Unarguably the most famous and recognized piece of Japanese literature is The Tale of Genji, by Murasaki Shikibu. Lady Murasaki, a court lady in the service of the Empress Akiko, wrote this monumental work around the year 1010. That makes the book, hailed as the ‘first great novel ever written,’ roughly 1,000 years old. The tale chronicles the life of title character, the shining Genji, a lover, poet, musician, scholar, politician, artist, a physical embodiment of 11th century Japanese virtues and ideals.

The book is long (over 1,000 pages in translation), and many contradictions exist between chapters (authorship of some is obscure). It’s very easy to get lost in the lengthy depictions of various pomp and scenery. You’d need a detailed chart of Imperial ranks and corresponding colors, as well as another complex chart describing which plants, flowers, and animals are associated with which time of the year to fully grasp every part of the book. Additionally, it would help to be familiar with the early imperial collections of waka poetry and poem-tales, as The Tale of Genji is rich in allusion to such sources. For the rest of us, the trick is exactly not to get bogged down in all the minor details that require a history lesson to explain. Genji’s appeal lies in the depth of its characters and their interactions. Over 400 characters appear throughout the 54 chapters, among them several unique, memorable personalities, from the old fashioned, reserved Yugao, to the brash, lustful Prince Niou. The melancholic, aesthetic Japanese ideal known as ‘mono no aware (a virtually untranslatable term, roughly meaning a vague, dark appreciation/lamentation of the transience of the human world),’ paints the novel and its characters with a universal human tint that breaks through cultural and temporal differences. The sheer size and depth of the novel is astounding, especially considering its over 1,000 years old. How deep were you 1,000 years ago? That’s right.

The Tale of Genji has been translated into numerous languages. The first complete English translation, by Arthur Waley, is almost eighty years old. There are more recent (and more accurate) English translations by Edward Seidensticker and Royall Tyler. Most modern editions include footnotes with light explanations of vague passages. For anybody who doesn’t know classical Japanese but is still interested in reading Genji in Japanese, check out the translation by Tanizaki Jun’ichiro of the novel into modern Japanese.

Many say that Genji is the greatest piece of Japanese literature to date. I prefer to think that Japanese authors have managed to write some better works over the past millennium, but Genji certainly wasn’t a bad start; the influence of the novel on the Japanese masterpieces of later eras, even to this very day, is evident and undeniable. I recommend this classic as an excellent gateway into the vast universe of Japanese literature.

Written by Kevin Singleton and originally appeared in the Tombo Times, September 2003.