Chapter 4: Yugao (The Twilight Beauty)

In which shit gets kind of intense

(So let's just ignore the fact that I haven't posted anything in like four years and move on)

Okay, so Genji is visiting his old nurse who is dying.  It's very sad.  So sad, in fact, that it's kind of inappropriate and her family is terribly embarrassed.  But that's okay, because it turns out that her next-door neighbor is a mysterious lady!  Heeeey.

I think what happens is she sees him out the window and of course is undone by his beautifulness so she sends him a poem on a fan.  Which is kind of surprising because it turns out later that what he likes most about her is how she is extremely passive and spineless, but whatever. He is intrigued! He must know who she is, so he gets his buddy Koremitsu to spy on her servants, and I love this, the author says
"Koremitsu, who could not bear to disappoint his lord, marshaled his own wide experience of courtship to devise a way to at last introduce him into the house.  All that makes a long story though, so as usual I have left it out."
I bet there's a whole novel just in those two sentences. Anyway, so get this, it turns out the lady is apparently the ex-lover of Genji's good friend the Secretary Captain!  But Genji is for sure a hos before bros kind of guy so this does not worry him at all and he continues with his courtship full steam ahead.

In the meantime, he is neglecting his other lover, the lady of Rokujo street (an older woman!) and also has a meeting with Nokiba no Ogi from the previous chapter who is now married to someone else and whatever, he's totally over her now.

So anyway, Genji is visiting Yugao all the time and sleeping over, but I'm not sure if that means they're actually having sex or not. But he is definitely staying over because one particular morning there is all this noise from uncouth people in the street talking and people polishing rice and whatnot and it is so embarrassing. So he convinces her that they should go away to (I think) the countryside for basically a sexy weekend, and I'm pretty sure they definitely do have sex.
It's very creepy and strange at the country place, and while Genji is dozing off he has a vision of a woman who is angry at him for being with Yugao instead of her, and then Yugao  just stops breathing and dies.

What. The.

I guess everyone thinks it was a evil spirit or a ghost, I don't know. It's very weird. They take her back to the city and it's all awkward because now Genji is defiled by being near a dead person and he can't go visit the Emperor but he can't explain why, and then he falls ill (of grief, I think). He's very sad that he found this "charmingly frail" woman who he could "form to his will" but she died before he could fully form her. Eventually though, he gets better and then randomly adopts Yugao's daughter that she had with the Secretary Captain!

I swear, this is like reading a book about aliens.

Chapter 3: Utsusemi (The Cicada Shell)

In which Genji loves the one he's with.

So, as we begin this chapter, Genji is complaining to Utsusemi's brother (Kogemi) about how cruel and hateful she is, and not even Kogemi's pleasing slenderness can console him.
So Kogemi is looking for a good opportunity to bring them together, and one evening when the Governor of Kii has gone off somewhere, he takes Genji to the house to see her.

Utsusemi is there, playing Go with her friend Nokiba no Ogi (also Kii's sister), who happens to be tall, nicely rounded, and "striking in head and forehead", whatever that means. She's not quite as graceful or pretty as Utsusemi, but she has exquisite manners and is apparently cleverer. Genji thinks she is pretty hot.

Anyway, these midnight trysts are always confusing, but what I think happens is that Genji sneaks into Utsusemi's room after everyone's asleep, but she sneaks out at the last minute, leaving Nokiba there, and since she's there, and he's there, Genji has sex with her instead. Why not?

He kind of feels guilty about it, but not that guilty, and then he finds a robe that Utsusemi left behind, so he steals it and takes it home. And then, because he's kind of a kinky dude, he puts the robe on under his clothes, and lies down in his bed with Kogimi and is all, "man, I don't know if I can keep liking you if your sister's going to be such a bitch."

But he still writes her another poem, and doesn't write one to Nokiba, and Utsusemi is mad and Nokiba is ashamed and Kogimi is stuck in the middle and that's pretty much the end of the chapter.

Chapter 2: Hahakigi (The Broom Tree)

In which Genji can't be with the one(s) he loves.

So we start out five years after the end of the previous chapter. "Shining Genji" is 17 now, and still gorgeous:
...he looked so beautiful that one could have wished him a woman.
I'm not sure who "one" is, but his best friend is apparently some guy called the Secretary Captain. The two of them, and some other dudes, are hanging out and talking about the ladies.

