expressed in the poem included in the

  to her father, though by looking only at the paint-

  album, which begins with the assertion that the

  ing, it would be diffi

  cult to identify her as such. She

  Third Princess’s infi delity with Kashiwagi will never

  is the o
nly female fi gure seated on the green tat-

  be forgotten, expressed as that “painful segment”

  ami, with a curtain to her side, and her hair shows

  ( ukifushi

  ) in Cranston’s skillful rendering,

  no sign of tonsure. This follows the description in

  which captures the pun on fushi, a word that means

  the previous chapter of her hair as only minimally

  “time,” but also the “joint” or “segment” of a bam-

  cut and looking much as it did before taking vows.

  boo stalk. The poem continues, however, with Genji

  Her robes, pale pink over white, are somewhat sub-

  conceding that the bamboo shoot ( kuretake no ko),

  dued compared to the garments of the two female

  in other words the child ( ko) before him, Kaoru, is

  attendants in the room. Suzaku’s gift is a show of

  too endearing to disavow. Genji expressed the same

  sympathy, and his poem refers to their mutual pur-

  ambivalence in the previous chapter when he fi rst

  suit of the Buddhist path. The bamboo shoots and

  held the newborn, his feelings for the innocent child

  taro roots were taken f rom the forest beside his

  mingling with trepidation over the resemblance to

  mountain abode and are intended to symbolize the

  Kashiwagi and the possibility that his turn as a cuck-

  eremitic lifestyle that he imagines she desires as well.

  old would become known.

  Kaoru’s physical appearance is described in the

  tale as having its own special radiance, and his long

  and supple body as though it had been delicately

  carved f rom the pale inner wood of a willow tree.

  His head, as seen in the painting, is shaved according

  to the custom for children under the age of three

  and gives off a bluish tint, the color of “dewfl owers”

  ( tsuyukusa). The artist uses an underlayer of blue

  pigment that does indeed make the child’s head

  seem paler than white. Genji marvels at the child’s

  appealing facial features that seem to emanate a

  warm glow but feels uneasy as he considers the

  possible dangers that lie ahead as the boy is raised

  under the same roof as his granddaughter, the First

  Princess of the Akashi Consort, who has been put in

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  Murasaki’s care. Genji succumbs to Kaoru’s charm-

  in Chapter Thirty-Six. In the dream, Kashiwagi’s

  ing antics as he toddles into the room and makes

  ghost picks up the fl ute and composes:

  a beeline for the bamboo shoots, soothing his new

  Fuetake ni

  May the wind that blows

  teeth and his curiosity by gnawing on one, then

  Fukiyoru kaze no

  In the fl ute bamboo oblige —

  immediately discarding it for another. In the paint-

  Koto naraba

  Be there no other strain —

  ing, Kaoru holds a long, rugged, brown shoot up

  Sue no yo nagaki

  Long years yet I would desire

  to his mouth, with two others lying on the tatami

  Ne ni tsutaenamu

  These notes passed on through the air.

  mat already tasted and cast aside. He continues

  cranston, p. 878

  to nibble away, his own drool dripping excessively

  ( shizuku mo yoyo to), leading Genji to exclaim that

  In the ghost’s poem, because “notes” or “sound” ( ne)

  the boy has strange “desires,” or irogonomi. The is a homonym for “root,” the idea of Kashiwagi’s word is used most often to describe sexual desire,

  descendants playing the fl ute into the future shares

  signaling Genji’s inability to see him as merely an

  imagery with the lengthy bamboo, which is perpet-

  innocent child rather than the off spring of a father

  uated by means of its root. Phallic connotations are

  whose desires overcame him. The scene concludes

  also implied, with the word for “root” ( ne), a term

  when Genji takes the bamboo away, and the toddler

  for genitalia, refl ecting the paternity anxiety inher-

  blithely scampers off .

