EA 170 Week 2a Outline (Fall 2017)
I. Critical Analysis Questions
A. Questions to think about any text/image/performance we study:
1. Who was it written/created by? (male? female? upper/lower class? etc. )
2. Who was it written for? (Who was the intended audience? Was there a patron?)
3. How is the story or image supposed to affect that audience; i.e. what is the purpose/goal of the story? (Entertainment? Didactic? Both?)
4. What was the historical context? (economic, political, religious) Does anyone (person/group) benefit from this representation?
5. What are the genre constraints? (Is it a novel, a poem, a play, an image?) What are the structural elements that define the genre that might limit representation? (live performance, written word, image etc.)
6. What are the narrative constraints? What narrative elements are necessary to make the story work? (Is there a typical plot for this kind of story? Is the narrator first or third person? etc.)
7. Historical development of stories (If this story is adapted in later periods, how has it been changed? How do the above questions help us understand why those changes occur?)
A. Example of Critical Analysis of Kagero Diary
1. Who is it written/created by?
a. A Heian period woman of the "middle class" of the aristocracy (daughter of a provincial governor), who married the highest ranking courtier of the day.
2. Who was it written for? (Who was the intended audience? Was there a patron?)
a.
Her peers (other female and male aristocrats).
b.
Her husband, Fujiwara no Kaneie, probably encouraged her to write it and helped pay for it to be reproduced.
3. How is the story or image supposed to affect that audience; i.e. what is the purpose/goal of the story? (Entertainment? Didactic? Both?)
4. What was the historical context? (economic, political, religious) Does anyone (person/group) benefit from this representation?
a. Context: Heian period marriage politics.
b. Benefits: The narrator? Kaneie? Her son?
5. What are the genre constraints? (Is it a novel, a poem, a play, an image?) What are the structural elements that define the genre that might limit representation? (live performance, written word, image etc.)
a. Memoir/Diary written in Japanese (a fairly new genre)
6. What are the narrative constraints? What narrative elements are necessary to make the story work? (Is there a typical plot for this kind of story? Is the narrator first or third person? etc.)
a. first person narration with a bit of third person as well (i.e. talking about herself in the third person)
b. "real life" versus "romances"
C. Example of The Tale of Genji
1. Who was it written by?
a. Written by a lady-in-waiting to Empress Shôshi around 1000-1010 CE, known as
Murasaki Shikibu. Like the author of Kagero Diary, she was the daughter of a provincial governor. Her father was well-known as a Chinese scholar; in her mid to late 20s she married an older man, another Chinese scholar who was a friend of her father's, apparently happily. But he died only two years later (after the birth of a daughter). Sometime during her marriage or shortly afterward she started writing Tale of Genji and it began to be circulated at court in hand-copied versions. She probably was asked by Fujiwara Michinaga to come to court in 1005 to serve in Shôshi's salon on the basis of those chapters.
2. Who was the intended audience? Patron?
a. Intended audience: Empress Shôshi's salon and imperial court
b. Patron: Fujiwara no Michinaga (son
of Kaneie and father of Empress Shôshi)
3. What was its purpose? Entertainment? Didactic? Both?
a. Entertainment, but Murasaki Shikibu had something to say about politics and the effect of marriage institutions on women's lives.
4. What is the historical context? Politics? Religion? Economics?
a. Fujiwara marriage politics
5. Are there any genre/narrative constraints?
a. long fictional tale (allows for supernatural elements)
b.
previous romances (but in many ways goes against the standard plots, like Kagero Diary)
c.
conflicts generated by politics and marriage institutions
6. Historical development: we will see several different versions of Tale of Genji and consider how the story (and gender issues) changeover time
II. Tale of Genji Names of Female Characters [Note that there is a list of characters
with alternative names and chapters in which they appear on pp. 1173-1179]
Review of ranking: 1-3 daughters of high level ministers; 4-5 daughters of provincial governors, could become ladies-in-waiting at court; 6-9 servants
Review of naming practices: women (and men) were generally not referred to by their real names,
but went by sobriquets (special nicknames) or by their rank and position.
We know the real names of historical men and empresses because they were listed
in official genealogies, but most women's real names were not listed and so
are lost to history (eg. the author of Kagero Diary, the author of Tale of Genji).
For Heian period readers, the nicknames also immediately indicated hierarchy/status.
A. Nicknames taken from places
associated with the woman (see diagram of Inner Palace at back of book):
1.
Kiritsubo (Genji's mother; minor-ranking "Intimate" [koi] of Emperor): named after the Pawlownia
Court apartments (#4, furthest from Emperor, on the less powerful right side). When the emperor moves her to Koroden (#11) this creates even more enmity.
2.
Kokiden (Emperor's Chief Consort): named after the Hall of Great Light
apartments (#3, closest to the Emperor, on the more powerful left side)
3.
Fujitsubo (Emperor's #2 Consort, enters court after Kiritsubo dies,
Genji sleeps with her and their illicit son becomes the Reizei Emperor): named after the Wisteria
Court apartments (#2 apartments: closer than Kiritsubo and on the more powerful left side, but further away than
Kokiden)
4.
Rokujô Haven (Genji's mistress [NOT WIFE!]; the widow of a former crown prince who
was the older brother of Genji's father):
Rokujô (Sixth Avenue) refers to the location of her mansion.
