Which may all sound a little bit… well, dull,Īctually, though, it’s all a bit racier than that – morals were a little different then. The main focus of the book is the daily life at court, where hours are spent entertaining the Empress, chatting with other gentlewomen and discussing the elaborate clothes worn by courtiers and government officials. Sei describes the seclusion of a miniature world, ensconced in the Imperial Palace in Kyoto, with occasional excursions for processions and pilgrimages. Mainly descriptive, the book also reveals a lot about Shōnagon herself, allowing us to build up a picture of a woman at court.Īs you can imagine, this was a different place and a very, very different time. Less a novel than a series of musings and anecdotes, Shōnagon’s work is a description of life at the Imperial court around the turn of the millennium, giving the reader an insight into how the rich and noble lived a thousand years ago. Sei Shōnagon’s The Pillow Book(translated by Meredith McKinney) is one of the earliest, and best-known, works of classic Japanese literature. Yes, it was a man’s world then too – but one best written about with a female touch 😉 However, today we’ll be taking a big jump in time as well as space as we look back to the end of the tenth century.
In a place and time where poetry was as important as knowledge and beauty was highly revered, Sei Shonagon's private writings offer a charming, intimate glimpse into a world of innocence and pale beauty.Ī new introduction by respected Japanese literary scholar Dennis Washburn provides historical insight into Japanese culture, Sei Shonagon's world, and Waley's translation.While we’ll be travelling around the world during Women in Translation Month, most of our journeys will be fairly contemporary, with the majority of books written in recent years. Through his elegant and readable abridged translation, Arthur Waley perfectly conveys Sei Shonagon's girlish temperament and quirky personality.
A perfect companion to that work, The Pillow Book of Sei Shonagon brings an added dimension to Murasaki's timeless and seminal novel and further illuminates Japanese court life in all its ritualistic glory. She was a contemporary and acquaintance of the well-known courtesan Murasaki Shikibu, author of the Japanese masterpiece The Tale of Genji. Sei Shonagon-a young courtesan of the Heian period-kept a diary, which provides a highly personal account of the intrigues, dalliances, quirks, and habits of Japan's late tenth-century elite. In the tenth century, Japan stood physically and culturally isolated from the rest of the world. Take a firsthand journey into a time, society and world full of intrigue.
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