Paper short abstract:

This paper aims to analyze the canonization, popularization and politicization process of Genji monogatari in order to proof that its status of classic has not been altered by the collateral literature – commentaries, digests, translations, and adaptations – it gave birth to throughout centuries.

Paper long abstract:

This paper aims to analyze how Genji monogatari (1008ca.) reached its status of “classic” and to demonstrate how the collateral literature born with its canonization and popularization did not affect the original text, which preserves its authority.

During the Heain period Genji was an essential model for waka poetry, and its fortune also lasted in medieval times, when court culture and samurai culture – generally considered poles apart – indissolubly linked themselves thanks to the works by Fujiwara no Koreyuki (Genji shaku, 1160ca.), Fujiwara no Toshinari (Roppyakuban uta awase, 1193), and Fujiwara no Teika (Okuiri, 1233), who led the text to the apex of its canonization. Later, with the introduction of quotations from Genji in renga, the text entered the popular culture in simplified form. However, despite the popularization process, the academic substratum was still influent, and it was used by the shogunate in order to legitimate its power: this is proved by the Kakaishō (1378-1394), commissioned to Yotsutsuji Yoshinari by the shogun Ashikaga Yoshiakira, and by the fact that samurai families attempted to identify themselves as descendants of the Fujiwara clan by practicing “aristocratic” arts. This is a parallel politicization process that culminated with the theorization of mono no aware by Motoori Norinaga: this aesthetical canon was exploited in modern times to support the birth of the nationalist ideology. It is the case of Tanizaki Jun’ichirō’s translations: not only they are bound to the concept of Japanesity, but they are also an example of alteration since some chapters were changed or totally excluded.

Even now, numerous adaptations on various media are being produced – manga, movies, drama – and they modify the source depending on cultural and social needs, but everything shares indelible connections with the original Genji, whose status of “classic” stays unchanged.