Page:Japanese Literature (Keene).pdf/83

Rh of the nature of the book, and of its author, Lady Murasaki.

The Tale of Genji would seem to be a conspicuous exception to many of the generalizations I have made about the qualities of Japanese literature. Far from being a work of cryptic brevity, it runs to some 2,500 pages in most editions. Older novels, such as The Hollow Tree, were quite long too, but the faultiness of their construction generally resulted in the books falling into clearly defined and almost independent segments. The Tale of Genji is not constructed in accordance with any Western novelist’s conception, but possesses rather the form of one of the horizontal scrolls for which Japan is famous. They often start with just a few figures, gradually develop into scenes of great complexity and excitement, and as gradually dwindle back into a cluster of men, then a horse, then, almost lost in the mist, a last solitary soldier. In its magnitude and its sureness of technique, The Tale of Genji is indeed exceptional, yet the work is clearly the product of purely Japanese traditions. It represents the culmination of all that had gone before, and at the same time its central importance makes it the most typical as well as the greatest work of Japanese literature. It was a classic in its own day and, devotedly read and annotated by emperors and philosophers, as well as by all manner of ordinary people, it has inspired a great deal of other literature and art. When in the seventeenth century an era of peace and prosperity followed centuries of terrible wars, it was to The Tale of Genji that the wealthy merchants turned for the model of the life they wished to enjoy, and novelists forgot six centuries of gloom in recreating Genjis of their own. That the influence of The Tale of Genji still survives, is evidenced by its great importance in the work of Tanizaki, perhaps the leading Japanese novelist of our day. Now, thanks to Arthur Waley’s superb translation,