Things they find attractive in women:
Living hidden away in an overgrown house
Speaking in a very quiet voice, and not saying much
Writing in faint ink
Putting up with things that deserve reproof
Nice handwriting

Things they find unattractive in women:
Hair tucked behind the ears
Doing nothing but housework
Wantonness (e.g. indulging in shameless banter)
Being pious and stuffy
Garlic breath
Cursive writing

So after this illuminating conversation, Genji is supposed to be traveling somewhere, but he can't because that direction is forbidden. (There's a whole complicated thing about which direction you can go on which day--it's totally crazy.)
So anyway he decides that he'll go stay with this guy the Governor of Kii, whose house is in a better direction. AND whose house just happens to be full of a bunch of visiting ladies!
Fun!

AND it turns out that one of the ladies happens to be known for being proud, so this piques Genji's interest, even though he still has a crush on Fujitsubo, his sort-of stepmother. And this is funny, because the proud lady (Utsusemi) turns out to be the Governor of Kii's stepmother. Who is young and might possibly be hot, if anyone ever saw her!

So Genji sneaks into her room in the middle of the night, and it's hard to tell, but I don't think they have sex. But they talk all night until he has to leave in the morning, so he takes her little brother with him as a servant so the brother can take messages back to her.
Romantic!

However, even though Genji sends Utsusemi many lovely poems, she is cruel and unmoved.

So, as we end the chapter:
"Very well, then you, at least, shall not leave me." Genji had the boy lie down with him. The boy so appreciated his master's youth and gentleness that they say Genji found him much nicer than his cruel sister.
I bet!

Chapter 1: Kiritsubo (The Paulownia Pavilion)

In which we meet Genji, and he is awesome.

Actually, this chapter is really more about Genji's mother, and how everyone was very sad when she died, to the extent that it was kind of inappropriate.

Apparently, the Emperor was crazy in love with her, and he would keep having her come visit him, like, all the time, which according to the COPIOUS FOOTNOTES was also kind of inappropriate because it was like treating her as a servant. (Yay, Heian women had rights, sort of! but not really.)

Anyway, Genji is the most beautiful child anyone has ever seen, to the degree that it is, all together now: kind of inappropriate. But it turns out okay, because he is so beautiful that you can't really be mad at him, not even the Emperor's other consort (the mother of the Heir Apparent), especially after the Emperor decides to make Genji a commoner (even though he really wants him to be his successor because he is AWESOME).

Oh, and then the Emperor marries Genji (age 12) off to Aoi, who is 16 and apparently not impressed with the famed Genji beauty. Somehow I don't think this marriage will go well.

Especially since he kind of has a crush on the Emperor's new consort, Fujitsubo.
Inappropriate!

Let the Games Begin...

Well, clearly we're going to start the year by fighting over who gets to be played by Kate Winslet.  I suppose I should introduce myself--I am the college roommate.  While Jenne will be holding up the falling in love end of the project, I guess that I, as the already-partnered, will be left with weeping into the sleeves of my kimono.

Well, foo.

Anyway, as it happens, this is also the millennial anniversary of The Tale of Genji, which, of course, lends Extra Special Significance to the project.

More about that in the New York Times Travel section.

Off to put on my red silk trouser skirts and get started.  

The Plan

Okay, so the plan is that my college roommate and I have decided to read one chapter of The Tale of Genji a week for a whole year, which should get us through the thing if we double up on a few weeks. (There are 54 chapters.)
We were both students at Oberlin College in the 90s and both took classes in Japanese literature, but we never actually got around to reading the whole book. But after our trip to Japan this fall, we were all inspired and decided to do it.
For posterity, I will reproduce here the text of my original email suggesting this project:

OK, after reading the Liza Dalby kimono book I am all fired up. I suggest we read the unabridged fucking Genji. Yes I am crazy. But what if we read, like, one chapter a week? Then we'd be done in like a year, right?

In the interest of comparing translations, I'm going to read the Tyler version, and she will read the Seidensticker.
I'm going to try to post something on here for at least each chapter, and hopefully as a result I will come to some sort of greater understanding of life and possibly also fall in love so that I can write one of those Gen-X finding-yourself books that gets made into a movie starring Kate Winslet.
Or alternatively I might get bored and abandon the whole project after 3 weeks. STAY TUNED.