Haven = Miyasudokoro, a title indicating she has borne a child to an emperor or crown prince.
B. Nicknames associated with images, often flowers, from important poems (note
that in the Japanese text of Tale of Genji these names generally
do not appear, they were devised by later readers who created guides to the book
and are used by translators into English and modern Japanese)
1.
Yûgao (Tô no Chûjô discusses her in The Broom
Tree chapter 2 pp. 31-33; Genji finds her accidentally when visiting his wet nurse in chapter 4 and begins an affair; she dies of possession
illness)
Yûgao = literally, "evening faces," here translated as "twilight beauty"; a gourd vine with large white flowers
Chap. 4, "The Twilight Beauty" pp.
54-58: the house in which she lives is covered with yûgao flowers
and the flowers are referred to in an exchange of poems that initiates the affair.
2.
Aoi or Aoi no Ue (Genji's #1 wife, dies in childbirth)
Aoi = "heartvine,” a vine with heart-shaped leaves; "no
Ue" = "first wife"
Named
after the Aoi festival celebrating the founding of the Kamo shrine; the carriage
fight between Aoi and Rokujô's men occurs during a parade leading up to a
ceremony at the shrine.
3.
Murasaki (niece of Fujitsubo -- note that wisteria is also purple
-- Genji "adopts" her when she is quite young and raises her to
be his wife)
Murasaki
= reddish-purple color made from the roots of the murasaki (gromwell)
plant, associated in poetry with passionate love and faithful spouses
p.
100
How glad I would be to pick and soon to make mine
that little wild plant
sprung up from the very root shared by the murasaki
The meaning of the poem is that Genji longs to "pick" the child, who is a relative of the other "purple" lady that Genji loves, Fujitsubo (Wisteria Court). But from this poem, the character gets the name "Murasaki."
CAUTION!!!!!: Do NOT confuse the author of Tale of Genji (Murasaki Shikibu) with
the character Murasaki. The author got her pen name from the character but
they are not the same!
III.
Political Situation at the beginning of the book
A. Genealogy, also click here
Min. of Right
Minister
of the Left
____|_____
______|______
|
|
|
|
Kiritsubo---------Emperor------Kokiden #4 daughter--Tô no
Chûjô Aoi no Ue
|
|
|
|
|
CROWN PRINCE (Suzaku)
Aoi no Ue----Genji
B. Chapter 1: Basic Politics
1. Why does the Emperor make
Genji a commoner?
3.
What are Genji's living arrangements with the daughter of the Minister of
the Left (Aoi no Ue)?
4.
Why do they have trouble in their marriage?
a.
Why is this politically dangerous for Genji? Does he care?
IV.
Women, Political Power, and Jealousy
A.
No direct power, but economic power = influence. Also, for Ladies- in-waiting, proximity to power.
1.
Cannot hold political office (except Empress and wet-nurse) and so cannot aquire wealth via office
B.
Who is Kokiden?
1.
Political role
2.
Why is Kokiden so antagonistic towards Kiritsubo?
a.
b.
3.
What does Kokiden do to hurt Kiritsubo?
a. Why doesn't the Emperor interfere?
4.
Why does Kiritsubo die?
a.
Response to harrassment
1)
Recurring pattern in the book
b.
Narrative necessity
V. The Ideal Woman: Chapter 2 The Broom
Tree “Rainy
Night Discussion” (pp. 20-35) and Murasaki Shikibu's Diary excerpts
A. "Rainy Night Discussion" location
1.
People involved: Genji and his best friend, Tô no Chûjô (Aoi's brother the Secretary Captain); also
the Chief Left Equerry and the Fujiwara Aide of Ceremonial (the latter two are not important as characters, and don't show up again)
B. Basic rhetorical strategy:
C. How this scene relates to book as
a whole (sets up types, and encourages Genji to look for certain kinds of women)
1. Provincial governor (zuryô) p. 23
(This is the level of Michitsuna's mother, and Murasaki Shikibu herself.)
a. sets up Utsusemi immediately (ch. 3), and Akashi Lady later (ch. 13). Akashi Lady is mentioned pp. 84-85.
2. The “Unknown Woman”
[Tyler p. 24]: "Anyway, the really fascinating girl is the one of whom no one has ever heard, the strangely appealing one who lives by herself, hidden away in some ruinous, overgrown old house; because, never having expected anyone like her, you wonder what she is doing there and cannot help wanting to know her better.”
a. Yûgao (ch. 4)
b. Murasaki (ch. 5)
c. Suetsumuhana (Safflower) is a counter-example (6, 15, 22)
3. Women suitable for wives (pp. 24-26, but also overlaps with #1, and depends on man's rank)
IV. Class Discussion:
1. What qualities are seen as good and bad in women generally?
a. Murasaki Shikibu's Diary
b. Tale of Genji "Broom Tree" chapter (2)
2. According to the men in the Broom Tree chapter, what qualities are important in a "good" wife?
a. Are any of these qualities still seen as normative (valued positively) today?
3. How does social status seem to affect the judgments?
4. How is a woman supposed to show her feelings?
5. What is considered an appropriate level of education for a woman?
6. How does the woman in The Kagero Diary measure up to these standards?