Celebrated court lady and another who wrote a large part, if not all, of

the Gengimonogatari(TALE OF GENGI), the supreme classic of Japanese

literature. The work known as the Murasaki Shikibu nikki(Diary of
Murasaki Shikibu; tr Murasaki Shikibu: Her Diary and Poetic Memoris,
1982) is also attributed to her, as are most of the poems in the collection
Murasaki Shikibu shu. She is held to be the greatest another of narrative
prose in the history of Japanese literature. Name, Lineage, Early Life - Of
her life, almost nothing can be said with certainty. Although she was
known during her lifetime as To no Shikibu, the sobriquet by which she is
known today has prevailed since the late Heian period(794 - 1185). To,
the Sino-Japanese reading for the character fuji of “wisteria”, clearly
designates the FUJIWARA FAMILY, to a cadet branch of which she was
born. Shikibu refers to the Shikibusho or Ministry of Rites, in which both
her father and her brother held office. Two theories have been advanced
to explain the Murasaki element: that because it means “purple” it refers
to the wisteria of her family name and it derives from the name of
Genji’s great love in the Genji monogatari. The SOMPI MUMMYAKU (a
collection of genealogical tables) of the Muromachi period (1333-1568)
gives her a common ancestor in the male line with FUJIWARA NO
MICHINAGA, the most powerful statesman of her time, and makes them
fifth cousins. By perhaps her grandfather’s gereration, Murasaki’s branch
of the family had slipped to the second level of the clan hierarchy. It is
conjectured that she was born sometime in the eighth decade of the
10th century ant that, from what is known of her father’s career, she
spent her early years in the imperial capital of Heiankyo (now kyoto). In
996 her father was posted as governor to Echizen (now part of Fukui
Prefecture), which bordered the Sea of Japan, and it is believed that
Murasaki accompanied him. Middle Years -very late in the 10th century
she was married to a fourth cousin, Fujiwara Nobutaka. She had one
daughter and was widowed in 1001. Sometime in the first decade of the
11th century she was summoned to court as a lady - in-waiting to the
empress Akiko(also known as Fujiwara no Shoshi; see JOTO MONIN),
daughter of Fujiwara no Michinaga. The likelihood is that she began
writing the Genji monogatari in the early years of her widowhood and
that because of it she attracted Michinaga’s notice and was invited into
the service of his most important daughter. Murasaki’s knowledge of the
early historical chronicle Nihon shoki (720), which was written in
Chinese, led to her being called “the chronicle woman” (Nihongi no
tsubone), the nikki tells us, and, among other duties, she gave the young
empress instruction in the verse of the Chinese poet Bo Juyi. Remarks in
the Genji monogatari about painting, calligraphy, and the polite arts
establish that her learning was not merely academic, and from her
collected poems it is apparent that she was adept at the koto, of zither.
A famous passage in the nikki in whici she comments upon the
inclinations and endowments of other court ladies suggests that she
may have been a rather tart and crossgrained woman. Late Years
Murasaki Shikibu was apparently still Akiko’s service in 1013, but the
implicit evidence in the Genji monogatari itself perhaps tell us as much
about her life as does any explicit evidence. It argues forsingle
authorship over a lengthy period of years, with the possibility of later
additions and revisions. The Genji monogatari grows and develops just
as an another might be expected to grow and at the end suggests a
serene rejection of the world such as comes with age experience. The
reasonable conclusin is that an aging Murasaki Shikibu wrote the last
chapters. If she lived approximately as long as Genji, then she lived
about 50 years and died in the third decade of the 11th century. Place in
Literature - In the late Heian period and ofter, there were imitations of
the Genji, but their authors tell short of the qualities that account for
Murasaki Shikibu’s excellence - her interest in the complexities of the
human sprit and her ability to create the illusion of individual life upon
the written page. She was a dramatic writer in the sence of achieving
her effects and conveying her messages through simile and metaphor,
the rhetorical devices that characterize the largely Iyrical tradition of
Japanese literature. Murasaki Shikibu is generally placed biside
SEISHONAGON at the pinnacle of premodern prose literature; however,
the writings at SESHONAGON are much less boldly original and much
nearer the main lyrical tradition. In the middle ages (mid-12th-16th
centuries) Murasaki became an almost mythological figure. In the Noh
play Genji kuyo, for instance, she is revealed to be an incarnation of
KANNON, patron deity of ISHIYAMADERA, a temple not far form Kyoto
where tradition has it, she began writing the Genji monogatari. In the
millennium since it appeared, the reputation of the Genji has never
flagged, and its author is still held in the greatest esteem.