  ent in the Kashiwagi storyline. And as Cranston

  It is diffi

  cult to regard the bamboo in Mitsunobu’s

  states, his use of the word “air” in translation is

  painting, which is excessively long and horizontally

  intended to suggest “heir” to refl ect the underlying

  held, as anything but a suggestive allusion to the

  meaning of the poem. When Yūgiri conf ronts his

  bamboo fl ute, the Yokobue of the chapter title. As

  father about the dream and the fl ute’s rightful heir,

  the chapter continues, the mother of Kashiwagi’s

  Genji admits nothing but understands the import

  widow bestows on Yūgiri a transverse fl ute that once

  of the dream. The chapter ends with Genji trying

  belonged to the deceased courtier. As an instrument

  to take possession of the bamboo fl ute to give to

  that symbolizes patrilineal transmission, the gift is

  Kaoru, as though reversing his earlier actions of

  signifi cant and causes the vexed ghost of Kashiwagi

  removing the bamboo shoot f rom Kaoru’s hands.

  to visit Yūgiri in a dream and inform him that the

  Although Genji goes unrepresented in the album

  fl ute was intended for someone else. The ghost painting, his voice in the poem inserts him into the appears eerily in the same garb that Kashiwagi wore

  scene and allows him to hover over the spectacle of

  the last time Yūgiri saw him, as he lay on his sickbed

  this illegitimate son with his faux bamboo fl ute.

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  Moonlight as ever

  In a cloudland not other

  Than it was before . . .

  Yes, the fault lies in my house

  That this autumn is so changed.

  cranston, p. 880

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  38

  Bell Crickets

  Suzumushi

  Tsukikage wa

  Onaji kumoi ni

  Mienagara

  Wa ga yado kara no

  Aki zo kawareru

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  The setting, as in the previous leaf, is the quarters

  of the Third Princess’s quarters justifi es keeping her

  of the Third Princess in the southeastern residence

  at Rokujō and preempts Suzaku’s plan to move his

  at Rokujō, on the fi fteenth of t
he eighth month,

  daughter to his Sanjō residence. Genji has created

  the night of the harvest moon. The moon-viewing

  a veritable nunnery in miniature for the Princess,

  banquet at the imperial palace is canceled for rea-

  complete with disciple nuns and a renovated spring

  sons that go unexplained, and courtiers descend garden, which before was too ostentatious for a on Genji’s villa. They fi nd him playing the thir-place of meditation on the sorrows of the world.

  teen-string koto ( sō no koto), and a musical concert

  The western half of the spring garden has been

  ensues. The courtiers’ arrival at Rokujō follows fenced off f rom Murasaki’s eastern wing and trans-an extended passage in the tale that describes the

  formed into a subdued autumn moor. Into the

  elaborate Buddhist ceremonies, sutra readings, and

  grassy fi eld Genji has introduced bell crickets, which

  dedications that Genji commissioned to transform

  give the chapter its name, and to which he likens

  the Third Princess’s residence into a chapel befi t-

  the Third Princess, saying that her voice is similarly

  ting her new status as a nun. He ordered statues of

  bright and clear. For her part, the Third Princess

  Buddhist deities, paintings, and a shelf for off erings.

  seems somewhat less than entirely committed to

  He even transcribed the Amida Sutra himself, so that

  rigorous meditation on the afterlife; just before the

  the Third Princess would always have a copy at her

  scene depicted, Genji plucks the koto, and the Third

  disposal. It took Genji weeks of diligent work to

  Princess stops rubbing her prayer beads in order to

  write out the sutra, and his calligraphic transcrip-

  listen more attentively, drawn to the pleasures of his

  tion is said to be magnifi cent. Given the power of

  music. Knowing he has her attention, Genji has wel-

  handwriting in the tale to invoke a person’s pres-

  comed the courtiers f rom the palace to join him in a

  ence, Genji’s transcription of the sacred text ensures

  concert “to celebrate the bell cricket.”

  that the Third Princess will have him in mind even

  The painting depicts the musical diversion taking

  during her Buddhist practice. That he should wish

  place beneath the full moon, with all of the musi-

 

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