Chapter XIII: Locker Room Talk in Genji?

In the woodblock print above, Genji and

his best friend are peaking through a

latticed fence to spy on the women they admire.

It's been a while since we looked into the story of Genji. Last time we were there, he had just been married at age twelve to a daughter of a high ministry official. He had fallen in love, however, with a different woman, Aoi.

Chapter Two places Genji, who is now around 17, in a room with two of his best friends. It is night, an the three are quietly discussing what makes women from different social classes perfect. In many ways, this reminds me of the stereotypical conversations young men are said to have in locker rooms, or in other places where the opposite sex is not around.

That aside, this conversation also brings us to a large theme clearly found in Genji: What makes a perfect man or a perfect woman? And does social class have anything to do with their being perfect? Thinking back on our conversation about beauty, is it necessary for someone to have a beautiful face or body to be perfect? What about money, education, a sense of humor, or personality?

YOUR TASK:

1) Imagine you are Hikaru Genji, it's 2009, and you are placing a personal ad on http://www.matchmaker.com/. What will his personal profile look like? What will he list as his requirements for the perfect partner? (Feel free to use a template from any current matchmaking web site to complete this assignment, but please keep everything Rated PG.)

Chapter XII: Genji in Many Forms

As promised, today's first blog is about the various versions of Genji that are available in Japan. Despite the fact that Genji is written using simple characters, in the original it nonetheless reads like Shakespeare, since the language is old and very stylized. For this reason, it is difficult for many people to pick up and read.

Yesterday we learned in the survey that most people read the manga version (cover and a few pictures posted above). It is interesting to note that even in the modern comic, the images are highly reflective of woodblock prints: often there is a lot of "blank space;" images of nature are always included; charcters faces are also stylized (small hooks for noses and slits for eyes), with little to no expression.

Nonetheless, the comic employs many of the same literary techniques as the original book: there's a distinct, omniscient narrator; dialogue between the charactes (often idle gossip regarding people and their behavior); and of course, the basic plot elements.

But this is where the versions differ. Genji, in its original form, only alludes to sexuality. It is up to the reader to determine how far Genji goes in each of his encounters with the women in his life. The manga version is different in the sense that you go much farther in these scenes than in the book. So, at times, the manga version feels like "soft porn" -- obviously something not appropriate to be taught or studied in school!

That said, there are other versions that are not as sketchy. Take, for example, the Takarazuka version above. Takarazuka is a highly stylized form of modern Japanese theater. Originally from Kobe, Takarazuka now has a large theater in several cities in Japan, including, of course, Tokyo. Here the performers are all women (a counteract to Kabuki, where all professional actors (even today) are men).

Only running two hours, Takarazuka's version of Genji was a reduction of the original, and it did spend most of its time focusing on the human relationships rather than the drama which is also fully present in the novel. Still, it was a highly refined, lavish show, full of subtle colors that reflected seasons, emotions and elements of high society. I was very lucky to see it.

Today I'm off to two museums -- Gotoh and Tokugawa Reimeikai Foundation -- to see original illustrations of Genji from as far back as the 1100s. This will be the perfect way to further my understanding of the visualization of Genji before I leave Tokyo and head into the western countryside tomorrow.

YOUR TASK:

1) Take a favorite book, movie, or comic book and describe its evolution in a timeline. What version came first? What came after? Why do you think stories like this go from one genre to the next? What happens in the process?