Chapter 15: The Wormwood Patch
This chapter cracked me up. I find Murasaki Shikibu's dry wit and sense of social satire very congenial, and this chapter was all dry wit, all the time. The over-the-top descriptions of the increasing decrepitude of the poor princess's estate reminded me of Cold Comfort Farm, until I started expecting someone to say, "Hello, Prince Hitachi's child."
It's the return of the red-nosed Safflower Princess. During Genji's exile, his financial support dries up and her home and garden quickly revert to overgrown messiness, then to the Heian equivalent of Skull Island:
Her gardens, never well tended, now offered ample cover for foxes and other sinister creatures, and owls hooted in unpruned groves morning and night. Tree spirits are shy of crowds, but when people go away they come forward as if claiming sovereignty. Frightening apparitions were numberless.
Foxes are mentioned a couple of times in this chapter. It seems as if the concept of the fox spirit is so well-known that one can just write "foxes" and have people know by context that you mean the sort that can turn into a person and wreak havoc on your life, as occurs in many folk tales and Kij Johnson's lovely Heian-era novel The Fox Woman.
Everyone urges the Safflower Princess to sell the estate, but it belonged to her father and she's sentimentally attached, and if she did sell, she's have to go live with relatives she doesn't like. This whole chapter struck me as having a lot of modern resonance, as that situation is one I'm familiar with from both real life and tons of English novels, but this bit in particular, with a single word substitution, could have appeared in a Georgette Heyer novel:
The furnishings were old but of the finest workmanship, exactly the sort that collectors like best. Word got out that this and that piece was by this and that master, and the collectors were sure that the impoverished Hitachi house would be an easy target.
Her brother, the monk, comes and visits but is basically useless. The servants' quarters is destroyed in a typhoon. Wormwood invades the garden like kudzu. The princess reads bad poetry for dubious comfort, all of which has depressingly apt titles like "The Bat" or "The Lady Recluse." The servants desert in droves. (The servants desert in droves all through the chapter, but no matter how many leave, there always seem to be droves left to flee the house.)
There was no one to clean and polish them, of course; but if the lady lived among mountains of dust it was elegant and orderly dust.
(I am quoting a lot because this chapter is filled with priceless lines like that, so it's hard to resist.)
The princess' aunt, who is an assistant viceroy's wife, keeps inviting her to come live with her, but they don't get along (and I think the princess doesn't want to be the poor relation in someone else's house), so she keeps refusing. The princess holds out hope that Genji, who has now returned to court, will save her. The aunt mocks this hope. Finally, the aunt departs, taking with her Jiju, the princess's old nurse's daughter who was (almost) her last remaining servant and companion. With that, the princess hits bottom.
As for her profile, only someone with more than ordinary affection for her could have borne to look at it. But I shall not go into the details. I am a charitable person, and would not wish for the world to seem malicious.
But lo! Genji has not forgotten her! Well, sort of not. He's on his way to perv on visit the lady of the orange blossoms, when he is struck by the sight of a gigantic rain forest the Safflower Princess' estate. He sends Koremitsu to see if anyone still lives there. I cannot improve upon the crack that Genji makes upon Koremitsu's return:
"You took your time," said Genji. "And what did you find? You must have had to cut away a great deal of underbrush to find anything."
Feeling sorry for the princess, Genji has Koremitsu beat down the weeds with a horsewhip (no, really) and fights his way inside. He goes through his flirty routine, not feeling it but trapped within the formula, and then... he feels some respect for the princess' stoicism in hardship... and suddenly she doesn't look that ugly after all. Later, Genji fixes up the place, and all the servants scurry back with indecent haste. Two years later, Genji moves her into his Mansion O' Love, and presumably everyone is happy. Except for...
Though no one has asked me to do so, I should like to describe the surprise of the assistant viceroy's wife at-this turn of events, and Jiju's pleasure and guilt. But it would be a bother and my head is aching; and perhaps -- these things do happen, they say -- something will someday remind me to continue the story.
It's the return of the red-nosed Safflower Princess. During Genji's exile, his financial support dries up and her home and garden quickly revert to overgrown messiness, then to the Heian equivalent of Skull Island:
Her gardens, never well tended, now offered ample cover for foxes and other sinister creatures, and owls hooted in unpruned groves morning and night. Tree spirits are shy of crowds, but when people go away they come forward as if claiming sovereignty. Frightening apparitions were numberless.
Foxes are mentioned a couple of times in this chapter. It seems as if the concept of the fox spirit is so well-known that one can just write "foxes" and have people know by context that you mean the sort that can turn into a person and wreak havoc on your life, as occurs in many folk tales and Kij Johnson's lovely Heian-era novel The Fox Woman.
Everyone urges the Safflower Princess to sell the estate, but it belonged to her father and she's sentimentally attached, and if she did sell, she's have to go live with relatives she doesn't like. This whole chapter struck me as having a lot of modern resonance, as that situation is one I'm familiar with from both real life and tons of English novels, but this bit in particular, with a single word substitution, could have appeared in a Georgette Heyer novel:
The furnishings were old but of the finest workmanship, exactly the sort that collectors like best. Word got out that this and that piece was by this and that master, and the collectors were sure that the impoverished Hitachi house would be an easy target.
Her brother, the monk, comes and visits but is basically useless. The servants' quarters is destroyed in a typhoon. Wormwood invades the garden like kudzu. The princess reads bad poetry for dubious comfort, all of which has depressingly apt titles like "The Bat" or "The Lady Recluse." The servants desert in droves. (The servants desert in droves all through the chapter, but no matter how many leave, there always seem to be droves left to flee the house.)
There was no one to clean and polish them, of course; but if the lady lived among mountains of dust it was elegant and orderly dust.
(I am quoting a lot because this chapter is filled with priceless lines like that, so it's hard to resist.)
The princess' aunt, who is an assistant viceroy's wife, keeps inviting her to come live with her, but they don't get along (and I think the princess doesn't want to be the poor relation in someone else's house), so she keeps refusing. The princess holds out hope that Genji, who has now returned to court, will save her. The aunt mocks this hope. Finally, the aunt departs, taking with her Jiju, the princess's old nurse's daughter who was (almost) her last remaining servant and companion. With that, the princess hits bottom.
As for her profile, only someone with more than ordinary affection for her could have borne to look at it. But I shall not go into the details. I am a charitable person, and would not wish for the world to seem malicious.
But lo! Genji has not forgotten her! Well, sort of not. He's on his way to perv on visit the lady of the orange blossoms, when he is struck by the sight of a gigantic rain forest the Safflower Princess' estate. He sends Koremitsu to see if anyone still lives there. I cannot improve upon the crack that Genji makes upon Koremitsu's return:
"You took your time," said Genji. "And what did you find? You must have had to cut away a great deal of underbrush to find anything."
Feeling sorry for the princess, Genji has Koremitsu beat down the weeds with a horsewhip (no, really) and fights his way inside. He goes through his flirty routine, not feeling it but trapped within the formula, and then... he feels some respect for the princess' stoicism in hardship... and suddenly she doesn't look that ugly after all. Later, Genji fixes up the place, and all the servants scurry back with indecent haste. Two years later, Genji moves her into his Mansion O' Love, and presumably everyone is happy. Except for...
Though no one has asked me to do so, I should like to describe the surprise of the assistant viceroy's wife at-this turn of events, and Jiju's pleasure and guilt. But it would be a bother and my head is aching; and perhaps -- these things do happen, they say -- something will someday remind me to continue the story.