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GENERAL |
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Chapters mentioned only marginally by Field in her book, or chapters for which I have no notes: 1-6,
11 (Hana Chiru Sato), 16, 17, 18 (Sekiya, Eawase, Matsukaze), 27 (Kagaribi), 30 (Fujibakama),
33 (Fuji no Uraba), 36, 37, 38 (Kashiwagi,Yokobue,Suzumushi), 42,43,44 (Niou no Miya,Koobai,
Takekawa), 46 (Shii ga moto), 48,49 (Sawarabi, Yadorigi), and 51 (Ukifune).
Myth- violence and conquest. Romance-erotic conquest. "The propensity for the erotic to induce
reflection is of course crucial to the development of interiority."p. 39 Major sub-text of the TOG?
"Secrecy is another of the effects of erotic transgression that serves the development of interiority." p. 40
"The amorous (irogonomi) tale is rescued from degeneration by coming under the shadow of
transgression, which introduces values of light and darkness by marking one relationship as being
more important than another. For its part, transgression finds an undepletable source of energy in
erotic attachment. In the union of the noble exile and the amorous hero is to be found the seed
of the Japanese novel." p. 39
On the idea of the secret, and how the revealing is handled: ''It is precisely because of his
presumed ignorance of the secret that the Kiritsubo Emperor is the most august of the unimpressive
rulers in this tale....When Reizei learns of his parentage, he seeks a solution in public terms, that is,
by suggesting that he abdicate so that his true father, Genji, the rightful ruler, could suceed him.
For Kaoru, in the later third of the tale, the same discovery results in the first full-blown identity
crisis in Japanese literature." pp.41-42.
"Genji's distinction as hero lies in his contradictory attributes: princely yet common, transgressor
and transgressed, psychically closed yet momentarily revealed."p.42. Think of what Field means by
the last phrase in the previous sentence; when is Genji momentarily revealed? In his private moments
with Murasaki perhaps? How is he psychically closed? Because he has an agenda, one typical of a hero,
to regain his native birthright?
Central sentence of the book: "If secrecy, as it is used in the Genji, is a medium for the development of
inner awareness, of a private self that can become the matter of fiction, it is at the same time a remnant
of the mythical world. The issue of children from illicit love is the fictional equivalent of heavenly birth
in myths. Transgression distinguishes the births of Reizei and Kaoru from other this-worldly births,
and secrecy serves in lieu of mystery." p.42.
"The Rokujo Lady and Fujitsubo emerge as symmetrical figures. Fujitsubo never loses Genji's love,
but the love is barely fulfilled, and moreover, it produces an ominous secret that burdens Genji's life
just as the Rokujo Lady's curse does." p. 61 "I have described Fujitsubo, daughter of an unidentified
emperor, as the 'original substitute.' Lady Rokujo, daughter of an unidentified minister, substitutes
for no one. As a possessing spirit, as bifurcated self, she achieves a concentration of being
unreplicated by other heroines."p. 61
"As we had occasion to notice with Fujitsubo, Genji is seldom portrayed from within: he is
internally invisible." p. 62 We are to believe here that Genji's confrontations with the Rokujo Lady's
spirit, after all he alone hears it, represent a confrontation of the archaic (Genji) with the modern (Rokujo)?
p. 62 "The possessing spirit heralds a new self--self as interiority--and reveals the division and
discontinuity of that self at the very moment of its discovery." p. 62.
"Both Genji and Tamakazura belong to the company of odd children, who, because of parental
neglect or death, are forced to occupy temporarily the margins of life but are fated for a prominence
unimaginable for their more fortunate peers." F.94
"Dwellings represent a cosmos, and in the Genji, their political and erotic significations are richly
developed. Initially and always, buildings are associated with women." F.103 Nijoin-Kiritsubo Lady,
Genji's mother, later with Murasaki. Murasaki dies here. Nijo no Toin(Eastern Pavilion) conceived by
Genji in the Miotsukushi chapter, and finished in the Matsukaze chapter to house Hana Chiru Sato and the
Gosechi dancer from Tsukushi who is with him at the end in the Maboroshi chapter....
"The Eastern Pavilion is an intermediate structure between an aristocratic half-way house and a harem.
It is an erotic vita of Genji's youth and early manhood."F.104 The Nijoin house also provides a home to
Akikonomu after her mother Rokujo's death.
"Murasaki is not an official wife, nor is she a casual lover or a secondary wife (in the sense that,
for example, the Akashi Lady or Hana Chiru Sato is. One might say that her identity depends on
what she is not." F. 173.
"The more interesting part of the murasaki no yukari {karmaic bonds to purple} legacy has to do
with the illicit. Since Murasaki is Fujitsubo's substitute, the taint of the Genji-Fujitsubo relationship
stigmatizes(marks as literarily interesting) the Genji-Murasaki relationship.The Genji-Fujitsubo
relationship involves metaphoric incest. If we transpose the theme to Murasaki--and eventually to
that other niece, the Third Princess--the claustrophobic, self-obsessed nature of Genji's
principal attachments becomes clear. Murasaki's residence in the Nijoin, the estate Genji
inherited from his mother, whom Fujitsubo reputedly resembles, expresses this succinctly." F. 173
"Radical purity--the innocenceof a child that refuses to accommodate to conventional knowledge
--distinguishesMurasaki throughout her life."F. 174