Kiritsubo 1

17.1-18.9

17.1-4

釈

17.1 いづれの御時にか

A verb like ありけむ is omitted here. This に is the RY of the copula, resulting from the so-called "clefted copula" -- that is, なる -> にある. In contrast to other monogatari which begin in the distant past with a word like むかし, the Genji immediately situates the action in an Emperor's reign, and subsequent passages will establish that the reign is a fairly recent one.

The reading of 御 has been a point of difficulty for some time. Most scholars seem to agree that the readings of ご, お, and み are limited to specific words. Alexander Vovin accepts み as the default reading, but his study was done on texts other than Genji. There are two basic theories as to how to read the character otherwise. The most widely accepted seems to be that unless specified otherwise, it should be read as おほむ. A minority opinion (expressed by scholars like Suzuki Kazuo) is that the reading おほん is limited to the Emperor, Crown Prince, Empress, and other figures of high royalty. The default is おむ (pronounced おん), in other cases.

女御、更衣

Multiple subjects for a single verb (さぶらふ here) can be listed with no particle between them. The translations "Consort" and "Intimate" are from Tyler.

In the Heian era, the government was nominally organized under the 8th century Yōrō codes, but by the time of the Genji they had ceased to have any real force, and there are large discrepancies between the government of the Genji and that of the Codes. As McCullough writes:

By far the most important among the lesser members of the Imperial harem were the Nyōgo...[they] first appeared in the early Heian period as Court ladies of unremarkable status, but by Michinaga's day they not only enjoyed the parental backing of Ministers of State, Regents, and Princes of the Blood, but also, if the chroniclers are to be believed, presided with dignity and taste over salons rich in precious objects and amusing trinkets....it was from their ranks that the Empresses arose. (820)

The Chinese models for the Japanese codes contain nyōgo as a low-ranking office that involved menial duties such as mending clothes.

McCullough explains the 更衣 as follows:

Most early Heian harems included a number of Kōi, who ranked immediately below [the Consorts], but were socially much inferior to, the Nyōgo. Their undistinguished origins were reflected in their title -- literally Clothes-Changer, a relic of the days when their function was to help the Emperor dress. They were, however, ordinarily daughters of kugyō, as in the case of [Genji's] mother, Kiritsubo. By the last half of the tenth century, formally designated Kōi were already disappearing, and by the eleventh century their role had devolved on the Principal Handmaids and Mistresses of the Wardrobe. (820)

The Chinese models do not contain this office.

さぶらひ

The word さぶらひ can literally mean "serve" but it can also just be a polite "be" verb; either meaning works here since the women are literally serving the Emperor.

17.2 たまひける

The auxiliary たまふ, extremely frequent in the Genji, is an honorific that establishes the contast presence of a narrator voice -- someone lower ranking than these women serving the Emperor, even the lower ranking Intimates. The use of RT forms in this sentence is typical in the tale -- 女御更衣あまたさぶらひ給ひける forms a nominalized (noun) phrase representing the group of women serving the Emperor. This noun phrase can then modify 中 to represent "within this group." The two remaining noun phrases headed by あらぬ and 給ふ work in the same grammatical fashion.

いと

This word means "very," but paired with a negative verb as in this case, it means "not particularly..."

やむごとなき

This word, referring to a high ranking position in the court, is a keyword of the first part of the "Kiritsubo" chapter. Kiritsubo herself is constantly contrasted with these other やむごとなき people who have position, but not the Emperor's love.

17.3 あらぬが

The が particle in the Genji does not mean "but." There are two ways of interpreting it here: (1) It is a subject marker, making the sentence XがY, showing that NP X is also NP Y. (2) It is a conjunction meaning "and," connecting two clauses. The difference between the two is small and is difficult to represent in an English translation.

時めき

Note that the subject of this verb is Kiritsubo, not the Emperor. Although it means that Kiritsubo was loved by the Emperor, this meaning is expressed in a roundabout way that makes Kiritsubo the subject of 時めき. The Koujien defines the word as よい時機にあって栄える; the most obvious way for a Consort or Intimate to "thrive" is to receive the Emperor's love.

評

The opening sentences of famous works are often well-known in their own right, and this sentence is no exception. It is markedly different from the openings of many of the monogatari that came before it. For instance:

今は昔、竹取の翁といふ者ありけり。

A long time ago, there was an old bamboo cutter. （竹取物語）

昔、男、初冠して、奈良の京、春日の里にしるましして、狩りにいにけり。

Long ago there was a man who had his capping ceremony and then went to the village of Kasuga near the Nara Capital to hunt. （伊勢物語）

昔、式部大輔左大弁かけて、藤原の王ありけり。

Long ago （宇津保物語）

今は昔、中納言なる人の、女あまたもたまへるおはしき。

Long ago, a certain Middle Counselor had many daughters. （落窪物語）

The four examples above all begin with 昔 or 今は昔, setting the stories (at least ostensibly) in the distant past. In contrast, the Genji opening suggests a specific (although unknown) time period for the story. There are clues within the story to suggest that the author had in mind the reign of Emperor Daigo (897-930), a point that was mentioned very early in the history of Genji reception. Two inspirations for the opening have been suggested. The Kagerō Diary has a vague, roundabout opening:

Thus the time has passed and there is one in the world who has lived such a vain existence, catching on to neither this nor that (Arntzen, 57).

The Kagerō Diary is thought to have been an influence on Murasaki Shikibu, particularly its blending of prose and poetry, and the stream of consciousness and psychological analysis. In this aspect the Kagerō Diary seems to anticipate the Genji more so than the other tales that preceded it.

A second similarity that has been pointed out since the Kakaishō is with the Poetry Collection of Lady Ise　（伊勢集）. Lady Ise was an active poet in the late 9th century, and is the best represented female poet in the first three imperial poetry collections (see chapter 4 of Okada 1991). Her name is mentioned alongside Ki no Tsurayuki twice in the Genji -- a rare appearance of a named literary figure in the story. In the "Kiritsubo" chapter itself, the Emperor looks at paintings of the Song of Neverending Sorrow with poems from Lady Ise on it. The opening of the poetry collections reads as follows in the base text for the 伊勢集全釈:

寛平みかどの御時、大御息所ときこえける御つぼねに、大和に親ある人さぶらひけり。

In the court of the Kampyō Emperor [Uda, 887-897], a woman whose parents were from Yamato served in the chambers of the Great Haven [Fujiwara no Onshi].

However, the 全釈 notes that some other manuscripts read いづれの御時にかありけむ ("This was in a certain reign") instead of 寛平みかどの御時. The editors of the 全釈 (Sekine and Yamashita) suggest that this was the original form of the text, which later was altered to include the actual Emperor's name. Okada notes that other scholars have suggested the reverse, that this textual variant was made in imitation of the Genji's opening. As for why the time period is concealed, some pre-modern commentators suggested links to Chinese philosophical works or Buddhist thought. Motoori Norinaga said the following, which seems to mirror modern opinion:

This tale is all a constructed tale (作物語); it is like the "tales of old" (昔話) of today. This is why it says "Long ago, in a certain reign," and says these things happened. These words apply to the entire story. The Poetry Collection of Ise also conceals the emperor's name, and it is told in the style of a tale of old. The meaning is the same. The [older] commentaries have many useless theories.