Page:Anthology of Japanese Literature.pdf/101

  



The years of my youth have passed, and I can see little in them that suggests greatness. It is, I suppose, natural that I should have fallen into such mediocrity. I am less handsome than most, and my character is hardly remarkable. But as the days and nights have gone by in monotonous succession, I have had occasion to read most of the old romances, and I have found them masses of the rankest fabrication. Perhaps, I think to myself, the events of my own life, if I were to put them down in a journal, might attract attention, and indeed those who have been misled by the romancers might find in it a description of what the life of a well-placed lady is really like. But I must begin at the beginning, and I see that my memories of those first years have blurred. I shall not be surprised then if one finds traces of fiction here too….

It had become clear that I was to have a child. I passed a most